voyage, and early this morning passed the great plantation of general Hampton, situated about 70 miles from New Orleans, at Ouma point, the name of a nation or tribe of Indians now nearly extinct, and who, with the remains of the Chetimashas, once living nearly opposite to bayou la Fourche, are at this time existing in a partly civilized state on the bayou Plaquemine.[240] The learned Peter S. Duponceau,[241] Esq. informs me, that the language of the Chetimashas, a people said, by Du Pratz, to be a branch of the Natchez, appears to be radically distinct from that of the other aborigines of the southern states. From hence the banks of the river are lower, and the labour of keeping up the levees greater, though the rise of the river is slower, its width and uniformity of channel more considerable, and now almost destitute of islands or bars. The river is very probably influenced in this respect by the embankments, which are continued almost without interruption from Fort Adams nearly to Fort Placquemine.[242] We had now in view a perpetual succession of the habitations of the richest planters, surrounded with groups of negro cabins. They are almost exclusively engaged in the planting of sugar, and possess establishments no way inferior to those of the West India Islands, some of them being valued at as much as 100,000
