undertaken. The only remedy is to diminish the number of the parties interested; and for that purpose, your committee are of opinion that Congress ought to adopt measures to dispose of its portion of these lands with as little delay as a just regard to the public interests will permit." [Senate document No. 408, pages 23 and 24, 1st session 29th Congress.]

The practicability of the proposed work is almost self-evident. Vast as it is in extent, and even more vast in importance, the materials for its construction are at hand. They are in the very foundations on which it is to rest, and along the whole line of its extent; while the capital and labor to be engaged in its execution anxiously await the opportunity. for investment. That it is entirely practicable, there is concurrent testimony of the highest character, furnished alike in the opinions of intelligent practical men who have given much attention to the subject, and in the actual existence of works of a similar character, successfully accomplished and kept up under circumstances of far greater difficulty and discouragement. Holland is a country which has almost entirely been reclaimed from the sea and the floods. Her past and present condition afford, in contrast, a complete demonstration in point. From uninhabitable marshes and bogs, liable to constant inundation, she has been converted into the very garden of Europe; even now, lying as she does much below the level of the waters on her margin, secure within her embankments. North Carolina has reclaimed from her swamps many valuable tracts of land. Even if other proof were wanting, what instances a stronger kind or more interesting character, though limited in extent, yet directly in point, could be desired than the embankments raised by individual planters themselves, which, in some degree and during some seasons, protect their fields from overflow? Indeed, what is the proposed work but these very embankments on an extended scale—their extension so as to embrace the whole line of our overflowing rivers, and secure all our lands from overflow?

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The utility of the work of reclaiming these lands needs but few words to impress its conviction upon every intelligent mind, and fewer still are. required to show that this utility, and the practicability of its attainment, are increased in the ratio of the extent of the work. They are demonstrated by the success of works identical in character and purpose in the State of Louisiana. What was the condition of the best lands in that State the coast," as it is called-prior to the extensive and systematic construction of her levees? What would that condition have been with only a few miles of levee, made here and there by an occasional planter? Uninhabitable swamps, pestilential marshes; profitless to the visionary speculator who undertook their cultivation, and scarcely less fatal as a dwelling place than the Roman Campagna to the unfortunates who were doomed, or the misguided who ventured to reside within their midst or near them. What are they now? It is but truth to say that a more valuable tract of country, a more fertile soil, or a more lovely and attractive scene of agricultural prosperity is not to be found upon our broad continent than is presented by these once pestilential marshes, but now smiling fields! Secure within their embankments, they bid defiance even to the great "Father of Waters;" and say to his mighty tide, as it rolls in tributary majesty along their shores, "thus far shalt thou come, and no farther!" It may not be inappropriate to add in this place, that, with

other improvements, the healthfulness of the country, embraced and influenced by these reclaimed lands, has been fully commensurate with its rapid and valuable development of all the other elements of agricultural and social advancement, Reason, observation, and the highest scientific authority, warrant the assertion that the reclaimed lands in question comprise the most healthful region of the whole southwestern country. That such would be the happy effects of a similar work upon the inundated lands of the other States, there can exist no doubt.

One other consideration of utility may be added here. It is one not generally adverted to; yet it is deemed of peculiar, of great, perhaps of paramount importance. It is the improvement of the navigation of the rivers upon whose banks the proposed levees shall be made. It is believed that the advantages to be gained by this alone would be greater than all that has heretofore or can hereafter be accomplished by government appropriations, by all other means for the same purpose. In this connexion, let it be considered that the quantity of overflowed and drowned lands on the Mississippi and its tributaries, exclusive of that in Kentucky and Tennessee, is estimated at 33,000,000 of acres. This is an immense evaporating surface. In shallow basins such as these present, the water stands at a high temperature, and evaporation, therefore, goes on much more rapidly than in the running stream. The quantity of water thus taken up by the air from 33,000,000 of acres, added to the quantity absorbed by the earth through a surface so immense, can scarcely be less than the quantity discharged by the river itself into the ocean. What, then, would be the effect of confining these waters within the banks of the river? Is it not obvious that it would make the current both stronger and deeper?-stronger to keep up the discharge, and deeper to contain the increased column.

