NEW ORLEANS, 6r'Wanz. The largest city in Louisiana. and, with the exception of Natchi toches, the oldest. It is situated on both banks of the Mississippi, 107 miles from its mouth. in lati tude 29° 58' N.. and longitude 90° 04' W. (Map: Louisiana. F 4). Its distance from Washington in direct line is 900 miles; from Saint Louis by rail. 039; and from Chicago by rail, 923. The city proper occupies a strip of land between the river and Lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain. with the latter of which it is connected by two canals. The corporate limits of the city embrace the whole parish of Orleans and a portion of Jeffer son on the right hank (the town of Algiers, or Fifth District). The official boundaries thus in close an area of 191 square miles. though the inhabited portion covers only about 37 square miles. The city lies about ten feet below the level of the Culf, and is so far below the level of high water in the Mississippi that it is protected from overflows by levees twenty feet high in plaees. Its. sobriquet, the 'Crescent City,' is de rived from the fact that the original city fol lowed the curve of the river in front of the old Place D'Armes; but as the inhabited portion has been gradually extended. its shape more nearly resemble& the letter S. It has a frontage of more than twelve miles on the river, which is about half a mile wide in front of Canal Street and from 40 to DM feet deep.
Canal Street, 21)0 feet broad, is the great busi ness thoroughfare. and cuts the Pity in two, the portion below being known as the French Quarter, or hirer Carnc, and the portion above as the American Quarter. The French portion, with its narrow streets, its oecasional tiled roofs, its old cathedral, its Spanish city hall or Cabildo, and its porte-cocin+res. is far more picturesque than the American Quarter. which contains the great business houses, the banks, and also the hand somest private dwellings. In the French Quarter. however, many beautiful residenees, surrounded by dowers and semi-tropical plants. are to be
seen on Esplanade Here dwell the old Creole families, descendants of the early French or Spatui4h settlers; here French is still spoken as a mother tongue, and though there has been much intermarrying and social intercourse with Americans, French customs are still observed, and visitors feel as if they had happened upon an aristocratic faubourg of Paris. Traces, also, of the Spanish regime are to be found in many inter esting specimens of the Ilispano-Moresque style of architecture, which, with the red-tiled Spanish houses and the exquisite wrought-iron of the bal conies, make this portion of the city unique. Above Canal Street the principal residence streets are Saint Charles Avenue and Prytania Street. These stretch for miles through the prettiest section of the city. here are the most beautiful gardens. The palm, the palmetto, the fig, the orange, and the magnolia grow in tropical abun dance, and even in winter the atmosphere is often perfumed with the odor of roses, violets, and sweet olive. Owing to the curve of the river, the streets do not run at right angles; they follow what is sometimes called 'the line of beauty.' Between the main thoroughfares of this portion of the city are interpolated a number of small streets, which, seeming to begin nowhere and end nowhere, cause great perplexity to strangers. The total extent of streets is 700 miles, of which only 204 miles arc paved at all. The lack of paving, resulting in the disuse of the unpaved streets, which in bad weather become almost impassable, has a tendency to congest traffic on the few streets that are paved. The street rail ways cover a total mileage of 176. Recently they have been consolidated under one company. A belt line, twelve miles long, extends around the most attractive portion of the city. There is also an electric line connecting with West End, a suburban resort, nearly seven miles from the head of Canal Street.