132 On the Navigation of the Mississippi. 



" 1823, from Jan. 



1824, ditto 



1825, ditto 



1826, ditto 



" The amount for the present year will be much greater than 

 any of the above. The number of flat-boats and keels is be- 

 yond calculation. The number of steam-boats above the falls 

 I cannot say much about, except that one or two arrive at and 

 leave Louisville every day- Their passage from Cincinnati is 

 commonly 14 or 16 hours. The Tccumseh, a boat which runs 

 between this place and New Orleans, and which measures 210 

 tons, arrived here on the 10th instant, in 9 days 7 hours, from 

 port to port ; and the Philadelphia of 300 tons made the pass- 

 age in 9 days 91 hours, the computed distance being 1650 miles. 

 These are the quickest trips made. There are now in operation 

 on the waters west of the Alleghany mountains, 140 or 145 

 boats. We had last spring (1826), a very high freshet, which 

 came 4| feet deep in the counting-room. The rise was 57 feet 

 3 inches perpendicular." 



The whole of the steam-boats of which you have an account 

 did not perform voyages to New Orleans only, but to all points 

 on the Mississippi, and other rivers which fall into it. I am 

 certain, that since the above date, the number has increased, 

 but to what extent I cannot at present say. 



When steam-boats first plied between Shipping-port and 

 New Orleans, the cabin passage was 100 dollars, and 150 dol- 

 lars on the upward voyage. In 1829, I went down to Natchez 

 from Shipping-port for 25 dollars, and ascended from New 

 Orleans, on board the Philadelphia, in the beginning of Janu- 

 ary 1830, for 60 dollars, having taken two state-rooms for my 

 wife and myself. On that voyage we met with a trifling acci- 

 dent, which protracted it to 14 days; the computed distance 

 being, as mentioned above, 1650 miles, although the real dis- 

 tance is probably less. I do not i-emember to have spent a day 

 without meeting with a steam-boat, and some days we met seve- 

 ral. I might here be tempted to give you a description of one of 

 these steamers of the western waters, but the picture having 

 been often drawn by abler hands, I shall desist. 



