Shortly after passing this fort, a sight of unparalleled grandeur broke upon us. The western horizon was yet ruddy with the last light of sunset, and was attracting my attention, contrasted as it was with the dull stream and dismal jungle around us. Suddenly I observed a bright flame rush, as it were, over the distant surface of the swamp: at the same moment we opened a noble reach of the river, and a vast fire was perceived, steadily advancing over the prairie land on our left, which character of surface is continued from here to the Balize, covered by a rank growth of lofty cane or reeds. As night drew on, the fire seemed to gather greater strength, rolling away to leeward a mighty ocean of flame; whilst nearer to us lines might be observed creeping close to the earth, devouring the dry grass, and marching right in the teeth of the wind, sheltered by the tall cane next doomed to fall. Whilst viewed far off, the effect was exactly that of a great city delivered to the flames: the trees growing by the river's brink, and scattered here and there over the prairie, showed like some yet standing spires, whilst here and there a tall cedar might be caught just falling; the dwarf trees and withered shrubs in front, with the flames quivering through their branches, might readily be imagined a remnant of the population fleeing from the destruction pressing on their rear, with the sullen Mississippi for their only refuge. We overtook and sailed down, side by side, with this mighty conflagration for an hour or more, through water made bright by the fiery reflection: at last, we outstripped its speed, but, for three hours after, I never withdrew my eyes from this the grandest sight it ever was given to me to contemplate; nor was the effect at all diminished though changed by distance. At one turn of our course we were presented with a _coup d'oeil_ of fearful grandeur; it seemed as though the flame had crossed the broad river, and formed a half circle, whose left extremity was lost in distance, and whose right pursued our path, rolling after us a lofty wall of fire, from behind which burst wreaths of smoke, of different degrees of darkness, as though shot up from some volcano's crater, whilst the more distant masses formed gradually into clouds of snow, whose lower edges were tinged with mingled lines of gold and jet. The wind blew half a gale at about N.N.W., and it was calculated that our pace could not be less than twelve miles per hour; that of the fire, therefore, must have been seven or eight, since, despite the turns of the river, we were closely followed by it for three hours, and very soon after we anchored at the Balize it again overtook us, rushing on unchecked whilst it found a supply of food, until extinguished in the waters of the gulf.