MISSISSIPPI 



5452 



MISSISSIPPI SOUND 



HtarisfippL Map showing the river basin. Inset, the delta on the Gulf of Mexico 



lower river has been considerably 

 improved. These jetties, extending 



E. and W. of the S. Pass and 

 measuring 4 m., have enabled a 

 channel of 30 ft. to be obtained, 

 thus greatly adding to the import- 

 ance of New Orleans as a port. 



The river was first visited by a 

 European in the 16th century, but 

 nothing was known of it until 1673, 

 when two Jesuits, Louis Joliet and 

 Jacques Marquette, sailed down 

 it as far as the mouth of the Arkan- 

 sas. La Salle, in 1681-82, went 

 down as far as the river mouth. 

 At that time it flowed through soil 

 claimed by France, and French- 

 men made a number of settle- 

 ments on its banks. After the 

 treaty of 1763 its course was the 

 joint property of Great Britain and 

 France. Spain secured the rights 

 previously held by France, while 

 the U.S.A., by the treaty of 1783, 

 obtained the British ones ; there 

 was trouble between these two 

 countries about the navigation, 

 but this was ended when Louisiana 

 was purchased by the U.S.A. in 

 1803. In the 19th century the 

 U.S.A. conducted a thorough sur- 

 vey of the river and its tributaries. 

 See Bluff ; Louisiana ; River ; con- 

 sult also Discovery of the Missis- 

 sippi, J. G. Shea, 2nd ed. 1903; 

 The Opening of the Mississippi. 



F. A. Ogg, 1904. 

 Mississippi. State of the 



U.S.A. A south central state, it 

 has a coast-line of 85 m. on that 

 part of the Gulf of Mexico known 

 as Mississippi Sound. Its area is 

 46,865 sq. m., of which 500 are 

 water. The surface rarely exceeds 



800 ft. in height, and falls away S. 

 and W. to the rich alluvial lands of 

 the Mississippi and Yazoo valleys, 

 which are protected from floods 

 by levees. These are known as the 

 bottom lands, and of them there 

 are 7,000 sq. m. in the delta of the 

 Yazoo. The chief rivers are the 

 Mississippi, which bounds it on the 

 W., Pearl, Tombigbee, Yazoo, and 

 Pascagoula. The state includes a 

 number of islands. 



A great amount of cotton is 

 grown, and much maize. Other 

 cereals are cultivated, and cattle, 

 sheep, and pigs are reared ; the 

 sugar-cane is grown, and much land 

 is under fruit. A considerable area 

 is still forest, and produces a good 

 deal of timber. There are some 

 fisheries, but no great quantity of 

 minerals. Jackson ia the capital. 

 Of the population of 1,790,000 

 more than half are negroes. 



As part of Louisiana, Mississippi 

 was first settled by French colon- 

 ists, who made their homes in a 

 land hitherto inhabited solely by 

 Indian tribes. It passed to Eng- 

 land in 1763, but in 1783 was for- 

 mally ceded to Spain, that country 

 having taken possession of it in 

 1781. A dispute soon arose about 

 the boundary between the U.S.A. 

 and the soil of Spam, the result 

 being a treaty by which the future 

 state was included in the U.S.A. 

 The Spaniards vacated it in 1798, 

 when it was made a territory. 



In 1817 Mississippi was admitted 

 to the Union as a state. A consti- 

 tution was drawn up in that year, 

 but the existing one dates from 

 1890. The state legislature con- 



sists of a senate and a house of 

 representatives, both elected for 

 four years. The franchise is 

 theoretically a democratic one, but 

 there is an educational test de- 

 signed to secure that the whites 

 shall be dominant. The state 

 sends two senators and eight re- 

 presentatives to Congress. 



Mississippi an. In geology, a 

 group of limestone rocks which are 

 well developed in the Mississippi 

 Basin of the United States. A sub- 

 division of the carboniferous sys- 

 tem, their exact classification is 

 still unsettled by geologists. See 

 Carboniferous System. 



Mississippi Scheme. Finan- 

 cial enterprise devised with the 

 object of restoring the shaken credit 

 of France. In 1715, when Philip of 

 Orleans became regent, the finances 

 of France were in an appalling con- 

 dition ; national bankruptcy was 

 almost inevitable. It was then that 

 John Law persuaded Orleans to 

 approve his scheme and started a 

 bank in France. 



With this for a basis, Law ac- 

 quired the sole right to trade in the 

 vast region around the Mississippi 

 which he called Louisiana, and in 

 1717 he founded a company for 

 this purpose. Having turned his 

 bank into a national institution 

 with the guarantee of the state 

 behind its notes, Law planned a 

 much bigger concern. Two other 

 trading companies were amalga- 

 mated with his, and under him a 

 new Compagnie des Indes domi- 

 nated practically the whole of 

 France's foreign trade. With the 

 issuing of new capital for its ac- 

 tivities the gamble began. The 

 shares rose rapidly in value, while 

 the company purchased the right to 

 manage the mint and to farm much 

 of the national revenue. Finally 

 the national debt was taken over, 

 the lenders receiving shares in the 

 company to which the government 

 paid interest at three p.c. New 

 shares were issued at a large pre- 

 mium, and in 1719 were selling at 

 forty times their face value. 



Armed with absolute power, Law 

 took strong measures to avert a 

 collapse, but his edicts, fixing the 

 price of the shares, and in other 

 ways striving to perpetuate an 

 artificial state of affairs, failed 

 miserably of their purpose. By 

 July, 1720, the bubble had burst. 

 The government took back the 

 national debt, but speculators had 

 suffered enormous losses. See Law, 

 John. 



Mississippi Sound. Channel 

 between the coast of Alabama and 

 Mississippi states, U.S.A., and 

 several narrow islands which cut it 

 off from the Gulf of Mexico. About 

 70 m. long, with a mean breadth of 



