III.
South-West Pass, Balize, April 1, 1839.
The steamer Tacon brought me down from Matanzas to Havana. The renowned Ravels were drawing immense houses at the Tacon theatre. I took the railway for Guines, a small town, towards the south side of the island, much resorted to by invalids. We made many excursions on horseback, visiting different cafetals and sugar plantations, passing through orange groves, the eye resting upon acres of pineapples. I attended high mass at the Cathedral in Havana, where rest the ashes of Columbus, which are said to have been brought from St. Domingo. Our passengers returning to the States have converted our brig into a sort of Noah’s ark; it has twenty poodle dogs, quantities of pigeons, doves, Guinea pigs, game cocks, etc., and about ninety thousand oranges on deck. No steamer offering, we were obliged to take this brig. We should have made the passage in five days, but a norther came on within twelve hours’ sail of the Balize, and we were among the Chandeleur Islands at one time without a chronometer, and the officers could not tell our course. The first appearance of two rival tug-boats, the Lion and Mohican, in the distance, running for us, was a grateful sight. We are now rapidly ascending the river, whose water is charged with alluvial deposit, and is very muddy. The low banks, covered with grass and cane-brakes, arrest the floating logs from the undermined forests of the upper rivers, brought down by the freshets; alligators are seen crawling upon them, and basking in the sun’s rays. Further up, we come in sight of sugar plantations, with the whitewashed huts of the negroes. The appearance of a high-pressure steamer, with hurricane deck, is very striking at first sight; and the eternal puff of the escaping steam, may be heard distinctly for miles. Towing on the Mississippi, against a current six miles per hour, requires enormous power. The shipping at New Orleans is immense, extending for six miles along the Levee, which is of a semicircular form, and gives New Orleans the name of the Crescent City. The cotton warehouses and presses are of gigantic size, to meet the demands of the trade. Many of the public buildings are substantial, and in good architectural taste. The St. Charles and St. Louis hotels are of a superior order, and are among the largest in the United States. The exhibition of merchandize on the levees, consisting of cotton, sugar, molasses, tobacco, lard, flour, grain, and all the products of the Western and Southern states bordering on the rivers, is immense, and connecting here from a hundred steamers with a fleet of shipping for most of the ports in the world, gives a faint idea of the trade of this commercial city.
A drive over the shell road, along the banks of the canal, to the Lake House, and the return by rail from Lake Pontchartrain—a peep at the French opera in the second municipality—a drive to Carrolton, the new and upper portion of the city—a walk over the battle-field below the city, where General Jackson defeated the British—will suffice for this visit, as I return again. I now take the steamer for the new Republic of Texas!