New Orleans: Up from the Deluge

In New Orleans, America's most hedonistic city, the humid air last week was laden with the stench of death, the streets overlaid by a fetid crust of mud. Day after day, as the floodwaters seeped back into the Mississippi, armed police and health crews pursued the macabre task of recovering human bodies and countless animal carcasses. They shot hundreds of snakes—and two alligators —that had been swept up from the swamps and dumped into the city by Hurricane Betsy. Dozens of citizens had been bitten by stray dogs crazed by hunger and salt water.

By week's end, water still stood...