IX APPENDIX. * 



portion are large and very abundant, indicating mainly a soil not 

 often inundated. But the cypress trees of vast height and mag- 

 nitude, and of unlimited demand, grow best in the lowest swamps, 

 and do greatly redeem and render equally valuable (as cdltivated 

 land) the most impracticable portions of the whole valley. Fifty 

 thousand feet of lumber, clear stuff, from an acre of cypress swamp, 

 is no unusual product. 



" Freedom from the extremes of heat and cold forms a great 

 feature of this Delta ; and distinguishes it greatly above the allu- 

 vions of the Nile, the Ganges, the Amazon, and the Orinoco. 



" The annual mean temperature at New Orleans, Baton Rouge,. 

 Natchez, Vicksburg, Helena, Memphis, and Cairo, shows a regular 

 gradation from 69° to 50°. 



" So inviting is the temperature of this Delta, during the 

 largest portion of the year, from the northern limit of the cotton 

 region, southward ; and so promptly, uniformly, and abundantly 

 does the soil respond to the labors of the husbandman, that its hun- 

 dreds of winding streams were lined with settlers before the war, 

 even anterior to any certain protection, by levees, from frequent 

 inundation. It was common to say that a loss of two crops in 

 ten, by overflow, could be better borne than the half crops pro- 

 duced upon the uplands." 



(18) 



