quickly , cheaply and securely. And for
a long while we are traveling through
the great forests of the Mississippi ;
larger trees , uor deeper aud blacker
woods , are uowhere to bo fouud ; agaiu
is the tuau Doro viudicated as a dreamer
of primeval American scenery. And
hero again conies a faint creeping of
awe , as the mind reverts to that cold
sliaf t of darkness swinging through the
airless places without ; the bigness , the
loneliness , the helplessness of it , and the
unavoidable certainty of it withal.
There are , apparently , not a great
many sufficiently eager to include a
total eclipse of the sun among their life-
experiences to undertake a journey to
the gulf-states for its sake. At any rate
the throng to New Orleans is not great.
This is perhnps due to the superior con
venience of Georgia aud Carolina
stations to the eastern cities , where the
people are understood to care more for
such things. But also there is , accord
ing to the statistics , a geater liability to
rain in New Orleans than in the interior
districts. Now Orleans , it is said , stands
sixty chances out of a hundred for a
clear day tomorrow , while som6 of the
other places may claim as high as
seventy-five. It is not pleasant to think
of rain coming after all ; but we have
done our part ; the event is with Allah.
If he wish his eclipse to be seen , let him
arrange. Meantime all w& can do is
( supposing our left leg to be crossed over
our right ) to place the right above the
left , and continue to wait.
New Orleans takes its good fortune
calmly , if not skeptically. A policeman
is heard to say , in response to a threat
of calamity , "I'll believe that , like I
will the eclipse , when I see it. " The
word eclipse , in common parlance in this
city , is accented on the first syllable.
The people about the hotels are aware
that something is expected to happen ,
but are by no means enthusiastic over
it. In ancient Jackson Square , at sun
down , assemble the old French people
and the new Italians , and sitting in their
accustomed places divert themselves
with the sight of Andrew Jackson
riding nobly ( just as in the old geogra
phies ) over the maxim , "The Union
must and shall be Preserved , " while
their children soil themselves upon the
grass-plots and the policeman expels
their dogs ; but their conversation does
not run upon celestial phenomena. They
are content with the hollyhocks and
petunias , the cornstalks and sunflowers ,
of the foliage beds of Jackson Square.
If any of them are solicitous for the
morrow's weather , it does not appear on
their surfaces.
The Great Father at Washington ,
however , has a thoughtful care for his
children , and he causes a notice to be
exposed in the hotels , to the effect that
"the presence of an anti-cyclonic system
gives practically sure indication that the
entire line of the eel ipse will have clear
weather. Probably no eclipse ever
occurred under finer seeing conditions
than will exist tomorrow. ' ' And having
this comforting assurance , one can done
no better than to go to bed , for things
will happen early and swiftly on the
morrow.
For the plain statement of things
one's self has observed , the first person
singular is the most practicable vehicle.
I issued , then , upon the streets of New
Orleans at 5:30 : o'clock on the morning
of the 28th of May. It was too early to
judge of the day , but thus far the east
was covered with clouds. I took up my
march to the northward. I knew that
the primitive inhabitants dwelt in that
quarter , and it was my wish to be as far
removed as possible from the enlightened
observer , with his note book full of
data and his instruments of precision. I
wished also to escape from the scientific
frame of mind , and to view this phe
nomenon , above all others , as mere bare
man , for I was thinking on the one hand
of the many times our cave-dwelling
forefathers had been sent howling by its
occurrence , and on the other how the
tip of this same pencil of shadow will
continue to sweep at regular intervals
over the face of this , our planet , when
mankind shall have perished from off it ,
and no animate eye shall remain to
regard darkness nor light. I wished to
see whether I could call up something
of the terror of my remote skin-clad
ancestors at this ancient spectacle , if
removed from the contamination of
tourists' adjectives. I even had hopes
that what the Times-Democrat's eclipse
reporter called total totality might come
upon me in some favored spot where
white-haired Africans should beat drums
and do dances of sorcery. This I have
since been assured by natives was a
foolish hope.
There was time to spare , and so I
walked about while the auti-cyclonic
system was preparing the stage-setting.
As the sun mounted higher , red and
dim , behind the curdled clouds in the
east , I went up'and down in the old
French Market and saw the creole
housekeepers that we have read about
buying their day's supplies , their red-
snappers , their crawfishes , their gumbo.
Then about 7 o'clock the stream of
people who had work to do became so
strong that I , who had none , was borne
aside ; so I sat upon a bench by the way
side , where a tiny stream of New
Orleans sewage flowed by the curb
between me and the clanging street
cars.
cars.New Orleans gutters are not wholly
sweet , and they breed flies that are very
hostile. So when the eclipse ( which by
this time was under way ) was far
enough advanced so that people began
to come out and take observations
through smoked glasses , I was glad to
arise and strike into the unexplored
interior.
Everybody has seen partial eclipses of
the sun ; at least they occur often
enough. Up to a certain point this one
was in no wise different from those
rather tame transactions. As I zigzagged
about , in search of darkest Africa ,
among streets with such names as Hos
pital and Barracks , and others called
Bourbon , Oouti and so on , I saw only
many children playing , an occasional
pedestrian keeping a watchful eye on
the heavens , and now and then a grocer's
clerk smoking a scrap of glass at his
side-door with a burning wisp of paper.
But when that certain point was passed
there was quite a new order of things.
The first show-piece that claimed my
attention was some singular shadows on
the sidewalk under the branches of a
tree. The shadows did not accurately
represent the form of the objects which
cast them. They consisted of short
curves , six to eight inches I should say
in length , composed of alternate bright
and dark bands , and seemed to move
with a crawling motion from Ithe sun.
I stopped to watch them , for it was a
rather uncanny thing to see , and like
nothing known to me hitherto ; then I
perceived that they were probably the
shadow-bands I had heard of. A short
distance further on I saw them again ,
under an iron trellis.
My recollections of the happenings of
the next few minutes are not sharply
defined. They do not seem wholly real
to me now , nor did they at the time. I
became aware that the daylight had
greatly failed. The air became thick ,
murky , brown , indescribably oppressive.
There are sundry adjectives in Italian ,
used by a certain poet in describing the
atmosphere of hell , that I should like to
use in connection with it. I walked
with hesitation , in a kind of nervous
dread of stumbling or being run into ;
whether because of the deficient light or
from a feeling of something unnatural
taking place , I cannot say. Then , from
some impulse that seems odd to mo now ,
I stepped into the Treme Market , which
I found at hand , and walked half-way
through it. But there I was in a kind
of nightmare ; people were buying and
selling , but I was almost feeling my way
with my hands. At the first side-door
I escaped from the obscurity of that
place into the yellow light without
again ; and it was well for me that I did ,
for I had scarce reached the first street
corner when I felt that the darkness
was coming upon me.
I had been keeping track of the
progress of the eclipse with occasional
side glances at the sun , which left little
blue images of its gradually shrinking
disk impressed upon the retina. And so
wholly was I unprepared for the total
phase when it came , as that I had
believed fully a quarter of the sun to be
yet uncovered. And whether it was a
feeling of sudden chill , or the rush of
the approaching shadow , or whatever it
was , I am quite sure that I felt the