And That Flatboatman Would Be Sure To Go Into New Orleans And Sue Our Boat, Swearing Stoutly That He Had A Light Burning All The Time, When In Truth His Gang Had The Lantern Down Below To Sing And Lie And Drink And Gamble By, And No Watch On Deck.

Once, at night, in one of those forest-bordered crevices (behind an island) which steamboatmen intensely describe with the

Phrase 'as dark as the inside of a cow,' we should have eaten up a Posey County family, fruit, furniture, and all, but that they happened to be fiddling down below, and we just caught the sound of the music in time to sheer off, doing no serious damage, unfortunately, but coming so near it that we had good hopes for a moment. These people brought up their lantern, then, of course; and as we backed and filled to get away, the precious family stood in the light of it - both sexes and various ages - and cursed us till everything turned blue. Once a coalboatman sent a bullet through our pilot-house, when we borrowed a steering oar of him in a very narrow place.

Chapter 11 The River Rises

DURING this big rise these small-fry craft were an intolerable nuisance. We were running chute after chute, - a new world to me, - and if there was a particularly cramped place in a chute, we would be pretty sure to meet a broad-horn there; and if he failed to be there, we would find him in a still worse locality, namely, the head of the chute, on the shoal water. And then there would be no end of profane cordialities exchanged.

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