THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY ILLINOiS RISTORICAI SURVEY Four Months in a Sneak- Box. A BOAT VOYAGE OF 260O MILES DOWN THE OHIO AND MISSISSIPPI RIVERS, AND ALONG THE GULF OF MEXICO. BY NATHANIEL H. BISHOP, AUTHOR OF "a THOUSAND MILEs' WALK ACROSS SOUTH AMERICA,' ANU '"VoVAOE OK THE PAl'ER CANUii." BOSTON: LEE AND SHEPARD, PUBLISHERS. NEW YORK: CHARLES T. DILLINGHAM. 1S79. COPYRIGHT, 1S79, By Nathaniel II. Bishop. Electrotyped at the Boston Stereotype Foundry, 19 Spring Laue. TO THE OFFICERS AND EMPLOYEES OF THE LIGHT HOUSE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE UNITED STATES Sbls ^ook is pcb'uatcb BY ONE WHO HAS LEARXED TO RESPECT THEIR HONEST, INTELLIGENT AND EFFICIENT LABORS IN SERVING THEIR GOVERNMENT, THEIR COUNTRYMEN, AND MANKIND GENERALLY. 1085S7 INTRODUCTION. Eighteen months ago the author gave to the public his " Voyage of the Paper Canoe : — a geographical journey of 25oo miles from Ql'ebec to the Gulf of Mexico, during the YEARS 1874-5." The kind reception by the American press of the author's first journey to the great southern sea, and its republication in Great Britain and in France within so short a time of its appearance in the United States, have encouraged him to give the public a companion volume, — "Four Months in A Sneak-Box," — which is a relation of the expe- riences of a second cruise to the Gulf of INIexico, but by a different route from that followed in the " Voyage of the Paper Canoe." This time the author procured one of the smallest and most com- fortable of boats — a purely American model, devel- oped bv the bay-men of the New Jersey coast of the United States, and recently introduced to the gunning V VI INTRODUCTION. fraternity as the Barnegat Sneak-Box. This curi- ous and stanch little craft, though only twelve feet in length, proved a most comfortable and serviceable home while- the author rovs^ed in it more than 2600 miles down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, and along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, until he reached the goal of his voyage — the mouth of the wild Suwanee River — which was the terminus of his "Voyage of the Paper Canoe." The maps which illustrate the contours of the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, like those in the other volume, are the most reliable ever given to the public, having been drawn and engraved, by con- tract for the work, by the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey Bureau. Lake George, Warren Co., New York State, September ist, 1879. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. THE BOAT FOR THE VOYAGE. Canoes for Shallow Streams axd FREquEXX Portages. — SXEAK-BOXES FOR DeEP WATERCOURSES. HiSTORY AXD Description of the Barxegat Sneak-box. — A Walk Dowx Eel Street to Maxahawken Marshes. — Hoxest George the Boat-builder.— The Buildixg of the Sxeak- Box "Cextexnial Republic." — Its Transportation to THE Ohio River i CHAPTER H. SOURCES OF THE OHIO RIVER. Description of the Monongahela and Alleghany Riv- ers. —The Ohio River. — Explorations of Cavelier de LA Salle. — Names given by Ancient Cartographers to the Ohio. — Routes of the Aborigines from the Great Lakes to the Ohio River 19 CHAPTER HI. FROM PITTSBURGH TO BLENNERHASSET'S ISLAND. The Start for the Gulf. — Caught in the Ice Raft. — Camping ox the Ohio. — The Grave Creek Mound. — An Indian Sepulchre. — Blennerhassets Island. — Aaron Burr's Conspiracy. — A Ruined Family ^9 vii Vlll CONTENTS. CHAPTER IV. FROM BLENNERHASSET'S ISLAND TO CINCINNATI. River Camps. — Tiie Shanty-Boats and River Migrants. — Various Experiences. — Arrival at Cincinnati. —The Sneak-box frozen up in Pleasant Run. — A Tailor's Family. — A Night under a German Coverlet 55 CHAPTER V. FROM CINCINNATI TO THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. Cincinnati. — Music and Pork in PoRKOPotis. — The Big Bone Lick of Fossil Elephants. — Colonel Croghan's Visit to the Lick. — Portage around the "Falls" at Louisville, Kentucky. — Stuck in the Mud. —The First Steamboat of the West. — Victor Hugo on the Situa- tion. — A Freebooter's Den. — Whooping and Sand-hill Cranes. — The Sneak-box enters the Mississippi ... 79 CHAPTER VI. DESCENT OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. Leave Cairo, Illinois. — The Longest River in the World.— Book Geography and Boat Geography.