University of Virginia Library

Chapter XX.

They ASKED us considerable many questions;
wanted to know what we covered up
the raft that way for, and laid by in
the day-time instead of running—was
Jim a runaway nigger? Says I—

"Goodness sakes, would a runaway
nigger run south?"

No, they allowed he wouldn't. I
had to account for things some way, so
I says:

[ILLUSTRATION]

on the raft.

"My folks was living in Pike
County, in Missouri, where I was born,
and they all died off but me and pa
and my brother Ike. Pa, he 'lowed
he'd break up and go down and live
with Uncle Ben, who's got a little one-horse
place on the river, forty-four mile
below Orleans. Pa was pretty poor, and had some debts; so when he'd
squared up there warn't nothing left but sixteen dollars and our nigger, Jim.
That warn't enough to take us fourteen hundred mile, deck passage nor no other
way. Well, when the river rose, pa had a streak of luck one day; he ketched
this piece of a raft; so we reckoned we'd go down to Orleans on it. Pa's luck
didn't hold out; a steamboat run over the forrard corner of the raft, one night,
and we all went overboard and dove under the wheel; Jim and me come up, all
right, but pa was drunk, and Ike was only four years old, so they never come up

no more. Well, for the next day or two we had considerable trouble, because
people was always coming out in skiffs and trying to take Jim away from me,
saying they believed he was a runaway nigger. We don't run day-times no more,
now; nights they don't bother us."

The duke says—

"Leave me alone to cipher out a way so we can run in the day-time if we want
to. I'll think the thing over—I'll invent a plan that'll fix it. We'll let it alone
for to-day, because of course we don't want to go by that town yonder in daylight—it
mightn't be healthy."

Towards night it begun to darken up and look like rain; the heat lightning
was squirting around, low down in the sky, and the leaves was beginning to
shiver—it was going to be pretty ugly, it was easy to see that. So the duke and
the king went to overhauling our wigwam, to see what the beds was like. My
bed was a straw, tick—better than Jim's, which was a corn-shuck tick; there's
always cobs around about in a shuck tick, and they poke into you and hurt; and
when you roll over, the dry shucks sound like you was rolling over in a pile of
dead leaves; it makes such a rustling that you wake up. Well, the duke allowed
he would take my bed; but the king allowed he wouldn't. He says—

"I should a reckoned the difference in rank would a sejested to you that a
corn-shuck bed warn't just fitten for me to sleep on. Your Grace'll take the
shuck bed yourself."

Jim and me was in a sweat again, for a minute, being afraid there was going
to be some more trouble amongst them; so we was pretty glad when the duke
says—

"'Tis my fate to be always ground into the mire under the iron heel of
oppression. Misfortune has broken my once haughty spirit; I yield, I submit;
'tis my fate. I am alone in the world—let me suffer; I can bear it."

We got away as soon as it was good and dark. The king told us to stand well
out towards the middle of the river, and not show a light till we got a long ways
below the town. We come in sight of the little bunch of lights by-and-by—that
was the town, you know—and slid by, about a half a mile out, all right. When
we was three-quarters of a mile below, we hoisted up our signal lantern; and

about ten o'clock it come on to rain and blow and thunder and lighten like everything;
so the king told us to both stay on watch till the weather got better;
then him and the duke crawled into the wigwam and turned in for the night. It
was my watch below, till twelve, but I wouldn't a turned in, anyway, if I'd had a
bed; because a body don't see such a storm as that every day in the week, not by
a long sight. My souls, how the wind did scream along! And every second or
two there'd come a glare that lit up the white-caps for a half a mile around, and
you'd see the islands looking dusty through the rain, and the trees thrashing
around in the wind; then comes a h-wack!—bum! bum! bumble-umble-umbum-bum-bum-bum—and
the thunder would go rumbling and grumbling away,
and quit—and then rip comes another flash and another sockdolager. The waves
most washed me off the raft, sometimes, but I hadn't any clothes on, and didn't
mind. We didn't have no trouble about snags; the lightning was glaring
and flittering around so constant that we could see them plenty soon enough to
throw her head this way or that and miss them.

