AT THE MOUTH OF THE OHIO.
It must have been eight o'clock when Flora opened the window of her
room. She told me she had slept soundly, and felt as well as ever she
did in her life. I think Sim would have snored till noon if I had not
called him; but he had slept at least six hours, and I concluded that he
could stand it till night. I gave him the steering oar, and Flora and I
got breakfast. Our first meal on board was not entirely satisfactory,
for we had no table, and only one chair.
I took the helm again while Sim ate his breakfast, and then went to bed
myself; for I found, after my night of watching and excitement, I was in
no condition to work. My companions were as considerate of me as I had
been of them, and permitted me to sleep till the middle of the
afternoon. I was "as good as new" then; and, after we had dined, I put
up a table, and made a couple of stools.
During the day, we met two steamboats, and passed a huge flat-boat
loaded with grain; but no one on board of them seemed to take any
particular notice of us. Every kind of a craft is seen on the great
western rivers, and none is so strange as to excite a sensation in the
mind of the beholder. At six o'clock we had been afloat about twenty
hours; and, according to my estimate, it was nearly time for us to see
the Mississippi. The Wisconsin had widened as we advanced, and I was
sure that we should be in the great river before midnight.
After supper, I discussed with Sim the subject of keeping watch during
the night, and we decided that four hours were enough for each of us to
steer at one time. But we had no means of measuring time in the night,
and we could only guess at the length of the watch. I was to serve from
eight till twelve, and Sim from twelve till four, when I was to take my
place again.
Flora retired early on the second night, and I sent Sim to bed as soon
as it was fairly dark. I was alone again, in the solitude of that waste
of waters. The novelty of the scene had in some measure worn off. I had
nothing but my own thoughts to amuse me. The river appeared still to be
widening, and, as I had anticipated, before my watch had ended, the raft
entered the Mississippi. The river was high, the current much stronger
than it had been in the Wisconsin, and the progress of the raft was
correspondingly increased. I met a steamboat struggling against the
stream, and passed quite near to her. The swell that she left behind her
caused the raft to roll heavily for a moment; but it did not disturb the
sleepers in the house.
I called Sim at twelve o'clock, as nearly as I could judge, and he
faithfully promised me that he would keep awake till daylight. I left
him alone on the platform, and turned in, though not without some doubts
in regard to his ability to be true to his promise. I went to sleep very
promptly, and I must do Sim the justice to say that I found the raft all
right when he called me at sunrise, an hour later than the time agreed
upon. He told me that nothing had happened during the night, except
that a steamboat had nearly upset the raft.
I do not intend to make a daily record of our voyage down the river. One
day was very much like the next day, and all days were alike. On the
afternoon of the first day on the Mississippi, we approached a village,
where there was a steamboat landing. We were in want of supplies for our
table, and I decided to stop for an hour or two. But I found that it was
an easier matter to go ahead than it was to stop, for the raft had got
into the habit of doing so. The water was too deep to permit the use of
poles, and we were helplessly carried past the village.
I was vexed at this mishap, for I did not like to drink my coffee
without milk. However, we came to another and a larger village about
sundown, and, making my calculations in good season, I succeeded in
driving the raft into the shallow water where we could use the poles. We
struck the shore some distance above the place; but a walk of half a
mile was not objectionable, after our long confinement on the raft.
At this town I purchased a cheap clock, and an old, patched sail, which
had been used on a wood-boat, as well as some provisions and groceries.
Sim and I lugged these articles to the raft, and immediately cast off
again. I put the clock up in the house, where it could be seen through
the door without leaving the platform. The lantern hung over it, so that
we could tell the time by night.
I had great hopes of the sail, and the next day I rigged it upon two
poles, serving as yards. On one corner of the sail I found a block,
which had been used for the sheet. I fastened it at the masthead, so
that we could hoist and lower the sail at pleasure. I was no navigator,
and no sailor; and I had to experiment with the sail and rigging for a
long while before I could make them work to my satisfaction.
My inventive powers did not fail me, and by attaching a rope to each end
of the two yards, I obtained the control of the canvas. When I had
completed the work, and hoisted the sail, I was delighted with its
operation. The wind came pretty fresh from the north-west, and I think
the raft made five, if not six miles an hour with its help. With the
sail drawing well, the labor of steering was reduced more than half. The
raft had no tendency to whirl round, and it was really a pleasure to
steer her. We were not obliged to follow the current in its broad sweeps
around the bends of the river, and we saved many miles by taking "short
cuts." I found, too, that the raft was under better control, and,
instead of being at the mercy of the current, we could go where we
pleased. When there was any wind, and it came from the right direction,
I could make a landing where and when I wished with very little
difficulty.
