22 



landing 1 is in the midst of the woods, with no house or shelter of 

 any kind within three miles of it. A number of carriages are punc- 

 tually in attendance, at the arrival and departure of the boats, to 

 convey passengers to and from the town. The soil is composed oi 

 sand or a stiff yellowish clay, tinted with iron; and a short distance 

 from town the banks of the Bogne Felia are made up of layers of 

 this yellowish clay, and are from twenty to thirty feet high. This 

 kind of land is almost valueless, except for its timber, and for the 

 manufacture of bricks; and there are a considerable number of saw- 

 mills and brickyards on the Tchefuncta, the lumber and brick being 

 sent to New Orleans in sloops, which swarm in these waters and on 

 the lake. At one of the sawmills, we passed, the river bank was 

 composed of bogue iron ore in layers, which is one of the character- 

 istics of the orange sand formation. The short leafed pine, inter- 

 mixed with an occasional oak, forms the predominant growth of the 

 woods. The botanical specimens collected here were numerous, and 

 many of them interesting. 



GRAND ISLE. 



As it was impossible to reach the gulf coast in the Attakapas par- 

 ishes, I availed myself of the steamboat communication which places 

 New Orleans in direct connection with Grand Is e. I started on 

 Saturday morning at eight o'clock, in the Col. D. S. Cage, a small 

 steamboat drawing about eighteen inches water, from Harvey's 

 canal, which takes its beginning a short distance from the river in 

 the outskirts of the town of Algiers. It is six miles long, from thirty 

 to forty feet wide, and just deep enough for a light draught steam- 

 boat to travel from three to four miles an hour. The land on both 

 sides of the canal is wholly composed of willow, gum and cypress 

 swamps, and is not susceptible of cultivation. There are a few 

 settlements on the banks of the canal, consisting of a number of 

 miserable huts surrounded by a few acres of cleared land cultivated 

 in corn; fishing being the principal occupation of these "natives." 

 Bayou Barataria, which is the outlet of the canal, is a beautiful 

 little stream whose waters are of the deepest green, and it has some 

 fine sugar plantations on its banks. On this bayou, as well as on 

 the bayous and lakes with which it connects, there are miles of mar.-h 

 prairies with not a single tree, except perhaps some stray willow 



