me is so associated with the
ram fleet had thus caused the loss of two of them, and led Porter to
caution Farragut to keep the one now with him always under his own
eye.

Soon after the coming of General Grant, while the army was digging
canals at two or three different points, with the view of opening new
waterways from above to below Vicksburg, Admiral Porter had suggested
that by cutting the levee across the old Yazoo Pass, six miles below
Helena, access might be had to the Yazoo above Haines's Bluff and
Vicksburg turned by that route. Grant ordered the cutting, and Porter
sent the light-draught Forest Rose to stand by to enter when open.

There are two entrances from the Mississippi to the pass, the upper
one direct, the lower one turning to the left and running parallel to
the course of the river. Just within their junction the levee, built
in 1856, crosses the pass, which is here only seventy-five feet wide
between the timber on either side. At the distance of a mile from the
great river the pass enters the northern end of Moon Lake, a
crescent-shaped sheet of water, probably an old bed of the
Mississippi. The lake is seven or eight miles long and from eight
hundred to a thousand yards wide, with a uniform depth enough to float
the largest steamboats. Two or three plantations were then on the east
shore, but the rest was unbroken forest, quiet and isolated, abounding
in game as the waters did in fish. The pass issues again half way down
the eastern side, through an opening so shut in with trees that it can
scarcely be seen a hundred yards away, and pursues a tortuous course
of twelve or fourteen miles to the Coldwater River, the upper portion
of the Yazoo. In this part of the route, which never exceeds one
hundred feet in width and often narrows to seventy-five or less, the
forest of cyprus and sycamore trees, mingled with great cottonwoods
and thickly twining wild grape-vines, formed a perfect arch overhead,
shutting out the rays of the sun; and, though generally high enough to
allow the tall smoke-stacks to pass underneath, sometimes grazed
their tops and again swept them down to the deck as the swift current
bore the vessels along.

Digging on the levee was begun on the 2d of February, under the
direction of Lieutenant-Colonel James H. Wilson, of the Engineers. At
this time the difference of level between the water inside and out of
the levee was eight and a half feet. At seven the next evening, the
digging