vessels that might present themselves at Pass à Loutre. At the same time arrangements were privately made for sending a few such out. As the result I have to report as follows: On the 17th of June the steamship Concordia, drawing 17 feet 8 inches, passed out without assistance and without detention. On the 18th the bark Britannia sailed in, drawing 17 feet. Other vessels followed as indicated below, viz: June 20.-Steamship United States, in, drawing 16 feet. June 23.-Ship Wm. Woodbury, out, drawing 17 feet 10 inches. June 25.-Ship Lizzie Moses, out, drawing 18 feet 3 inches. June 26.-Ship Perseverence, out, drawing 17 feet 10 inches. June 26.-Steamship Cromwell, out, drawing 16 feet 6 inches. June 27.-Steamship Geo. Washington, in, drawing 16 feet 10 inches June 30.-Steamship Kensington, in, drawing 15 feet 6 inches. June 26.-Steamship Tranquebar, out, drawing 18 feet 9 inches. This latter vessel grounded in mid-channel, and remained nine days, within a few feet of deep water; during that time a good but narrow channel, seventeen feet deep, was available on each side of her. Her grounding is directly traceable to the carelessness or intention of the pilot aboard, who tried to carry her through at low tide, instead of waiting for the flood, when she could have gone over without trouble. An authorized government officer on hand, to have directed her crossing, would have prevented detention of the ship and damage to the channel. By the practical demonstration reported above, the work at Pass à Loutre was placed before the public in its true light, and the object in making it gained. I submit the following information relating to paragraphs II and III, circular of June 10, 1868. II. (3.) The following amount can be profitably expended on the work during the present fiscal year: For providing the second of the two dredge-boats authorized by the joint resolution of Congress, approved March 29, 1867. For working expenses, repairs, and alterations of Essayons For working expenses and repairs of dredge-boat No. 2, from 1st of April, 1870, to June 30, 1870, (3 months).... Total For the year ending June 30, 1871, will probably be required for working expenses and repairs of two dredge-boats the sum of.... $275,000 00 70,000 00 20, 000 00 365, 000 00 $125,000 00 II. (4 and 5.) The work is located in the collection district of New Orleans, Louisiana; and near the light-house of Pass à Loutre, mouth of the Mississippi River. (6 and 7.) See statement appended marked A. (11.) Statement of cash. Amount available from fiscal year ending June 30, 1868.. $36,000 00 Additional allotment for 1868 and 1869... Available for year ending June 30, 1869.. Total drawn during fiscal year....... Amount available June 30, 1869.. Available for year ending June 30, 1870... Amount available for 1869 and 1870... Amount required for the year ending June 30, 1870.... III. This does not admit of permanent completion. 50, 000 00 In order to maintain, at all seasons of the year, a channel depth of twenty feet across the bar at Pass à Loutre, an annual expenditure of $125,000 will be required; of which amount, $100,000 is estimated for the working expenses of two dredge-boats, and $25,000 for necessary repairs, buoys, and contingencies. All of which is very respectfully submitted. C. W. HOWELL, Captain of Engineers and Brevet Major U. S. A. Bvt. Maj. Gen. A. A. HUMPHREYS, Brig. Gen. and Chief of Engineers U. S. A., Washington, D. C. Statement of commerce, to the benefit of which the work for the improvement of the mouth of the Mississippi River contributed, during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1869. New Orleans, Louisiana, is the collection district in which the work is located. The work is situated near light-house at Pass à Loutre. Number of entrances of sail and steam vessels. Number of clearances of sail and steam vessels. Total number of entrances and clearances... Total tonnage of vessels entering and clearing.. Total value of exports of domestic commodities to foreign countries. Total value of exports of foreign merchandise to foreign countries Grand total value of exports. 