Cairo, Illinois, is the barometer of the river’s rise and fall, the gage at that point being used as the basis for estimates for the entire river below Cairo.  These estimates are made by computations which are so accurate that Vicksburg, Baton Rouge, and New Orleans know, days or even weeks in advance, when to expect high water, and within a few inches of the precise height the floods will reach.

Some years since, the United States engineer in charge of a river district embracing a part of Louisiana, notified the local levee boards that unusually high water might be expected on a certain date and that several hundred miles of levees would have to be “capped” in order to prevent overflow.  The local boards in turn notified the planters, in sections where capping was necessary.

One of the planters so notified was an old Cajun—­Cajun being a corruption of the word “Acadian,” denoting those persons of French descent driven from Acadia, in Canada, by the British many years ago.  This old man did not believe that the river would rise as high as predicted and was not disposed to cap his levee.

“But,” said the member of the local levee board, who interviewed him, “the United States engineer says you will have to put two twelve-inch planks, one above the other, on top of your levee, and back them with earth, or else the water will come over.”

At last the old fellow consented.

Presently the floods came.  The water mounted, mounted, mounted.  Soon it was halfway up the lower plank; then it rose to the upper one.  When it reached the middle of that plank the Cajun became alarmed and called upon the local levee board for help to raise the capping higher still.

“No,” said the local board member who had given him the original warning, “that will not be necessary.  I have just talked to the United States engineer.  He says the water will drop to-morrow.”

The old man was skeptical, however, and was not satisfied until the board member agreed that in case the flood failed to abate next day, as predicted, the board should do the extra capping.  This settled, a nail was driven into the upper plank to mark the water’s height.

Sure enough, on the following morning the river had dropped away from the nail, and thereafter it continued to fall.

After watching the decline for several days, the Cajun, very much puzzled, called on his friend, the local levee board member, to talk the matter over.

“Say,” he demanded, “what kinda man dis United States engineer is, anyhow?  Firs’ he tell when de water comes.  Den he tell jus’ how high she comes.  Den he tell jus’ when she’s agoin’ to fall.  What kinda man is dat, anyhow?  Is he been one Voodoo?”

* * * * *

The spirit of the people of Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana, who live, in flood time, in the precarious safety afforded by the levees, is characterized by the same optimistic fatalism that is to be found among the inhabitants of the slopes of Vesuvius in time of eruption.