I had the middle watch, you know, but I was pretty sleepy by that time, so Jim
he said he would stand the first half of it for me; he was always mighty good,
that way, Jim was. I crawled into the wigwam, but the king and the duke had
their legs sprawled around so there warn't no show for me; so I laid outside—I
didn't mind the rain, because it was warm, and the waves warn't running so
high, now. About two they come up again, though, and Jim was going to call
me, but he changed his mind because he reckoned they warn't high enough yet
to do any harm; but he was mistaken about that, for pretty soon all of a sudden
along comes a regular ripper, and washed me overboard. It most killed Jim
a-laughing. He was the easiest nigger to laugh that ever was, anyway.

I took the watch, and Jim he laid down and snored away; and by-and-by the
storm let up for good and all; and the first cabin-light that showed, I rousted
him out and we slid the raft into hiding-quarters for the day.

The king got out an old ratty deck of cards, after breakfast, and him and the
duke played seven-up a while, five cents a game. Then they got tired of it, and
allowed they would "lay out a campaign," as they called it. The duke went
down into his carpet-bag and fetched up a lot of little printed bills, and read

them out loud. One bill said "The celebrated Dr. Armand de Montalban of
Paris," would "lecture on the Science of Phrenology" at such and such a place,
on the blank day of blank, at ten cents admission, and "furnish charts of character
at twenty-five cents apiece." The duke said that was him. In another bill he
was the "world renowned Shaksperean tragedian, Garrick the Younger, of Drury
Lane, London." In other bills he had a lot of other names and done other
wonderful things, like finding water and gold with a "divining rod," "dissipating
witch-spells," and so on. By-and-by he says—

"But the histrionic muse is the darling. Have you ever trod the boards,
Royalty?"

"No," says the king.

"You shall, then, before
you're three days older, Fallen
Grandeur," says the duke. "The
first good town we come to, we'll
hire a hall and do the sword-fight
in Richard III. and the balcony
scene in Romeo and Juliet. How
does that strike you?"

[ILLUSTRATION]

the king as juliet.

"I'm in, up to the hub, for
anything that will pay, Bilgewater,
but you see I don't know
nothing about play-actn', and
hain't ever seen much of it. I
was too small when pap used to
have 'em at the palace. Do you
reckon you can learn me?"

"Easy!"

"All right. I'm jist afreezn'
for something fresh, anyway. Less commence, right away."

So the duke he told him all about who Romeo was, and who Juliet was, and
said he was used to being Romeo, so the king could be Juliet.

"But if Juliet's such a young gal, Duke, my peeled head and my white
whiskers is goin' to look oncommon odd on her, maybe."

"No, don't you worry—these country jakes won't ever think of that. Besides,
you know, you'll be in costume, and that makes all the difference in the
world; Juliet's in a balcony, enjoying the moonlight before she goes to bed,
and she's got on her night-gown and her ruffled night-cap. Here are the
costumes for the parts."

He got out two or three curtain-calico suits, which he said was meedyevil
armor for Richard III. and t'other chap, and a long white cotton night-shirt
and a ruffled night-cap to match. The king was satisfied; so the duke got out
his book and read the parts over in the most splendid spread-eagle way, prancing
around and acting at the same time, to show how it had got to be done; then
he give the book to the king and told him to get his part by heart.

There was a little one-horse town about three mile down the bend, and
after dinner the duke said he had ciphered out his idea about how to run
in daylight without it being dangersome for Jim; so he allowed he would
go down to the town and fix that thing. The king allowed he would go
too, and see if he couldn't strike something. We was out of coffee, so Jim
said I better go along with them in the canoe and get some.

When we got there, there warn't nobody stirring; streets empty, and
perfectly dead and still, like Sunday. We found a sick nigger sunning himself
in a back yard, and he said everybody that warn't too young or too sick
or too old, was gone to camp-meeting, about two mile back in the woods.
The king got the directions, and allowed he'd go and work that camp-meeting
for all it was worth, and I might go, too.

