Trees torn up by the roots, their green branches waving high above the
flood, timbers from cottages, and wrecks of bridges, were floating down
to the Gulf of Mexico.
It was curious to watch the various things in the water as they sailed
slowly along. Demijohns bobbed about. Empty store boxes mockingly
labelled _dry goods_ elbowed bales of hay. Sometimes a weak
cock-a-doodle-doo from a travelling chicken-coop announced the
whereabouts of a helpless though still irrepressible rooster. Back yards
had been visited, and oyster-cans, ash-barrels and unsightly kitchen
debris brought to light. It was a mighty revolution where the dregs of
society were no longer suppressed, but sailed in state on the top wave.
"It is an idle wind which blows no one good," and amid the general
destruction the drift-wood was a God-send to the poor people, and they
caught enough to supply them with fire-wood for months. Logs, fences,
boards and the contents of steamboat woodyards were swept into the
current. On high points of land near the shore were collected piles
bristling with ragged stumps and limbs of trees. The great gnarled
branches of forest trees sometimes spread over half the river, while
timbers lodging among them formed a sort of raft which kept out of the
water the most wonderful things--pieces of furniture, and kitchen
utensils which shone in the sun like silver.
Cullum's Ripple is a few miles below Cincinnati.
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