all that is left as a footing for hundreds. The wares swash heavily at their feet; or sometimes, as the wind blows stronger, they leap clear over the frail embankment. Trudging wearily back and forth on the clayey, slippery dykes are planters, once well-to-do, with families of culture and refinement; others of a middle class, and occasional specimens of a type denominated by the “man and brother” as “po’ white trash” are to be seen among the throng. The “man and brother” is usually in the majority in the lowland districts, and adds greatly to the picturesqueness of the levees in time of flood. Some rear their tiny excuses for tents along the bank, and spend the time in uneasily watching the turbid water. Occasionally some Dinah or Chloe, who has been on the levee for a week, goes through the motion of washing clothes in the surging stream, gaining thereby the approval of conscience over a duty performed, whether the garments be improved or not. Here there is little concern, these being wandering roustabouts who had nothing to lose; there some grizzled Uncle Tom bemoans the loss of his two scrawny mules, and the few pigs and fowls, and his favorite cow, which represent the savings of years from his toil in his little patch of corn and cotton; and he feels even sorer over his losses than the rich planter who has lost a hundred times as much. So the little bands assemble, mingle and disperse, comparing notes, and all waiting in painful anxiety for some steamer to pick them up before the sodden levee shall dissolve beneath their feet and leave them struggling in the stream. At length the government relief boat appears, and gathers the throngs by hundreds, to transport them to higher lands. Beyond the levee, skiffs and flat-boats move about the submerged region, picking up the people who have taken refuge on the housetops, among the trees, or on piles of drift. None on the levee fear being passed in the night, for the powerful search-light illuminates every straggling group. [Illustration: WAITING FOR A STEAMER.] On reaching a place of safety from the waters, scores of the refugees are almost penniless, and the question of food is a pressing one. The liberal contributions of scores of generous souls suffice but for a short time. The government must again come to the front, and issue rations, or a money equivalent, sufficient to maintain the destitute till the falling of the waters allows them to resume labor upon their lands. After that, the crop-lien system in vogue in the South enables the people to get credit of their merchants until the cotton-picking or corn-gathering. [Illustration: THE SEARCH-LIGHT.]