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out of the range of the Vicksburg batteries, and perhaps change the main channel of the mighty river so as to leave Vicksburg on a bayou two or three miles back from that channel. Here our men were debarked, and work on the canal recommenced; while Grant's corps was brought down on transports to their aid, and Porter's fleet strengthened by several additional iron-clads and gunboats. Gen. Grant arrived and assumed chief command Feb. 2d. Williams's engineers had located their embryo canal unwisely. At its head, a strong eddy set the current away from the bank, rendering difficult the coaxing of a large body of water into it if it were completed; while its lower terminus was commanded by the batteries of Vicksburg-a serious drawback upon its prospective usefulness. Still, it was judged expedient to complete this, rather than commence a new one; and the river was rising so fast, under the stimulus of incessant rains (which by no means increased the attractiveness to our soldiers of digging up the mire and tough clay), that it was confidently expected soon. to obliterate all traces of our engineering blunders. As there was daily increasing peril that it would drown out our camps, compelling our men to rëembark, the excavated earth was all thrown up on the west side, forming an embankment in front of our camps, between them and Vicksburg. Thus the work was proceeding vigorously and hopefully, when" the swelling flood of the Mississippi -now eight feet above the bottom of the canal-broke over the precautionary dam erected across its head,

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and at once poured in a flood which filled the embryo internal improvement in a few minutes, burying myriads of implements, and constraining the diggers to run for their lives. Several regiments, quartered in exposed positions, were obliged to move their tents and furniture with remarkable celerity; while some companies were isolated from our main body, and had to be ferried across the new lagoon to rejoin it. The embankment of the Vicksburg and Shreveport Railroad arrested the progress of the inundation northward; and our soldiers stationed below were required to move their tents to the ground above that embankment. And now, after some days'-consideration and hesitating effort, it was decided that the canal was an abortion-the Father of Waters having paralyzed it by his veto; while the batteries of Vicksburg frowned grimly, defiantly as ever.

Ere this, Gen. Grant-having more hands than work-had had a channel cut from the Mississippi, some 40 to 50 miles above, into Lake Providence; whence there was a continuous water-way, through bayous Baxter and Macon, into the Tensas, and thus into the Mississippi far below Vicksburg, as also into the Washita and Red rivers; while another sidecut, leaving the great river near Milliken's Bend, Bend, communicated, through a net-work of bayous and connecting streams, with the eastern (shorter) branch of the Tensas, and thence, through a similar net-work, regained the lower Mississippi near New Carthage. This one had actually been made so far available, by the help of dredge-boats, that a small

29 March S.

steamer and several barges had passed through it; when the rapid fall" of the river closed it for the season.

A third and more determined effort to flank the defenses of Vicksburg was made on the east side of the Mississippi, by way of the Yazoo Pass;' which, leaving the great river a little below Helena, flows through Moon Lake into the Coldwater, and down this stream into the Tallahatchie, which, uniting with the Yallobusha, forms the Yazoo.

Brig.-Gen. L. F. Ross, with a division of Gen. McClernand's corps from Helena, and the 12th and 17th Missouri, of Sherman's corps, headed this expedition, some 5,000 strong, which included the large gunboats Chilicothe and De Kalb, five smaller ones, and eighteen transports, under the command of Lt. Watson Smith. The passage through the levee of the Mississippi having been considerably enlarged, our vessels in succession boldly entered on the narrow, tortuous, but now headlong current, which bore them under a gigantic, overarching forest, into Moon Lake, and thus onward to the Coldwater. So constant and formidable were the obstacles encountered, in the shape of abrupt turns, fallen trees, inadequate depth, and sturdy limbs that swept away smoke-stacks and other standing fixtures, that three days were required for this transit, though the distance was barely twelve miles. Of course, the Rebels, who were fully and constantly posted, did not diminish these impediments, but were prone to aggravate them.

Proceeding" down the Coldwater, the obstacles to be overcome were changed rather than diminished. The channel was a little wider, but hardly less crooked, while its current was sluggish; the impulse gained from the Mississippi having been lost by a diffusion of the water over the swamps and bottoms on either side. Two mortar-boats here overtook the flotilla; and the mouth of the Coldwater was at length reached: our vessels having experienced some damage to rudders, wheels, and other works, but having encountered no serious resistance from the enemy; and with no vessel sunk or disabled.

Moving down the Tallahatchie, to a sharp easterly bend ten miles above its junction with the Yallobusha, the expedition was brought " to a stand, just above the little village of Greenwood.

Maj.-Gen. W. W. Loring had been dispatched" from Jackson to the Yazoo to bar any access by our forces to the valley of that river; and, having hastily studied its configuration and that of its chief tributaries, had chosen this as the point most favorable for resistance. The meeting streams approach within a mile, two or three miles above their junction; receding directly afterward. Loring, with his engineer, Maj. Meriwether, had obstructed the Tallahatchie by a raft," with an old steamboat sunk behind it, and thrown a line of defenses, composed of cotton-bales and earth, across the neck of the peninsula; its best guns, says Lt. Smith's invincible lack of resolution and energy, and manifest indifference, retarded, by several days, the arrival of our vessels at this point, and was the true cause of our utterly needless failure.

Quinby now returned to the ground just abandoned before the defenses; but had scarcely done so when he received" an order from Grant to withdraw the expedition; which he forthwith obeyed, returning to the Mississippi unmolested.

Admiral Porter, having reconnoitered the country directly eastward of the Mississippi from Steele's bayou, just above Milliken's Bend, and listened to the testimony of friendly negroes, informed" Gen. Grant that a devious route, practicable at that stage of water for lighter iron-clads, might be found or opened thence into the Sunflower, and so into the Yazoo below Yazoo City, but above Haines's Bluff; whereupon, Grant decided to attempt it. Ascending" with Porter, in the ram Price, pioneered by several other iron-clads, through Steele's bayou to Black Fork or bayou, which makes across from Steele's into Deer creek, Grant, finding their way constantly impeded by overhanging trees, hurried back to Young's Point for a pioneer corps; but was soon advised by Porter that there was more serious work ahead; when Sherman was sent with a division; most of which was debarked at Eagle Bend, on the Mississippi, and thence marched across to the bayou (Steele's), here but a mile from the river-much of the distance being now under water, and requiring to be bridged or corduroyed before it could be passed. And such was the height of the water in the bayous and streams that our boats could with difficulty be forced through the branches of the trees which thickly overlaced those nar

Col. C. R. Ellet, commanding the ram Queen of the West, having the gunboat De Soto and a coal-barge in company, ran" the Vicksburg batteries without injury, and thence steamed down to the mouth of Red river, thence raiding" down the Atchafalaya to Simmsport; thence returning to the Red, and going up that river to a point 15 miles above the mouth of the Black, where he captured the steamboat Era, with 4,500 bushels of corn; thence ascending the Black and Washita to Gordon's Landing, where his treacherous pilot, Garvey, ran the Queen ashore, just as she was opened on from the bank by a Rebel battery, which soon shot away her lever and escape-pipe, then cut in two her steam-pipe, filling her with scalding steam, and compelling Ellet and his crew to abandon her-she being wholly disabled and impotent-escaping on cotton-bales, and reaching the De Soto, which was just below. Going down the river, the De Soto was run into the bank and lost her rudder; when she and her barge were scuttled and burnt; Ellet and his crew taking refuge on the Era, throwing overboard her corn. Con