lighter side of the same activity was the formation, in 1830, by Michael Krafft and his merry companions of the famous Cowbellion de Rakin Society, the predecessor of the Strikers, O. O. M., and every other mystic organization in the South. It was the transfer of their celebrations from New Year's Eve to Mardi Gras which has made the carnival season famous. The city grew in all directions; old Creole homes gave way to modern houses, the Orange Grove Tract was built up in warehouses, and St. Michael Street, because of its shipping interests, was called the British Channel. New streets were opened, Spring Hill became a famous summer resort, and handsome residences soon adorned both shores of the bay.
Then, alas, came the panic of 1837, in which, however, the Bank of Mobile is said to have been one of the four banks in the whole country which did not suspend. Everything else seemed to go to pieces. Even the city government made an assignment. To add to the distress, in 1839 was the most disastrous of all fires, in its two attacks sweeping Royal Street and Dauphin and St. Francis up to where the cathedral then stood unfinished. An epidemic of yellow fever the same summer slew the