Day after day we continued on our voyage, Sim and I dividing equally
between us the labor at the steering oar. We could not use the sail all
the time, but it was a vast help to us when the wind was favorable. As
time permitted, I made improvements on the house, which added to our
comfort. I put up two berths, which we filled with hay obtained from the
prairies. I made a closet for the dishes, and a well in the body of the
raft, where the kettle of milk could be kept cool in the water.
We made a landing almost every day at some town, and on Sunday we hauled
up and went to church, whenever we were in a place where we could do so.
On our sixth day it rained in torrents, and I hauled up at the bank of a
river, and made fast to a tree. It was not comfortable to stand on the
platform, wet to the skin, and steer. Sim and I slept nearly the whole
day, while Flora read the books and newspapers which I had bought at the
towns. I had done all the work I could find to do on the raft, and had
fitted up the house to my mind. I had an easy time of it.
At one of the large towns I found what was called "A Panorama of the
Mississippi River," which I bought and put up in the house. After this
we knew just where we were, for the Panorama was a kind of chart, with
all the towns on the river, the streams which flowed into it, and the
distances from place to place, indicated upon it. With a good breeze we
made about a hundred miles in twenty-four hours, and when we could not
use the sail, the current carried us sixty miles.
When we reached the mouth of the Missouri, the prospect seemed to me,
who had never seen a considerable body of water, to be like a great
inland sea. Flora was appalled at our distance from the land, and Sim
shouted, "Hookie!" Our raft, which had seemed so large on the stream
where it had been built, now loomed puny and insignificant. Great
steamboats, three times as large as any I had ever seen, and looming up
far above the water, dashed by us. Huge flat-boats floated lazily down
the river, and the scene became more lively and exciting as we advanced.
A new world had opened to us.
From the broad river we saw the great city of St. Louis, and we gazed
with wonder and astonishment at its dense mass of houses, its busy
levee, and the crowds of steamboats which thronged it. We had never seen
the great world before, and we were overwhelmed with surprise. Flora was
silent, and Sim cried "Hookie" a hundred times within an hour.
The swift current and the steady breeze carried us away from this stormy
scene into the quiet of nature; for the great river has its solitudes,
though many times in the day we saw steamboats going up and down, or
encountered other craft voyaging towards the Gulf.
On the tenth day we approached the mouth of the Ohio. Again the expanse
of waters increased, till it seemed to my narrow vision to be almost an
ocean. It was nearly dark, and the weather was as pleasant as a maiden's
dream. We had advanced about seven degrees of latitude towards the
south, and Nature was clothed in her brightest green. We had stepped
from the cold spring of Wisconsin to the mild summer of the South. Ten
days before we had been among leafless trees; now we were in the midst
of luxuriant foliage. Flora sat in her arm-chair, near the platform,
enjoying the scene with me.
"If you are tired of the raft, Flora, we will go the rest of the way in
a steamboat," I said, after we had spoken of the changing seasons we had
experienced.
"I am not tired of it--far from it," she replied.
"We have over a thousand miles farther to go."
"I think I shall only regret the river was not longer when we get to New
Orleans."
"I wonder what Captain Fishley thinks has become of us," I added,
chuckling, as I thought of the family we had left.
"He and his wife must be puzzled; but I suppose they won't find out
where we are till we write to them."
"They will not know at present then. We have got rid of our tyrants now,
and I am in no hurry to see them again."
"Twig the steamers!" shouted Sim, from the roof of the house, where he
had perched himself to observe the prospect. "They are having a race."
I had seen them before, and I wished they had been farther off, for one
of them seemed to be determined to run over the raft, in her efforts to
cut off her rival. Our craft was in the middle of the channel, and one
of the steamers passed on each side of us, and so close that we were
nearly swamped in the surges produced by their wheels. I breathed easier
when the boats had passed, for I knew how reckless they were under the
excitement of a race. I could hear them creak and groan under the
pressure, as they went by.
We watched them as they rushed forward on their course. They were just
rounding into the Ohio, on their mad career, when we saw one of them
suddenly fly in pieces, torn, rent, shivered, the atmosphere filled with
fragments. Then came a terrific explosion, like the din of an
earthquake, shaking the raft with its violence. The boiler of the
steamer had exploded.