The duke said what he was after was a printing office. We found it; a little
bit of a concern, up over a carpenter shop—carpenters and printers all gone to
the meeting, and no doors locked. It was a dirty, littered-up place, and had
ink marks, and handbills with pictures of horses and runaway niggers on them,
all over the walls. The duke shed his coat and said he was all right, now. So
me and the king lit out for the camp-meeting.

We got there in about a half an hour, fairly dripping, for it was a most awful

hot day. There was as much as a thousand people there, from twenty mile
around. The woods was full of teams and wagons, hitched everywheres, feeding
out of the wagon troughs and stomping to keep off the flies. There was sheds
made out of poles and roofed over with branches, where they had lemonade and
gingerbread to sell, and piles of watermelons and green corn and such-like truck.

The preaching was going on under the same kinds of sheds, only they was
bigger and held crowds of people. The benches was made out of outside slabs of
logs, with holes bored in the round side to drive sticks into for legs. They
didn't have no backs. The
preachers had high platforms
to stand on, at one end of the
sheds. The women had on sunbonnets;
and some had linseywoolsey
frocks, some gingham
ones, and a few of the young
ones had on calico. Some of the
young men was barefooted, and
some of the children didn't have
on any clothes but just a towlinen
shirt. Some of the old
women was knitting, and some
of the young folks was courting
on the sly.

[ILLUSTRATION]

"courting on the sly."

The first shed we come to,
the preacher was lining out a
hymn. He lined out two lines,
everybody sung it, and it was
kind of grand to hear it, there
was so many of them and they
done it in such a rousing way; then he lined out two more for them to sing—
and so on. The people woke up more and more, and sung louder and louder;
and towards the end, some begun to groan, and some begun to shout. Then the

preacher begun to preach; and begun in earnest, too; and went weaving first to
one side of the platform and then the other, and then a leaning down over the
front of it, with his arms and his body going all the time, and shouting his words
out with all his might; and every now and then he would hold up his Bible and
spread it open, and kind of pass it around this way and that, shouting, "It's the
brazen serpent in the wilderness! Look upon it and live!" And people would
shout out, "Glory!—A-a-men!" And so he went on, and the people groaning
and crying and saying amen:

"Oh, come to the mourners' bench! come, black with sin! (amen!) come,
sick and sore! (amen!) come, lame and halt, and blind! (amen!) come, pore
and needy, sunk in shame! (a-a-men!) come all that's worn, and soiled, and
suffering!—come with a broken spirit! come with a contrite heart! come in
your rags and sin and dirt! the waters that cleanse is free, the door of heaven
stands open—oh, enter in and be at rest!" (a-a-men! glory, glory hallelujah!)

And so on. You couldn't make out what the preacher said, any more, on
account of the shouting and crying. Folks got up, everywheres in the crowd,
and worked their way, just by main strength, to the mourners' bench, with the
tears running down their faces; and when all the mourners had got up there to
the front benches in a crowd, they sung, and shouted, and flung themselves
down on the straw, just crazy and wild.

Well, the first I knowed, the king got agoing; and you could hear him over
everybody; and next he went a-charging up on to the platform and the preacher
he begged him to speak to the people, and he done it. He told them he was a
pirate—been a pirate for thirty years, out in the Indian Ocean, and his crew
was thinned out considerable, last spring, in a fight, and he was home now, to
take out some fresh men, and thanks to goodness he'd been robbed last night,
and put ashore off of a steamboat without a cent, and he was glad of it, it was
the blessedest thing that ever happened to him, because he was a changed man
now, and happy for the first time in his life; and poor as he was, he was
going to start right off and work his way back to the Indian Ocean and put
in the rest of his life trying to turn the pirates into the true path; for he
could do it better than anybody else, being acquainted with all the pirate crews

in that ocean; and though it would take him a long time to get there, without
money, he would get there anyway, and every time he convinced a pirate he
would say to him, "Don't you thank me, don't you give me no credit, it all
belongs to them dear people in
Pokeville camp-meeting, natural
brothers and benefactors of the race
—and that dear preacher there, the
truest friend a pirate ever had!"

