University of Virginia Library

4. CHAPTER IV.

EARLY in the morning Squire Hawkins took passage in a
small steamboat, with his family and his two slaves, and
presently the bell rang, the stage-plank was hauled in, and
the vessel proceeded up the river. The children and the
slaves were not much more at ease after finding out that
this monster was a creature of human contrivance than they
were the night before when they thought it the Lord of
heaven and earth. They started, in fright, every time the
gauge-cocks sent out an angry hiss, and they quaked from
head to foot when the mud-valves thundered. The shivering
of the boat under the beating of the wheels was sheer
misery to them.

But of course familiarity with these things soon took away
their terrors, and then the voyage at once became a glorious
adventure, a royal progress through the very heart and home
of romance, a realization of their rosiest wonder-dreams.
They sat by the hour in the shade of the pilot house on the
hurricane deck and looked out over the curving expanses of
the river sparkling in the sunlight. Sometimes the boat
fought the mid-stream current, with a verdant world on either
hand, and remote from both; sometimes she closed in under
a point, where the dead water and the helping eddies were,
and shaved the bank so closely that the decks were swept by
the jungle of over-hanging willows and littered with a spoil
of leaves; departing from these “points” she regularly
crossed the river every five miles, avoiding the “bight” of
the great bends and thus escaping the strong current; sometimes

she went out and skirted a high “bluff” sand-bar in the
middle of the stream, and occasionally followed it up a little
too far and touched upon the shoal water at its head—and
then the intelligent craft refused to run herself aground, but
“smelt” the bar, and straightway the foamy streak that
streamed away from her bows vanished, a great foamless
wave rolled forward and passed her under way, and in this
instant she leaned far over on her side, shied from the bar
and fled square away from the danger like a frightened thing
—and the pilot was lucky if he managed to “straighten her
up” before she drove her nose into the opposite bank; sometimes
she approached a solid wall of tall trees as if she meant
to break through it, but all of a sudden a little crack would
open just enough to admit her, and away she would go plowing
through the “chute” with just barely room enough
between the island on one side and the main land on the
other; in this sluggish water she seemed to go like a racehorse;
now and then small log cabins appeared in little clearings,
with the never-failing frowsy women and girls in soiled
and faded linsey-woolsey leaning in the doors or against woodpiles
and rail fences, gazing sleepily at the passing show;
sometimes she found shoal water, going out at the head of
those “chutes” or crossing the river, and then a deck-hand
stood on the bow and hove the lead, while the boat slowed
down and moved cautiously; sometimes she stopped a moment
at a landing and took on some freight or a passenger while a
crowd of slouchy white men and negroes stood on the bank
and looked sleepily on with their hands in their pantaloons
pockets,—of course—for they never took them out except to
stretch, and when they did this they squirmed about and
reached their fists up into the air and lifted themselves on
tip-toe in an ecstasy of enjoyment.

When the sun went down it turned all the broad river to a
national banner laid in gleaming bars of gold and purple and
crimson; and in time these glories faded out in the twilight
and left the fairy archipelagoes reflecting their fringing foliage
in the steely mirror of the stream.

At night the boat forged on through the deep solitudes of
the river, hardly ever discovering a light to testify to a
human presence—mile after mile and league after league the
vast bends were guarded by unbroken walls of forest that
had never been disturbed by the voice or the foot-fall of a
man or felt the edge of his sacrilegious axe.

An hour after supper the moon came up, and Clay and
Washington ascended to the hurricane deck to revel again in
their new realm of enchantment. They ran races up and
down the deck; climbed about the bell; made friends with
the passenger-dogs chained under the life-boat; tried to make
friends with a passenger-bear fastened to the vergè-staff but
were not encouraged; “skinned the cat” on the hog-chains;
in a word, exhausted the amusement-possibilities of the deck.
Then they looked wistfully up at the pilot house, and finally,
little by little, Clay ventured up there, followed diffidently
by Washington. The pilot turned presently to “get his
stern-marks,” saw the lads and invited them in. Now their
happiness was complete. This cosy little house, built entirely
of glass and commanding a marvelous prospect in every
direction was a magician's throne to them and their enjoyment
of the place was simply boundless.

They sat them down on a high bench and looked miles
ahead and saw the wooded capes fold back and reveal the
bends beyond; and they looked miles to the rear and saw

the silvery highway diminish its breadth by degrees and close
itself together in the distance. Presently the pilot said:

“By George, yonder comes the Amaranth!”

