In vain were these passengers landed at the nearest
accessible points. A new lot was always found to take the place of
those who had left, and for ten days the raft resembled a combination
of floating hotel, nursery, hospital, and farm-yard. The resources of
our raftmates were taxed to their utmost during this time to provide
for the manifold wants of their welcome but uninvited guests, while
Solon declared, "I hain't nebber done sich a sight er cooken durin' all
de days ob my life."
By the time the mouth of the Red River was reached, half of Concordia
Parish was flooded, and but for the forest trees rising from the water,
the boys would have thought themselves afloat on a vast inland sea.
The low bluffs on which the capital of Louisiana is seated, and beyond
which the cane lands extend in almost a dead level to the Gulf, were
occupied by the tents and rude shelters of hundreds of refugees from
the drowned districts. Here our raftmates began to entertain fears for
the safety of their friends at the Moss Bank plantation, which lay but
a day's journey farther down the river.
At Baton Rouge they cleared the raft of its living encumbrances, and
then pushed ahead. From this point to the Gulf the great river is
enclosed between massive levees, or embankments of earth, behind which
the level of the far-reaching cane-fields is much lower than the
surface of high-water.
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