1, 667 1,968 3, 635 2,582, 764 49 $11, 775, 553 00 $75, 128, 932 00 754, 858 00 75, 883, 790 00 Amount of revenue collected as duties on imports during the fiscal year.... $4,263, 385 14 I certify this to be a correct statement, and from the best information I have been able to obtain. C. W. HOWELL, Captain of Engineers and Brevet Major U. S. A. APPENDIX K. UNITED STATES ENGINEER OFFICE, Corner Houston and Greene Streets, N. Y., January 29, 1869. GENERAL: I have the honor to report the completion of the survey and examination of the mouth of St. John's River, executed in compliance with instructions from Headquarters Corps of Engineers, dated July 27, 1868, with a view to meet a request made by the United States Senate Committee on Commerce, for "estimates of the expense of deepening the channel at the mouth of St. John's River, Florida, so that it will answer the demands of commerce." A chart of that portion of the river and shore lines embraced within the limits of the instrumental survey, including the whole of the bar at its mouth, is nearly finished, and will be transmitted to the Chief of Engineers in a few days. All the information furnished by the survey having already become available, I deem it proper to submit this report at once, in order that the purpose for which the survey was ordered may not be unnecessarily delayed. The general direction of St. John's River from its mouth, situated in latitude 30° 20' north to Jacksonville, a distance of about twenty-five miles, is east and west. Above Jacksonville as far as Pilatka, one hundred and twenty-five miles from the mouth, it lies nearly north and south, being parallel with the main coast and about twenty miles from it. "For nearly one hundred miles from its mouth it forms a wide sluggish sheet of water, more resembling a lagoon than a river," the distance from shore to shore in some places being fully five miles. The currents in the river are apparently but slightly influenced by freshets, even during the rainy season, and where most active near the mouth, are without doubt principally due to the tidal wave. The waters of the river are never turbid like those of the Mississippi, or like the Altamaha and Santee in certain seasons, and they do not, even when there is a conjunction of strong westerly winds and freshets, exert any considerable agency in the formation of the bar at the mouth of the stream, by the deposit of sediment brought down from the interior. The average velocity of the ebb current, when the river is most swollen, would doubtless bear a very considerable acceleration, without produ cing any injurious results by deposits. On the bar at the present time there is a minimum depth of seven feet of water at mean low tide, with an average rise and fall of 5.4 feet. After once passing the bar a vessel can carry, on the flood, from fourteen to fifteen feet of water to Jacksonville, where the rise and fall is only one foot. A depth of ten feet may be carried to Pilatka and eight feet to Lake George, while small steamers ply much higher up. The area of the water-way at quarantine, which is at the mouth of the river just within the point where it begins to widen out into the ocean, is 37,625 square feet, with a high-water width of 1,750 feet; while on the bar, estimated along its crest line or curve of least soundings, from shore to shore, the water-way measures 177,941 square feet, with a width of 16,630 feet. METHOD OF IMPROVEMENT BY STRAIGHTENING THE STREAM. It was perhaps the freedom of the stream from sediment, and practically from all currents except those caused by the ebb and flow of the tide, taken in connection with the circumstance that there are short curves in the channel between Jacksonville and the mouth of the river, that suggested, some years ago, a method of improvement by staightening the water-way at those curves, in order to facilitate the inward, and consequently the outward flow of the tide. It was assumed that any device which should cause the tidal wave to ascend to a higher point on the river than it had ordinarily attained before, thereby increasing the volume of water flowing in over the bar, would proportionally increase the duration of high-water navigation, as well as the velocity and scouring effect of the retiring current, and would also enlarge the area of the water-way on the bar. But whether this enlargement of water-way would take place in the channel to such degree as would secure the desired depth of the water on the bar, or would be distributed principally over the shoals between the channel and the shore on either side, producing little useful effect where most needed, are questions surrounded with such doubt and uncertainty as to render this method of improvement inexpedient, in my judgment, until some other plan has been tried without adequate success. Moreover, the survey and examination just completed did not, for want of sufficient time, embrace within its limits those portions of the river which would require to be straightened, and I am not therefore prepared to submit estimates of the cost of this method of improvement. It does not, however, seem to promise any certain and permanent advantage to navigation on the bar, while upon the shoals and curves above the bar within the limit reached by the increased tidal wave it would doubtless prove beneficial. · IMPROVEMENT BY MEANS OF PIERS AT THE MOUTH. The channel-way over the bar is subject to very great and sometimes sudden and apparently capricious changes in one or in all of the essential features of depth, direction, and