39S 



river had ever been divided, so as to form a delta, at 

 any point between New-Orleans and Fort St. Philip, 

 that branches of it would not now exist at Plaquemine 

 bend, or Fort St. Philip, through Bayou Madrigas on 

 the east, and Bayou Liard on the west? Can any per- 

 son believe, that if the river had ever been divided at 

 this point, or at any other between it and the efflux of 

 the river, that it would not have produced the same or 

 similar effects, that it has at the different branches that 

 are now formed ; where, instead of a strip of land 

 twenty-five miles in length, with a mean breadth of 

 only six, the extreme points of land at the east and 

 west branches, which form the base of a triangle, the 

 apex of which is the point of the delta, are distant forty- 

 two miles ? I can scarce believe an answer necessary. 



Hence, when we find that the currents of the rivers 

 Po, the Indus, the Ganges, and particularly the Nile, 

 may be said to have disputed every foot of ground 

 with the deltas, and in which they have been driven 

 before them, as with the Nile, where the delta has re- 

 treated from Memphis to the distance of many leagues 

 below ; the conclusion is, that the present is the first 

 and only delta formed by the Mississippi river. 



This opinion, however novel and highly improbable 

 it may seem, will appear much less doubtful, when we 

 examine some of the prominent features peculiar to 

 this river, and on which many of the existing pheno- 

 mena of that region materially depend. 



The most important and only one, that I shall bring 

 into view in the present instance, is that of its current 



