chita: a memory of last island

by lafcadio hearn

"but nature whistled with all her winds, did as she pleased, and went her way"--emerson

to my friend Dr.Rodolfo Matas of new orleans

1

travelling south from new orleans to the islands. you pass through a strange land into a strange sea. by various winding waterways. you can journey to the gulf by lugger if you please. but the trip may be made much more rapidly and agreeably on some one of those light. narrow steamers. built especially for bayou-travel, which usually receive passengers at a point not far from the foot of old saint-louis street, hard by the suger-landing. where there is ever a pushing and flocking of steam craft--all striving for place to rest their white breasts against the levee. side by side,--like great weary swans. but the miniature steamboat on which you engage passage to the gulf never lingers long in the mississippi......