Opelousas prairie is still more extensive than Attakapas, being computed to contain nearly eight thousand square miles. It is divided by bayous, wooded grounds, points, and bends, and other natural boundaries, into a number of smaller prairies, which have separate names, and characteristics more or less distinctive. Taken in its whole extent, it is bounded by the Attakapas prairie on the east, pine woods and hill on the north, the Sabine on the west, and the Gulf of Mexico on the south. The soil though in many places extremely fertile, is generally less so than that of Attakapas. It has, however, a compensating advantage, being deemed the healthiest region in the State. It embraces several large cotton plantations, and a considerable region devoted to the cultivation of the sugar cane. The parish which bears its name is one of the most populous in Louisiana. It is the centre of the land of shepherds, the very Arcadia of those who deal in domestic animals. To that employment, the greater part of the inhabitants are devoted, and they number their flocks and herds by thousands. On one estate five thousand calves were branded in the spring of 1845.
The people of this district are distinguished for that quiet, easy, unostentatious hospitality, which assures the visitor of his welcome, and makes him so much at home, that he finds it difficult to realize that he is only a guest.
Bellevue prairie lies partly in Opelousas, and partly in Attakapas. Calcasieu and Sabine prairies are only parts of the great plain, those names being given to designate some of the varied forms and openings it assumes in its ample sweep from the Plaquemine to the Sabine. They are, however, though but parts of a larger prairie, of immense extent. The Sabine, seen from any point near its centre, seems, like the mid-ocean, boundless to the view. The Calcasieu is seventy miles long, by twenty wide. Though, for the most part, so level as to have the aspect of a perfect plain, the surface is slightly undulated, with such a general, though imperceptible declination towards the streams and bayous by which it is intersected, as easily to carry off the water, and prevent those unhealthy stagnations which are so fatal in this climate. There is also a gentle slope towards the Gulf, along the shore of which the vast plain terminates in low marshes often entirely covered with the sea. These marshes are overspread with a luxuriant growth of tall reedy cane grass.
One of the most striking and peculiar features of these prairies is found in the occasional patches of timbered land, with which their monotonous surface is diversified and relieved. They are like islands in the bosom of the ocean, but are for the most part so regular and symmetrical in their forms, that one is with difficulty convinced that they are not artificial, planted by the hand of man, in circles, squares, or triangles, for mere ornament. It is impossible for one who has not seen them, to conceive of the effect produced by them, rising like towers of various forms, but each regular in itself, from the midst of an ocean of grass. Wherever a bayou or a stream crosses the prairie, its course is marked with a fringe of timber, the effect of which upon the eye of the observer is exceedingly picturesque, making a background to the view in many instances, like lines of trees in landscape painting.
All the rivers, bayous, and lakes of this State abound with alligators. On Red River, before it was navigated by steamboats, it was not uncommon to see hundreds in a group along the banks, or covering the immense masses of floating and stranded timber, bellowing like angry bulls, and huddled so closely together, that the smaller ones were obliged to get upon the backs of the larger. At one period, great numbers were killed for their skins, which were made into leather for boots and shoes, but not proving sufficiently close grained to keep out the water, the experiment was abandoned. Alligators average from eight to twelve feet in length. Some have been caught, measuring twenty feet.
The fear is often entertained, and sometimes expressed, that the levees of the Mississippi are not sufficient to resist the great body of water that is continually bearing and wearing upon them; and these fears have, in several cases, been realized, though never to any very great extent. In May 1816 the river broke through, about nine miles above New Orleans, destroyed several plantations, and inundated the back part of the city to the depth of three or four feet. The crevasse was finally closed, by sinking a vessel in the breach, for the suggestion and accomplishment of which, the public was chiefly indebted to Governor Claiborne.
In June, 1844, the river rose higher than it had done for many years, marking its whole course, for more than two thousand miles, with wide spread destruction to property and life. It crept over the levee in some places near New Orleans, but caused no actual breach in that vicinity. At Bonnet Carre it forced a crevasse, doing considerable damage and causing great alarm in the neighborhood; but the mischief was not so serious as might have been anticipated, and the embankment has been so increased and strengthened, as to leave but little apprehension for the future.
The interests of Education in Louisiana, though hitherto too much neglected, are now decidedly and perceptibly advancing. In the higher departments, are the College of Louisiana, at Jackson, in East Feliciana; and Jefferson College in St. James parish, on the coast—the former incorporated in 1825, the later in 1831. Both have at various times, received generous donations from the treasury of the state. Franklin College, in Opelousas was also incorporated in 1831, under the same favorable auspices.[2]
There are also several Academies acting under the legal sanction of the State, although not endowed by it. The Ursuline Nuns' School and that of the Sisters of Charity—the latter in the parish of St. James, afford instruction in all the polite branches of female education. The Convent at Grand Coteau near Opelousas, has an average of about two hundred scholars; and efficient persons from France have the control and direction of their education.