132 VIEW OF CITY. [CHAP. XXVIII. 



bound for St. Louis, and we were informed that she 

 would convey us to that city, a distance of 1100 

 miles in five days, against the current, for eighteen 

 dollars, or 4/., board included. 



We next went, for the sake of obtaining a general 

 view of the city and its environs, to the top of the 

 cupola of the St. Charles Hotel, the most conspi 

 cuous building in New Orleans, finished in 1836, 

 the lofty dome of which is of a beautiful form. 

 Within the memory of persons now living, there 

 were to be seen on the site of this massive edifice, 

 ducks and other water birds, swimming about in 

 pools of water, in a morass. The architect began 

 the foundation by placing horizontally on the mud 

 a layer of broad planks 21 inches thick, in spite of 

 which, the heavy building has sunk slightly in some 

 places, but apparently without sustaining material 

 injury. 



If a traveller has expected, on first obtaining an 

 extensive view of the environs of this city, to see an 

 unsightly swamp, with scarcely any objects to relieve 

 the monotony of the flat plain save the winding river 

 and a few lakes, he will be agreeably disappointed. 

 He will admire many a villa and garden in the 

 suburbs, and in the uncultivated space beyond the 

 effect of uneven and undulating ground is produced 

 by the magnificent growth of cypress and other 

 swamp timber, which have converted what would 

 otherwise have formed the lowest points in the land 

 scape into the appearance of wooded eminences. 

 From the gallery of the cupola we saw the well- 

 proportioned, massive square tower of St. Patrick s 



