This was the most terrible inundation, perhaps, ever
experienced in that region; and every one appeared to be now satisfied
that to continue to cultivate lands already reduced to man's dominion,
or to open and prepare any more, subject to this scourge, was madness.
Hence the emigration from this chosen section to the new El Dorado.
Lands rose rapidly in South Louisiana as an effect of this, while
above, in the flooded district, they were to be bought for almost a
nominal price. Those who ventured to purchase these and reduce them to
cultivation realized fortunes rapidly; for there was not a sufficient
flood to reach them again for ten years. The levees by this time had
become so extended as to afford almost entire immunity against the
floods of annual occurrence. The culture of sugar received a new
impetus and began rapidly to increase, and capital came flowing in.
Population of an industrious and hardy character was filling up the
West, and the demand from that quarter alone was equal to the
production, and both were increasing so rapidly as to induce the belief
that it would be as much as all the sugar lands in the State could
accomplish to supply this demand.
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