— Chick- asaw Bluff. — Meeting with the Parakeets. — Fort Donaldson. — Earthquakes and Lakes. — Weird Beauty of Reelfoot Lake. —Joe Eckel's Bar. — Shanty-boat Cooking. — Fort Pillow. — Memphis. — A Negro Jus- tice. — "De Common Law ob Mississippi" 115 CHAPTER VII. DESCENT OF THE MISSISSIPPI TO NEW ORLEANS. A Flatboat bound for Texas. — A Flat-man on River Physics. — Adrift and Asleep. — Seeing the Earth's Little Moon. — Vicksburgh. —Jefferson Davis's Cot- CONTEXTS. IX TON Plantation, and its Negro Owner. — Dying in iiio Boat. — How to civilize Chinese. — A Swim of One Hun- dred and Twenty Miles ON THE Mississippi. — Twenty- four Hours IN THE Water. — Arrival in the Crescent City 150 CHAPTER VIII. NEW ORLEANS. Bienville and the City of the Past. — French and Span- ish Rule in the New World. — Louisiana ceded to the United States. — Captain Eads and his Jetties. — Transportations of Cereals to Europe. — Charles Morgan. — Creole Types of Citizens. — Levees and Crawfish. — Drainage of the City into Lake Pont- chartrain 195 CHAPTER IX. ON THE GULF OF T^IEXICO. Leave New Orleans. — The Roughs at Work. — De- tained AT New Basin. — Saddles introduces Himself. — Camping on Lake Pontchartrain. — The Light-House of Point aux Herbes. — The Rigolets. — Marshes and JMosquitoes. — Lmportant Use of the MosqyiTO and Blow-fly. — St. Joseph's Light. — An Exciting Pull TO Bay St. Louis. — A Light-keeper lost in the Sea. — Battle of the Sharks. — Biloxi. — The Water-cress Garden. — Little Jennie 209 CHAPTER X. FROM BILOXI TO CAPE SAN BLAS. Points on the Gulf Coast. — Mobile Bay. — The Hermit OF Dauphine Island. — Bon Secours Bay. — A Cracker's Daughters. — The Portage to the Perdido. — The Port- age from the Perdido to Big Lagoon. — Pensacola X CONTENTS. Bay. — Santa Rosa Sound. — A New London Fisher- man. — Catching the Pompano. — A Negro Preacher AND White Sinners. — A Day and a Night with a Mur- derer. — St. Andrew's Sound. — Arrival at Cape San Blas 240 CHAPTER XI. FROM CAPE SAN BLAS TO ST. MARKS. A Portage across Cape San Blas. — The Cow-Hunters. — A Visit to the Light-House. — Once more on the Sea. — Portage into St. Vincent Sound. — Apalachicola. — St. George's Sound and Ocklockony River. — Arrival at St. Marks. — The Negro Postmaster. — A Philan- thropist AND his Neighbors. — A Continuous and Pro- tected Water-Way from the Mississippi River to the Atlantic Coast 273 CHAPTER Xn. FROM ST. MARKS TO THE SUWANEE RIVER. Along the Coast. — Saddles breaks down. — A Refuge WITH the Fishermen. — Camp in the Palm Forest. — Parting with Saddles. — Our Neighbor the Alliga- tor. — Discovery of the True Crocodile in Florida. — The Devil's Wood-pile. — Deadman's Bay. — Bowlegs Point. — The Coast Survey Camp. — A Day aboard the "Ready." — The Suwanee River. — The End 2S8 ILLUSTRATIONS. Drawn by F. T. Merrill. Engraved by John Andrew & Son. PAGE Shanty-Boats. — The Champion Floaters of the West, Frontispiece. Diagram of Parts of Boat, 14 Indian in Canoe, 28 The Start. — Head of the Ohio River, 31 Indian Mound at Moundsville, West Virginia, ... 54 A Night under a German Coverlet, 78 Popular Idea of the Nesting of Cranes, in Stern-wheel Western Tow-Boat pushing Flatboats, 114 Meeting with the Parakeets, 125 Dying in his Boat, 177 BOYTON descending THE MISSISSIPPI, 1 87 New Orleans Roughs amusing Themselves, . . . .214 Arrival at the Gulf of Mexico. — Camp Mosquito, . 239 The Portage across Crooked Island, 269 Saddles breaks down, 292 Parting with Saddles, 30 Last Night on the Gulf of Mexico, 322 xi -> LIST OF MAPS DRAWN AND ENGRAVED AT THE UNITED STATES COAST AND GEODETIC SURVEY BUREAU, TO ILLUSTRATE N. H. BISHOP'S BOAT VOYAGES. PAGE I. General Map of Routes followed by the Au- thor DURING two Voyages made to the Gulf OF Mexico, in the Years 1874-6, , . Opposite i GUIDE MAPS OF ROUTE FOLLOWED in duck-boat "centennial republic," along the gulf of mexico, in 1 876. 2. From New Orleans, Louisiana, to Mobile Bay, Alabama, Opposite 209 3. From Mobile Bay, Alabama, to Cape San Blas, Florida, Opposite 247 4. From Cape San Blas, Florida, to Cedar Keys, Florida, Opposite 273 MAP SHOWING RIVER AND PORTAGE ROUTES across FLORIDA FROM THE GULF OF MEXICO to the atlantic ocean. 