SOLON ROBINSON, 1849 209 



Such was the story, and it interested me very much, 

 and I hope it will all the boys who read it. If the snake 

 had been there to catch the toad, and the owl to catch the 

 snake, and the boy to catch the owl, how truly natural 

 dispositions would have been illustrated. 



Here is another curious fact related by the Judge. 

 "When I first came to New Orleans," said he, "the old 

 Carondelet Canal was the only means of communication 

 with the lake. Upon this, as well as upon the bayou St. 

 John, into which the canal opened, was a great mass of 

 some kind of water plant, a sort of vine, that so covered 

 the water and clung to the bows of vessels as seriously to 

 impede navigation. 



"Some time afterwards, there came a Yankee to New 

 Orleans, (I don't mean to say only one — their name is 

 legion,) and he brought with him another 'water plant,* 

 whether on speculation, or not, I don't know. But this 

 was not a vine. It more nearly resembled a house leek 

 than anything else. I forget what he called it. Well, he 

 put it to grow in a water cask, and it multiplied and 

 spread all over the top, and then it broke off in pieces and 

 floated over and down the ditches and finally into the 

 canal. The Frenchmen found and saved the Yankee in- 

 novation, but on it went spreading, in spite of curses, and 

 in a few years it was all over the canal and down the 

 bayou. In the meantime, where was the old pest of the 

 canal ? Gone entirely. The Yankee innovator had rooted 

 the old habitant out, and grew there in its stead. Nobody 

 cared for this ; it was not in the way, and it made a very 

 good shade for alligators and catfish. 



"After a time, I was walking along the canal, and be- 

 hold, the Yankee water plant was not there. When, why, 

 or how it had gone, none could tell, but it was gone." 



Back of the city, along the old ridge road, (land that is 

 not absolutely under water,) there are some extensive 

 commons. While passing down the Ponchartrain Rail- 

 road, the Judge called my attention to this, and then said : 

 "a few years ago, this land was all covered with a per- 



