We must now proceed, across the southern states, to the mouth of the Mississippi, for the purpose of tracing the course of that astonishing river, and describing the most important places in its vicinity.
Fourteen Day's Instruction.
UNITED STATES CONTINUED.
The River Mississippi.
The Mississippi has its source in about forty-six degrees thirty minutes of north latitude; and terminates in the Gulf of Mexico, at some distance below the town of New Orleans. Its length, in a direct line, exceeds one thousand seven hundred miles; and it falls into the sea, by many mouths, most of which, like those of the Nile, are too shallow to be navigable. For a considerable distance, its banks are low, marshy, and covered with reeds; and are annually overflowed, from the melting of the snows in the interior of the country. The inundation usually commences in March, and continues about three months; and the slime which it deposits on the adjacent lands, tends, in a very important degree, to fertilize the soil. This river is navigable to a great distance; but, at spring-tides, the navigation is difficult, on account of the strength of the currents, and the innumerable islands, shoals, and sand-banks, with which it is interspersed. Vessels of three hundred tons burden can ascend it as high as Natchez, four hundred miles from the sea; and those of lighter burden can pass upward, as far as the Falls of St. Anthony, in latitude forty-four degrees fifty minutes.
New Orleans, the capital of the state of Louisiana, is situated on the northern bank of the Mississippi, and is a place of great commercial importance. It was founded in the year 1717, and now contains near thirty thousand inhabitants. In 1787, it had eleven hundred houses; but, nine hundred of these having been consumed by fire, it has since been rebuilt on a regular plan, and a more enlarged scale. Most of the houses are constructed with wooden frames, raised about eight feet from the ground, and have galleries round them, and cellars under the floors: almost every house has a garden.
Louisiana having, till lately, been a French colony, the French language is still predominant at New Orleans. The appearance of the people too is French; and even the negroes, by their antics and ludicrous gestures, exhibit their previous connexion with that nation. Their general manners and habits are very relaxed. Though New Orleans is now a city belonging to the United States, the markets, shops, theatre, circus, and public ball-rooms, are open on Sundays, in the same manner as they are in the catholic countries of the old continent. Gambling-houses, too, are numerous; and the coffee-houses and the Exchange are occupied, from morning till night, by gamesters. The general stile of living is luxurious. The houses are elegantly furnished; and the ladies dress in an expensive manner.
Provisions are here of bad quality, and enormously dear. Hams and cheese, from England; potatoes, butter, and beef from Ireland, are common articles of import. The rents of houses, also, are very extravagant.
The country around New Orleans is level, rich, and healthy, and has many extensive sugar-plantations. And, for the space of five leagues below, and ten above the town, the river has been embanked, to defend the adjacent fields from those inundations of the Mississippi which take place every spring. The land, adjacent to the town, yields abundant crops of rice, Indian corn, and vegetables.