5. Route followed by the Author in Paper Canoe "Maria Theresa," in 1875, ■ • • ■ Opposite 319 xii FOUR MONTHS IN A Si\EAK-BOX. CHAPTER I. THE BOAT FOR THE VOYAGE. CAXOES FOR SHALLOW STREAMS AND FREQUENT PORTAGES. — ■ SNEAK-BOXES FOR DEEP WATERCOURSES. — HISTORY AND DE- SCRIPTION OF THE BARNEGAT SNEAK-BOX. — A WALK DOWN EEL STREET TO MANAHAWKEN MARSHES. — HONEST GEORGE, THE BOAT-BUILDER. — THE BUILDING OF THE SNEAK-BOX "CEN- TENNIAL REPUBLIC." — ITS TRANSPORTATION TO THE OHIO RIVER. T HE reader who patiently followed the au- thor in his long "Voyage of the Paper Canoe," from the high latitude of the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the warmer regions of the Gulf of Mexico, may desire to know the rea- sons which impelled the canoeist to exchange his light, graceful, and swift paper craft for the comical-looking but more commodious and comfortable Barnegat sneak-box, or duck-boat. Having navigated more than eight thousand miles in sail-boats, row-boats, and canoes, upon the fresh and salt watercourses of the North American continent (usually without a compan- I I 2 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. ion), a hard-earned experience has taught me that while the light, frail canoe is indispensable for exploring shallow streams, for shooting rap- ids, and for making long portages from one watercourse to another, the deeper and more continuous water-ways may be more comfortably traversed in a stronger and heavier boat, which offers many of the advantages of a portable home. To find such a boat — one that possessed many desirable points in a small hull — had been with me a study of years. I commenced to search for it in my boyhood — twenty-five years ago ; and though I have carefully examined numerous small boats while travelling in seven foreign countries, and have studied the models of min- iature craft in museums, and at exhibitions of marine architecture, I failed to discover the object of my desire, until, on the sea-shore of New Jersey, I saw for the first time what is known among gunners as the Barnegat sneak- box. Having owned, and thoroughly tested in the waters of Barnegat and Little Egg Harbor bays, five of these boats, I became convinced that their claims for the good-will of the boating fraternity had not been over-estimated; so when I planned my second voyage from northern America to the Gulf of Mexico, and selected the great water- courses of the west and south (the Ohio and Mis- FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 3 sissippi rivers) as the route to be explored and studied, I chose the Barnegat sneak-box as the most comfortable model combined with other advantages for a voyager's use. The sneak-box offered ample stowage capacit}^, while canoes built to hold one person were not large enough to carry the amount of baggage necessary for the voyage; for I was to avoid hotels and towns, to live in my boat day and night, to carry an ample stock of provisions, and to travel in as comfort- able a manner as possible. In fact, I. adopted a very home-like boat, which, though only twelve feet long, four feet wide, and thirteen inches deep, was strong, stiff, dry, and safe; a craft that could be sailed or rowed, as wind, weather, or inclination might dictate, — the weight of which hardly exceeded two hundred pounds, — and could be conveniently transported from one stream to another in an ordinary wagon. A Nautilus, or any improved type of canoe, would have been lighter and more easily trans- ported, and could have been paddled at a higher speed with the same effort expended in rowing the heavier sneak-box; but the canoe did not offer the peculiar advantages of comfort and freedom of bodily motion possessed by its unique fellow-craft. Experienced canoeists agree that a canoe of fourteen feet in length, which weighs only seventy pounds, if built of wood, bark, can- vas, or paper, when out of the water and resting 4 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. upon the ground, or even when bedded on some soft material, like grass or rushes, cannot support the sleeping weight of the canoeist for many suc- cessive nights without becoming strained. Lisht indeed must be the weight and slender and elastic the form of the man who can sleep many nights comfortably in a seventy-pound canoe without injuring it. Cedar canoes, after being subjected to such use for some time, gen- erally become leaky; so, to avoid this disaster, the canoeist, when threatened with wet weather, is forced to the disagreeable task of troubling some private householder for a shelter, or run the risk of injuring his boat by packing himself away in its narrow, coffin-like quarters and dreaming that he is a