CHAPTER XLVII
THE BAFFLING MISSISSIPPI
As inevitably as water flows down the hills of Vicksburg to the river, the visitor's thoughts flow down always to the great spectacular, historic, mischievous, dominating stream.
Mark Twain, in that glorious book, "Life on the Mississippi," declared, in speaking of the eternal problems of the Mississippi, that as there are not enough citizens of Louisiana to take care of all the theories about the river at the rate of one theory per individual, each citizen has two theories. That is the case to-day as it was when Mark Twain was a pilot. I have heard half a dozen prominent men, some of them engineers, state their views as to what should be done. Each view seemed sound, yet all were at variance.
Consider, for example, that part of the river lying between Vicksburg and the mouth. Here, quite aside from the problem as to the hands in which river-control work should be vested--a very great problem in itself--three separate and distinct physical problems are presented.
From Vicksburg to Red River Landing there are swift currents which deposit silt only at the edge of the bank, or on sand bars. From Red River Landing to New Orleans the problem is different; here the channel is much improved, and slow currents at the sides of the river, between the natural river bank and the levee, deposit silt in the old "borrow pits"--pits from which the earth was dug for the building of the levees--filling them up, whereas, farther up the river, the borrow pits, instead of filling up, are likely to scour, undermining the levee. From New Orleans to the head of the Passes--these being the three main channels by which the river empties into the Gulf--the banks between the natural river bed and the levees build up with silt much more rapidly than at any other point on the entire stream; here there are no sand bars, and the banks cave very little. In this part of the river it is not current, but wind, which forms the great problem, for the winds are terrific at certain times of year, and when they blow violently against the current, waves are formed which wash out the levees.
This is the barest outline of three chief physical problems with which river engineers must contend. There are countless others which have to be met in various ways. In some places the water seeps through, under the levee, and bubbles up, like a spring, from the ground outside. This, if allowed to continue, soon undermines the levee and causes a break. The method of fighting such a seepage is interesting. When the water begins to bubble up, a hollow tower of sand-filled sacks is built up about the place where it comes from the ground, and when this tower has raised the level of the water within it to that of the river, the pressure is of course removed, on the siphon principle.
As river-control work is at present handled, there is no centralization of authority, and friction, waste, and politics consequently play a large part.
Consider, for example, the situation in the State of Louisiana. Here control is, broadly speaking, in the hands of three separate bodies: (1) the United States army engineer, who disburses the money appropriated by Congress for levees and bank revetment, working under direction of the Mississippi River Commission; (2) the State Board of Engineers, which disburses Louisiana State funds wherever it sees fit, and which, incidentally, does not use, in its work, the same specifications as are used by the Government; and (3) the local levee boards, of which there are eight in Louisiana, one to each river parish--a parish being what is elsewhere called a county. Each of these eight boards has authority as to where parish money shall be spent within its district, and it may be added that this last group (considering the eight boards as a unit) has the largest sum to spend on river work.
The result of this division of authority creates chaos, and has built up a situation infinitely worse than was faced by General Goethals when Congress attempted to divide control in the building of the Panama Canal. It will be remembered that, in that case, a commission was appointed, but that Roosevelt circumvented Congress by making General Goethals head of the commission with full powers.
While the canal was in course of construction, General Goethals appeared before the Senate Committee on Commerce. When asked what he knew of levee building and work on the Mississippi, he replied:
"I don't know a single, solitary thing about the work on the Mississippi except that it is being carried on under the annual appropriation system. If we had that system to hamper us, the Panama Canal would not be completed on time and within the estimate, as it will be. That system leaves engineers in uncertainty as to how much they may plan to do in the year ahead of them. Big works cannot be completed economically, either as to time or money, unless the man who is making the plan can proceed upon the theory that the money will be forthcoming as fast as he can economically spend it."
In view of the foregoing, I cannot myself claim to be free from river theory. It seems to me clear that the Mississippi should be under exclusive Federal control from source to mouth; that the various commissions should be abolished, and that the whole matter should be in the hands of the chief of United States Engineers, who would have ample funds with which to carry on work of a permanent character.