A spark appeared, close to the water, several miles down
the river. The pilot took his glass and looked at it steadily
for a moment, and said, chiefly to himself:

“It can't be the Blue Wing. She couldn't pick us up this
way. It's the Amaranth, sure.”

He bent over a speaking-tube and said:

“Who's on watch down there?”

A hollow, unhuman voice rumbled up through the tube
in answer:

“I am. Second engineer.”

“Good! You want to stir your stumps, now, Harry—the
Amaranth's just turned the point—and she's just a-humping
herself, too!”

The pilot took hold of a rope that stretched out forward,
jerked it twice, and two mellow strokes of the big bell
responded. A voice out on the deck shouted:

“Stand by, down there, with that labboard lead!”

“No, I don't want the lead,” said the pilot, “I want you.
Roust out the old man—tell him the Amaranth's coming.
And go and call Jim—tell him.”

“Aye-aye, sir!”

The “old man” was the captain—he is always called so,
on steamboats and ships; “Jim” was the other pilot. Within
two minutes both of these men were flying up the pilothouse
stairway, three steps at a jump. Jim was in his shirt-sleeves,
with his coat and vest on his arm. He said:

“I was just turning in. Where's the glass?”

He took it and looked:

“Don't appear to be any night-hawk on the jack-staff—it's
the Amaranth, dead sure!”

The captain took a good long look, and only said:

“Damnation!”

George Davis, the pilot on watch, shouted to the night-watchman
on deck:

“How's she loaded?”

[ILLUSTRATION]

SHE'S GAINING.

[Description: 499EAF. Page 045. In-line image of three men in a ship. Two of the men are looking out of the windows, while the third is stearing the ship with a ship's wheel.]

“Two inches by the head, sir.”

“'T ain't enough!”

The captain shouted, now:

“Call the mate. Tell him to call all hands and get a lot
of that sugar forrard—put her ten inches by the head. Lively,
now!”

“Aye-aye, sir!”

A riot of shouting and trampling floated up from below,
presently, and the uneasy steering of the boat soon showed
that she was getting “down by the head.”

The three men in the pilot house began to talk in short,
sharp sentences, low and earnestly. As their excitement
rose, their voices went down. As fast as one of them put
down the spy-glass another took it up—but always with a
studied air of calmness. Each time the verdict was:

“She's a gaining!”

The captain spoke through the tube:

“What steam are you carrying?”

“A hundred and forty-two, sir! But she's getting hotter
and hotter all the time.”

The boat was straining and groaning and quivering like a
monster in pain. Both pilots were at work now, one on each
side of the wheel, with their coats and vests off, their bosoms
and collars wide open and the perspiration flowing down their
faces. They were holding the boat so close to the shore that

the willows swept the guards almost from stem to stern.

“Stand by!” whispered George.

“All ready!” said Jim, under his breath.

“Let her come!”

The boat sprang away from the bank like a deer, and
darted in a long diagonal toward the other shore. She closed
in again and thrashed her fierce way along the willows as
before. The captain put down the glass:

“Lord how she walks up on us! I do hate to be beat!”

“Jim,” said George, looking straight ahead, watching the
slightest yawing of the boat and promptly meeting it with
the wheel, “how'll it do to try Murderer's Chute?”

“Well, it's—it's taking chances. How was the cotton-wood
stump on the false point below Boardman's Island this
morning?”

“Water just touching the roots.”

“Well it's pretty close work. That gives six feet scant in
the head of Murderer's Chute. We can just barely rub
through if we hit it exactly right. But it's worth trying.
She don't dare tackle it!”—meaning the Amaranth.

In another instant the Boreas plunged into what seemed a
crooked creek, and the Amaranth's approaching lights were
shut out in a moment. Not a whisper was uttered, now, but
the three men stared ahead into the shadows and two of them
spun the wheel back and forth with anxious watchfulness
while the steamer tore along. The chute seemed to come to
an end every fifty yards, but always opened out in time.
Now the head of it was at hand. George tapped the big bell
three times, two leadsmen sprang to their posts, and in a
moment their weird cries rose on the night air and were
caught up and repeated by two men on the upper deck:

“No-o bottom!”

“De-e-p four!”

“Half three!”

“Quarter three!”

“Mark under wa-a-ter three!”

“Half twain!”