position. To a close observer the causes of these changes admit of an easy and satisfactory solution. They depend almost entirely, for their extent and character, upon the force and direction of the wind. The only other varying cause, not recurring at regular intervals under some known law, like the tides, is the influence of freshets upon the current of the river. This, if not practically inappreciable, can have no important bearing upon any plan of improvement to be applied at the mouth of the river. During the prevalence of strong westerly winds of considerable duration, the velocity of the ebb current is greatly increased, and it runs for seventeen or eighteen hours out of the twenty-four, and sometimes longer. The result is an increased depth of water in the channel on the bar, produced conjointly by the scouring effect of the increased outgoing" current, and by preventing the deposition of sand thrown into momentary suspension by the waves of the sea. Under these circumstances the channel has been known to attain a depth of eight feet at mean low water; and whether any other change would be effected in a given case, would depend on whether the existing direction and position of the channel were established mainly during the prevalence of westerly winds, or otherwise. When the wind blows off the ocean other phenomena are observed. It is known from observation that, in the shallow portions of the waterway over the bar, that is, upon the shoals or spits which extend out from the main shore on either side, the outward current runs with less velocity than in the channel, and ceases with the commencement of the flood, or very soon after; also, that upon the north shoal, near the shore line, there is a strong eddy during the first quarter of the ebb, setting due south at the rate of one knot. In the channel-way the ebb current runs, according to the force and direction of the wind, from one and a half to three hours after the flood begins. Along shore outside the bar there is a current, not exceeding half a knot in mild weather, setting to the southward during the flood, and to the northward during the ebb; but these currents may be destroyed or even reversed by the wind. During the prevalence of high northerly or northeasterly winds a current sets to the southward along the outer edge of the shoal, the force of the river ebb is deadened, and a portion of the sand thrown up by the waves of the ocean inside the sea buoy, and especially by the ceaseless breakers on the north spit, is deposited and remains in the channel. At the same time the sand set in motion by the waves on the south spit is carried to the southward. The natural results are that the channel way is moved to the southward with shallowed soundings, the extent of both elements of change depending greatly upon the force and duration of the wind. With strong southeasterly winds, on the contrary, the channel is forced to the northward, accompanied, as before, with a diminished depth of water. A plan of improvement which naturally suggests itself in the presence of these facts is, to confine the waters which now flow into the ocean over the shoals and through the bar channel dispersed over a water way 16,630 feet in width, so that they will be compelled to make their exit within narrower limits, and consequently with increased velocity, the object being to create an ebb current of sufficient force to scour out the channel to the requisite depth, and, of course, prevent the deposits which now take place under the influence of high, long-continued winds blowing toward the land. It appears that this scheme could be applied with reasonable promise of success, by constructing a pier or breakwater along the north side of the channel, and in its general direction parallel thereto, extending from the shore to the existing bar, approaching the outer edge thereof as nearly as practicable. A project of this character was discussed, and, I believe, recommended by a commission over fourteen years ago, but was never undertaken in consequence perhaps of its great cost, and some doubts of its feasibility entertained by those who proposed it. The same objections to it exist at the present time, and its estimated cost of $196,000 in 1854 would have to be increased to at least $300,000, to meet the advance in all kinds of material and labor. Moreover, no considerable benefit would be derived from the adoption of this project much short of its entire completion, and not within an expenditure of at least $200,000 to $225,000. For these reasons I cannot recommend this plan. IMPROVEMENT BY CLOSING THE MOUTH OF FORT GEORGE INLET. Dr. A. S. Baldwin, a citizen of Jacksonville, has for many years confidently advocated closing the mouth of Fort George Inlet, as offering a sure remedy for all the evils growing out of the inadequate depth of |