As one among countless items pointing to the need of Federal control, consider the case of the Tensas Levee Board, one of the eight local boards in Louisiana. This board does not build any levees whatsoever in the State of Louisiana, but does all its work with Louisiana money, in the State of Arkansas, where it has constructed, and maintains, eighty-two miles of levees, protecting the northeastern corner of Louisiana from floods which would originate in Arkansas. These same levees, however, also protect large tracts of land in Arkansas, for which protection the inhabitants of Arkansas do not pay one cent, knowing that their Louisiana neighbors are forced, for their own safety, to do the work.
Cairo, Illinois, is the barometer of the river's rise and fall, the gage at that point being used as the basis for estimates for the entire river below Cairo. These estimates are made by computations which are so accurate that Vicksburg, Baton Rouge, and New Orleans know, days or even weeks in advance, when to expect high water, and within a few inches of the precise height the floods will reach.
Some years since, the United States engineer in charge of a river district embracing a part of Louisiana, notified the local levee boards that unusually high water might be expected on a certain date and that several hundred miles of levees would have to be "capped" in order to prevent overflow. The local boards in turn notified the planters, in sections where capping was necessary.
One of the planters so notified was an old Cajun--Cajun being a corruption of the word "Acadian," denoting those persons of French descent driven from Acadia, in Canada, by the British many years ago. This old man did not believe that the river would rise as high as predicted and was not disposed to cap his levee.
"But," said the member of the local levee board, who interviewed him, "the United States engineer says you will have to put two twelve-inch planks, one above the other, on top of your levee, and back them with earth, or else the water will come over."
At last the old fellow consented.
Presently the floods came. The water mounted, mounted, mounted. Soon it was halfway up the lower plank; then it rose to the upper one. When it reached the middle of that plank the Cajun became alarmed and called upon the local levee board for help to raise the capping higher still.
"No," said the local board member who had given him the original warning, "that will not be necessary. I have just talked to the United States engineer. He says the water will drop to-morrow."
The old man was skeptical, however, and was not satisfied until the board member agreed that in case the flood failed to abate next day, as predicted, the board should do the extra capping. This settled, a nail was driven into the upper plank to mark the water's height.
Sure enough, on the following morning the river had dropped away from the nail, and thereafter it continued to fall.
After watching the decline for several days, the Cajun, very much puzzled, called on his friend, the local levee board member, to talk the matter over.
"Say," he demanded, "what kinda man dis United States engineer is, anyhow? Firs' he tell when de water comes. Den he tell jus' how high she comes. Den he tell jus' when she's agoin' to fall. What kinda man is dat, anyhow? Is he been one Voodoo?"
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The spirit of the people of Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana, who live, in flood time, in the precarious safety afforded by the levees, is characterized by the same optimistic fatalism that is to be found among the inhabitants of the slopes of Vesuvius in time of eruption.
One night, a good many years ago, I ascended Vesuvius at such a time, and I remember well a talk I had with a man who gave me wine and sausage in his house, far up on the mountain side, at about two o'clock that morning.
Seventeen streams of lava were already flowing down, and signs of imminent disaster were at hand.
"Aren't you afraid to stay here with your family?" I asked the man.
"No," he replied. "Three times I have seen it worse than this. I have lived here always, and"--with a good Italian smile--"it is evident, signore, that I am still alive."
Less than a week later I read in a newspaper that this man's house, which was known as Casa Bianca, together with his vineyards and his precious wine cellars, tunneled into the mountain side, had been obliterated by a stream of lava.
Precisely as he went about his affairs when destruction threatened, so do the planters along the Mississippi. But there is this difference: against Vesuvius no precaution can avail; whereas, in the case of a Mississippi flood, foresight may save life and property. For instance, many planters build mounds large enough to accommodate their barns, and all their live stock. Likewise, when floods are coming, they construct false floors in their houses, elevating their furniture above high-water mark, so that, if the whole house is not carried away, they may return to something less than utter ruin. It is the custom, also, to place ladders against trees, in the branches of which provisions are kept in time of danger, and to have skiffs, containing food and water, ready on the galleries of the houses.
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