IX. ON THE LOWER MISSISSIPPI. St. Louis [Saint Loo'-is]. rep'-tiles. plan-ta'-tions. al'-li-ga-tors. lev'-ee [lev'-y]. 1. BELOW the mouth of the Missouri, is St. Louis, the largest city upon the banks of the Mississippi. It is also one of the largest and best located places in the United States. Its position on the Mississippi enables it to send boats from its wharves, not only to every city and village along this river, but also to those on the Missouri. 2. But this is not all. Not far below St. Louis, is the mouth of the Ohio, which is also a tributary of the Mississippi. By this stream, boats can be sent to Cincinnati and Pittsburg, and other places on its banks. Thus, by these three great rivers, and the smaller ones flowing into them, St. Louis can easily trade with every part of the rich plain through which they flow. Be sides, like Cincinnati, railroads lead from this city in all directions. A long and handsome bridge, with railroad tracks as well as a carriage way, crosses the Mississippi here. 3. Below the mouth of the Ohio, the rich country through which the Mississippi flows begins to be covered with fields of cotton, instead of wheat and corn. In the spring, the young plant may be seen starting up from the seeds, in long lines across the fields. It grows rapidly, and puts forth branches like a little tree; and in summer it is covered with pretty pale-yellow flowers. Towards autumn, instead of flowers, there is a round fruit, looking somewhat like a walnut covered with its outside coat. When this fruit is ripe, it opens; and the long fibers of cotton, in which the seeds are wrapped, cover the plants like balls of snow. 4. Now hundreds of negro men and women may be seen in the fields, picking the cotton carefully from the pod with their fingers. This is very slow work; and, as the cotton balls are not all ripe at the same time, it lasts a long while. After the cotton is picked, it is dried, and the seeds are all taken out. This is done by a machine called a cotton gin, which works very rapidly. Finally, the snowy mass is packed in great bundles, or bales, and is ready to be sent to the cotton mills, to be made into cloth. 5. The country on each side of the lower Mississippi, for hundreds of miles from its mouth, is very low and flat. It is one great plain of black earth and sand, in which not even a single stone can be seen. The parts near the river are a little higher than the rest; and they are covered with great plantations of sugar cane, looking like fields of corn. Farther from the river, are immense marshes covered with canebrakes and tall trees. 6. Every year, in the spring and early summer, the streams overflow their banks; and these marshes become lakes, in which only the tops of the trees can be seen. Often villages would be washed away, plantations covered, and everything destroyed, were it not for walls, called levees, which are built on the banks of the river to make them higher, and prevent overflowing. Sometimes these levees are broken, and the lands behind them are covered with water, and many people are drowned. 7. This is a warm country, like the southern part of the Atlantic Plain. The marshes and streams are thronged with alligators, snakes, turtles, and other reptiles; and the air swarms with troublesome insects. 8. Towards the mouth of the Mississippi, with the sugar plantations all about it, is the great city of New Orleans. To this place the planters bring their sugar and molasses, to be put upon steamboats or sailing vessels, and sent to parts of the country where sugar cane is not raised. Boats and cars come here, too, loaded with cotton from the plantations farther up the river. This, also, is sent to other parts of our own country, or across the ocean to distant countries, where it is used to supply the mills. Thus you see that this, too, is a very active city. It is also a curious old town. You will like to learn more about it when older. 9. We have now traveled all the way from the source of the Mississippi to its mouth, about one hundred miles below New Orleans. This river is so very long, that should we start from its source in the spring, just after the snow is gone, and travel twenty miles every day, it would be nearly fall before we should arrive at its mouth. There are but very few rivers in the whole world longer than the Mississippi. The part of the sea into which it flows, lies upon the south side of the United States, and is called the Gulf of Mexico. 10. Ships from other countries cross the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico, and go up the Mississippi to New Orleans. There they unload their cargoes. Some of the goods are used in the city; and some are put on steamboats, and sent up the river to other places. These steamboats return to New Orleans, loaded with lumber, wheat, corn, tobacco, cotton, and other things, which are to be shipped to countries across the ocean. 11. Thus, you see, the rivers help to make a pathway, not only between different parts of our country, but also to other countries beyond the ocean. This it is which makes large rivers so important. X.-AT THE MOUTH OF THE HUDSON. Hud'-son. In'-di-an. an'-chor [an'-ker]. 1. THERE is, in the northern part of the United States, another river, which, though it is only about half as long as the part of the Mississippi above the Falls of St. Anthony, yet is nearly as important as the Mississippi itself. It is the Hudson. It is the Hudson. It flows from north to south through the eastern part of the State of New York. At its mouth is NEW YORK, the largest city in America. 2. Boats come down the Hudson to New York, bringing loads of wheat and corn from the great grainfields on the prairies, loads of lumber from the forests near the sources of the Mississippi, and many other products coming from the west by the great lakes on the north |