This view is sustained, likewise, by the results of the grand experiment referred to, which has already been made upon the very river in question. The effect here anticipated from the operation of the natural laws has actually been produced by similar works already constructed. The memorial of the Memphis convention of 1845, before alluded to, presents facts in this connexion which are conclusive. That memorial

says:

"The expenditures on the Mississippi thus far, if reports are to be credited, have produced no results corresponding to the vast amounts appropriated. Where the channel has been straightened at one point, it has been lengthened at another, and obstructions or deposites in one bend have only been transferred in their removal to another.

The only fact clearly established-and it is one to which attention should be particularly directed, as bearing, with peculiar influence, on the proposition submitted-is, that where the banks of the Mississippi have been leveed, and prevented from inundating the swamps, the spring rises are scarcely perceptible, and the surplus waters are discharged by deepening the bed; its currents no longer able to rise and expand over a wider surface, they have to deepen the bed to furnish vent for the waters to be discharged. This is particularly the characteristic of the river below Natchez, the highest point of continued embankments. The river from thence to its mouth is comparatively uninterrupted, and presents few or no sand bars obstructing its navigation. Opposite New Orleans its depth is very great; and as the city authorities encroach on the river, it either

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depens its bed or cuts from the opposite shore. The reclaiming, therefore, the wamps, and confining the river to its bed, will deepen it, and do more o preserve unimpaired the navigation of the Mississippi than all the projects which have hitherto been devised or acted on for its improveThe swamps of the Mississippi, now worthless, and made so by the inundations of that river, may be made, by their own reclamation, the instruments of improving the navigation of that stream.' [Senate document No. 410, p. 38, June 26, 1846, 1st session 29th Congress.]

By preventing these overflows, therefore, there is good and sufficient reason to believe, upon philosophical principles, confirmed by experiment, that the channel of the rivers would be deepened-that snags would be rooted up and carried off-that sand bars would be cut away where they existed, and their future formation prevented, and, as most beneficial consequences, that pilotage would be made more certain, navigation more sure, commerce more safe, shipwreck and disaster more rare.

The points of view in which this subject is to be regarded, and upon which the action of the government should be determined, are, 1st, the extent and importance of the interests involved in the evil complained of, and the remedy proposed; 2d, the authority of the government to apply the remedy; 3d, the practicability of the proposed work; 4th, the utility of the work if accomplished; 5th, the duty of the government in the premises.

To some extent, each of these points has been presented in the foregoing pages; and although this has been done cursorily, and more in the form of a suggestive outline than of discussion in detail, it is believed that enough has been said upon each to determine it in favor of the object of the proposed bill; that is, that the interests involved, alike public and private, are of vast extent, and of national importance; that the authority and duty of the government to provide for those interests in the way proposed are clear and unquestionable; that the practicability of the work is suggested by reason, and demonstrated by experience; and that its utility is so certain, and so comprehensive, as to command the ready assent and insure the zealous co-operation of every one who has the welfare of his country at heart, or the means of its promotion in his power.

Upon one consideration presented in the outset, it is well to insist. It results from all the facts connected with the subject, and must be conclusive against all the objections that a prudent regard for economy in the administration of the public property could suggest the only objections which can claim to be even plausible. It is in the fact that the lands which this bill proposes to grant are entirely and utterly valueless to the government, and must remain so while unreclaimed, to say no more of the additional facts that the influences of these lands, in their present condition, are positively, seriously, and in extent incalculably injurious to the other property of the government, and to the property and health of a numerous and valuable population.

Even if precedent were required to assert and enforce the views herein set forth as to the authority, policy, and duty of the government to grant such lands as these to a State, for the purpose of their reclamation by the State, one is at hand, and directly in point. It is "An act to aid the State

of Louisiana in draining the swamp lands therein;" passed by Congress at its last session, and approved March 2, 1849.

In view of all the foregoing, the committee, approving the principle and purpose of the bill referred to them, have modified its terms so as to make it conform not only in principle and substance, (as it did at first,) but likewise, as far as applicable, in the phraseology, to the act for Louisiana just recited; and in that form recommend its passage.