“Quarter twain!——”

[ILLUSTRATION]

"BY THE MARK TWAIN!"

[Description: 499EAF. Page 047. In-line image of a man on the deck of a ship swinging a rope around.]

Davis pulled a couple of ropes—there was a jingling of
small bells far below, the boat's speed slackened, and the pent
steam began to whistle and the gauge-cocks to scream:

“By the mark twain!”

“Quar-ter-her-erless
twain!”

“Eight and a half!”

“Eight feet!”

“Seven-ana-half!——”

Another jingling of little
bells and the wheels
ceased turning altogether.
The whistling of the steam
was something frightful,
now—it almost drowned
all other noises.

“Stand by to meet her!”

George had the wheel
hard down and was standing
on a spoke.

“All ready!”

The boat hesitated—
seemed to hold her breath, as did the captain and pilots—
and then she began to fall away to starboard and every eye
lighted:

“Now then!—meet her! meet her! Snatch her!”

The wheel flew to port so fast that the spokes blended into
a spider-web—the swing of the boat subsided—she steadied
herself——

“Seven feet!”

“Sev—six and a half!”

“Six feet! Six f——”

Bang! She hit the bottom! George shouted through
the tube:

“Spread her wide open! Whale it at her!”

Pow—wow—chow! The escape-pipes belched snowy
pillars of steam aloft, the boat ground and surged and trem-bled—and

slid over into——

“M-a-r-k twain!”

“Quarter-her——”

“Tap! tap! tap!” (to signify “Lay in the leads.”)

And away she went, flying up the willow shore, with the
whole silver sea of the Mississippi stretching abroad on every
hand.

No Amaranth in sight!

“Ha-ha, boys, we took a couple of tricks that time!” said
the captain.

And just at that moment a red glare appeared in the head
of the chute and the Amaranth came springing after them!

“Well, I swear!”

“Jim, what is the meaning of that?”

“I'll tell you what's the meaning of it. That hail we had
at Napoleon was Wash Hastings, wanting to come to Cairo
—and we didn't stop. He's in that pilot house, now, showing
those mud turtles how to hunt for easy water.”

“That's it! I thought it wasn't any slouch that was running
that middle bar in Hog-eye Bend. If it's Wash
Hastings—well, what he don't know about the river ain't
worth knowing—a regular gold-leaf, kid-glove, diamondbreastpin
pilot Wash Hastings is. We won't take any tricks
off of him, old man!”

“I wish I'd a stopped for him, that's all.”

The Amaranth was within three hundred yards of the
Boreas, and still gaining. The “old man” spoke through
the tube:

“What is she carrying now?”

“A hundred and sixty-five, sir!”

“How's your wood?”

“Pine all out—cypress half gone—eating up cotton-wood
like pie!”

“Break into that rosin on the main deck—pile it in, the
boat can pay for it!”

Soon the boat was plunging and quivering and screaming

[ILLUSTRATION]

FAST TOGETHER.

[Description: 499EAF. Illustration page of two men dueling inside with a large crowd gathering around them.] more madly than ever. But the Amaranth's head was almost
abreast the Boreas's stern:

“How's your steam, now, Harry?”

“Hundred and eighty-two, sir!”

“Break up the casks of bacon in the forrard hold! Pile
it in! Levy on that turpentine in the fantail—drench every
stick of wood with it!”

The boat was a moving earthquake by this time:

“How is she now?”

“A hundred and ninety-six and still a-swelling!—water
below the middle gauge-cocks!—carrying every pound she
can stand!—nigger roosting on the safety-volve!”

“Good! How's your draft?”

“Bully! Every time a nigger heaves a stick of wood into
the furnace he goes out the chimney with it!”

The Amaranth drew steadily up till her jack-staff breasted
the Boreas's wheel-house—climbed along inch by inch till her
chimneys breasted it—crept along, further and further till
the boats were wheel to wheel—and then they closed up with
a heavy jolt and locked together tight and fast in the middle
of the big river under the flooding moonlight! A roar and
a hurrah went up from the crowded decks of both steamers
—all hands rushed to the guards to look and shout and gesticulate—the
weight careened the vessels over toward each
other—officers flew hither and thither cursing and storming,
trying to drive the people amidships—both captains were
leaning over their railings shaking their fists, swearing and
threatening—black volumes of smoke rolled up and canopied
the scene, delivering a rain of sparks upon the vessels—two
pistol shots rang out, and both captains dodged unhurt and
the packed masses of passengers surged back and fell apart
while the shrieks of women and children soared above the
intolerable din——

And then there was a booming roar, a thundering crash,
and the riddled Amaranth dropped loose from her hold and
drifted helplessly away!

