RIVER PIRATES.
We had had our suppers, the children and Missis had gone to bed, and we
were about following them, when through the rain we heard someone get
upon the front deck. It was raining hard. We called out, asking who was
there. A man replied in a wheedling voice, saying that he was alone,
lost in the rain, and wished to remain till it was light enough to see
his way. We asked who he was, and he responded that he was a prominent
citizen of the neighborhood and asked us to open up the cabin a little
bit. The doors are on the sides, and he was evidently puzzled as to how
to get into the cabin. We were undressed and told him we could not let
him in; but he insisted. We called to the boys to see what was wanted,
thinking it might be some one in trouble; so Jake went out. The man
began to talk pretty saucily, but then Jim and Frank got out, and at
once his tone changed. He suddenly got very drunk, though perfectly
sober a moment before. Another man turned up also, in a skiff
alongside. He gave a rambling incoherent account of why he was there;
but the other man called angrily for him to come on, and soon they left,
rowing into the darkness. The man who came aboard was about 5 feet 6;
45, red-faced, deep-set eyes; his hat drawn well over his face; rather
heavily set. The other was a sulky-faced man about 25, with light hair.
That they were river pirates there is not a doubt; and had we been
short-handed there would have been trouble.
Next morning we set out, slowly floating with a little headwind, through
a fog. Temperature at 8 a. m., 50. Natchez-under-the-hill has
disappeared under the assaults of the river, and with it the wild
characters that made it famous, or rather notorious. The city is now
said to be as orderly and safe as any in the south. We now get fine gulf
oysters at 50 cents to $1 a hundred. They come in buckets. Shell oysters
are still rare. We got a small bunch of bananas at Natchez, for 60
cents.
We passed Morville, floating about three miles an hour. We have never
been able to secure any data as to the speed of the current in the
rivers.
* * * * *
Jan. 11, 1904.--We ran 42 miles yesterday, to near Union Point, tying up
to a sand bar. The boys crossed to a railway camp and were told game was
very abundant, so that it was hardly safe for a single man to go out
with the hounds at night--bear, panther and cat. We had a head wind all
day, from the west, sometimes strong enough to raise a few whitecaps,
and the engine did her stunt of bucking--which shows what she is good
for when in good humor. Temperature went up to 72 and hung around 70 all
day. This morning at 8 it is 42. The children and dog had a much needed
run on the sand. The boy needs much exercise and laboriously chops at
the heaviest wood he can find.