And then he busted into tears,
and so did everybody. Then somebody
sings out, "Take up a collection
for him, take up a collection!"
Well, a half a dozen made a jump
to do it, but somebody sings out,
"Let him pass the hat around!"
Then everybody said it, the preacher
too.

[ILLUSTRATION]

"a pirate for thirty years."

So the king went all through
the crowd with his hat, swabbing
his eyes, and blessing the people
and praising them and thanking
them for being so good to the
poor pirates away off there; and every little while the prettiest kind of girls,
with the tears running down their cheeks, would up and ask him would he let
them kiss him, for to remember him by; and he always done it; and some of
them he hugged and kissed as many as five or six times—and he was invited to
stay a week; and everybody wanted him to live in their houses, and said they'd
think it was an honor; but he said as this was the last day of the camp-meeting
he couldn't do no good, and besides he was in a sweat to get to the Indian Ocean
right off and go to work on the pirates.

When we got back to the raft and he come to count up, he found he had collected
eighty-seven dollars and seventy-five cents. And then he had fetched

away a three-gallon jug of whisky, too, that he found under a wagon when we
was starting home through the woods. The king said, take it all around, it laid
over any day he'd ever put in in the missionarying line. He said it warn't no use
talking, heathens don't amount to shucks, alongside of pirates, to work a campmeeting
with.

The duke was thinking he'd been doing pretty well, till the king come to
show up, but after that he didn't think so so much. He had set up and printed
off two little jobs for farmers, in that printing office—horse bills—and took the
money, four dollars. And he had got in ten dollars worth of advertisements for
the paper, which he said he would put in for four dollars if they would pay in
advance—so they done it. The
price of the paper was two dollars
a year, but he took in three
subscriptions for half a dollar
apiece on condition of them
paying him in advance; they
were going to pay in cord-wood
and onions, as usual, but he
said he had just bought the concern
and knocked down the
price as low as he could afford it,
and was going to run it for
cash. He set up a little piece
of poetry, which he made, himself,
out of his own head—three
verses—kind of sweet and saddish—the
name of it was,
"Yes, crush, cold world, this
breaking heart"—and he left
that all set up and ready to
print in the paper and didn't charge nothing for it. Well, he took in nine
dollars and a half, and said he'd done a pretty square day's work for it.

[ILLUSTRATION]

another little job.

Then he showed us another little job he'd printed and hadn't charged for,
because it was for us. It had a picture of a runaway nigger, with a bundle on
a stick, over his shoulder, and "$200 reward" under it. The reading was all
about Jim, and just described him to a dot. It said he run away from St.
Jacques' plantation, forty mile below New Orleans, last winter, and likely went
north, and whoever would catch him and send him back, he could have the
reward and expenses.

"Now," says the duke, "after to-night we can run in the daytime if we
want to. Whenever we see anybody coming, we can tie Jim hand and foot
with a rope, and lay him in the wigwam and show this handbill and say we captured
him up the river, and were too poor to travel on a steamboat, so we got this
little raft on credit from our friends and are going down to get the reward.
Handcuffs and chains would look still better on Jim, but it wouldn't go well
with the story of us being so poor. Too much like jewelry. Ropes are the correct
thing—we must preserve the unities, as we say on the boards."

We all said the duke was pretty smart, and there couldn't be no trouble about
running daytimes. We judged we could make miles enough that night to get
out of the reach of the pow-wow we reckoned the duke's work in the printing office
was going to make in that little town—then we could boom right along, if we
wanted to.

We laid low and kept still, and never shoved out till nearly ten o'clock; then
we slid by, pretty wide away from the town, and didn't hoist our lantern till we
was clear out of sight of it.

When Jim called me to take the watch at four in the morning, he says—

"Huck, does you reck'n we gwyne to run acrost any mo' kings on dis
trip?"

"No," I says, "I reckon not."

"Well," says he, "dat's all right, den. I doan' mine one er two kings, but
dat's enough. Dis one's powerful drunk, en de duke ain' much better."

I found Jim had been trying to get him to talk French, so he could hear what
it was like; but he said he had been in this country so long, and had so much
trouble, he'd forgot it.