Instantly the fire-doors of the Boreas were thrown open

and the men began dashing buckets of water into the furnaces—for
it would have been death and destruction to stop
the engines with such a head of steam on.

As soon as possible the Boreas dropped down to the floating
wreck and took off the dead, the wounded and the unhurt—
at least all that could be got at, for the whole forward half
of the boat was a shapeless ruin, with the great chimneys
lying crossed on top of it, and underneath were a dozen victims
imprisoned alive and wailing for help. While men with
axes worked with might and main to free these poor fellows,
the Boreas's boats went about, picking up stragglers from the
river.

And now a new horror presented itself. The wreck took
fire from the dismantled furnaces! Never did men work
with a heartier will than did those stalwart braves with the
axes. But it was of no use. The fire ate its way steadily,
despising the bucket brigade that fought it. It scorched the
clothes, it singed the hair of the axemen—it drove them
back, foot by foot—inch by inch—they wavered, struck a
final blow in the teeth of the enemy, and surrendered. And
as they fell back they heard prisoned voices saying:

“Don't leave us! Don't desert us! Don't, don't do it!”

And one poor fellow said:

“I am Henry Worley, striker of the Amaranth! My
mother lives in St. Louis. Tell her a lie for a poor devil's
sake, please. Say I was killed in an instant and never knew
what hurt me—though God knows I've neither scratch nor
bruise this moment! It's hard to burn up in a coop like this
with the whole wide world so near. Good-bye boys—we've
all got to come to it at last, anyway!”

The Boreas stood away out of danger, and the ruined
steamer went drifting down the stream an island of wreathing
and climbing flame that vomited clonds of smoke from
time to time, and glared more fiercely and sent its luminous
tongues higher and higher after each emission. A shriek at
intervals told of a captive that had met his doom. The
wreck lodged upon a sandbar, and when the Boreas turned

[ILLUSTRATION]

ONE OF THE VICTIMS.

[Description: 499EAF. Page 051. In-line image of a man lying in bed with another man, presumably a doctor standing over him.] the next point on her upward journey it was still burning with
scarcely abated fury.

When the boys came down into the main saloon of the
Boreas, they saw a pitiful sight and heard a world of pitiful
sounds. Eleven poor creatures lay dead and forty more lay
moaning, or pleading or screaming, while a score of Good
Samaritans moved among them doing what they could to relieve
their sufferings; bathing their skinless faces and bodies
with linseed oil and lime water and covering the places with
bulging masses of raw cotton that gave to every face and
form a dreadful and unhuman aspect.

A little wee French midshipman of fourteen lay fearfully
injured, but never uttered a sound till a physician of Memphis
was about to dress his hurts. Then he said:

“Can I get well? You need not be afraid to tell me.”

“No—I—I am afraid you can not.”

“Then do not waste your time with me—help those that
can get well.”

“But——”

“Help those that can get well! It is not for me to be a
girl. I carry the blood of eleven generations of soldiers in
my veins!”

The physician—himself a man who had seen service in the

navy in his time—touched his hat to this little hero, and
passed on.

The head engineer of the Amaranth, a grand specimen of
physical manhood, struggled to his feet a ghastly spectacle
and strode toward his brother, the second engineer, who was
unhurt. He said:

“You were on watch. You were boss. You would not
listen to me when I begged you to reduce your steam. Take
that!—take it to my wife and tell her it comes from me by
the hand of my murderer! Take it—and take my curse
with it to blister your heart a hundred years—and may you
live so long!”

And he tore a ring from his finger, stripping flesh and
skin with it, threw it down and fell dead!

But these things must not be dwelt upon. The Boreas
landed her dreadful cargo at the next large town and delivered
it over to a multitude of eager hands and warm southern
hearts—a cargo amounting by this time to 39 wounded
persons and 22 dead bodies. And with these she delivered a
list of 96 missing persons that had drowned or otherwise
perished at the scene of the disaster.

A jury of inquest was impaneled, and after due deliberation
and inquiry they returned the inevitable American verdict
which has been so familiar to our ears all the days of
our lives—“Nobody to blame.”[1]