sardine, while his restless weight is every moment straining his delicate canoe, and visions of future leaks arise to disturb his tran- quillity. The one great advantage possessed by a canoe is its lightness. Canoeists dwell upon the impor- tance of the LIGHT WEIGHT of their canoes, and the ease with which they can be carried. If the canoeist is to sleep in his delicate craft while making a long journey, she must be made much heavier than the perfected models now in use in this country, many of which are under seventy- five pounds' weight. This additional weight is at once fatal to speed, and becomes burdensome when the canoeist is forced to carry his canoe FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 5 upon his OWN shouldcM-s over a portage. A sneak-box built to carry one person weighs about three times as much as a well-built cedar canoe. This remarkable little boat has a history which does not reach very far back into the present century- With the assistance of Mr. William Errickson of Barnegat, and Dr. William P. Haywood of West Creek, Ocean County, New Jersev, I have been able to rescue from obliv- ion and bring to the light of day a correct his- tory of the Barnegat sneak-box. Captain Hazelton Seaman, of West Creek vil- lage, Xew Jerse}', a boat-builder and an expert shooter of wild-fowl, about the year 1S36, con- ceived the idea of constructing for his own use a low-decked boat, or gunning-punt, in which, when its deck was covered with sedge, he could secrete himself from the wild-fowl while gunning in Barnegat and Little Egg Harbor bays. It was important that the boat should be suffi- ciently light to enable a single sportsman to pull her from the water on to the low points of the bay shores. During the winter months, when the oreat marshes were at times incrusted with snow, and the shallow creeks covered with ice, — obstacles which must be crossed to reach the open waters of the sound, — it would be neces- sary to use her as a sled, to effect which end a 6 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. pair of light oaken strips were screwed to the bottom of the sneak-box, when she could be easily pushed by the gunner, and the transporta- tion of the oars, sail, blankets, guns, ammunition, and provisions (all of which stowed under the hatch and locked up as snugly as if in a strong- chest) became a very simple matter. While secreted in his boat, on the watch for fowl, with his craft hidden by a covering of grass or sedge, the gunner could approach within shooting-dis- tance of a flock of unsuspicious ducks; and this being done in a sneaking manner (though Mro Seaman named the result of his first eflbrt the "Devil's Coffin"), the bay-men gave her the so- briquet of " SNEAK-BOX "; and this name she has retained to the present day. Since Captain Seaman built his " Devil's Cof- fin," forty years ago, the model has been improved by various builders, until it is believed that it has almost attained perfection. The boat has no cheer, and sets low in the water. This lack of sheer is supplied by a light canvas apron which is tacked to the deck, and presents, when stretched upward by a stick two feet in length, a convex surface to a head sea. The water which breaks upon the deck, forward of the cockpit, is turned off at the sides of the boat in almost the same manner as a snow-plough clears a railroad track of snow. The apron also protects the head and shoulders of the rower from cold head winds. FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 7 The first sneak-box built by Captain Seainan had a piece of canvas stretched upon an oaken hoop, so fastened to the deck that when a head sea struck the bow, the hoop and canvas were forced upward so as to throw the water off its sides, thus effectually preventing its ingress into the hold of the craft. The improved apron origi- nated with Mr. John Crammer, Jr., a short time after Captain Seaman built the first sneak-box. The second sneak-box was constructed by jNIr. Crammer; and afterwards ISIr. Samuel Ferine, an old and much respected bay-man, of Barne- gat, built the third one. The last two men have finished their voyage of life, but "^^ Uncle Haze," — as he is familiarly called by his many admirers, — the originator of the tiny craft which may well be called multum in parvo, and which carried me, its single occupant, safely and comfortably twenty- six hundred miles, from Pittsburgh to Cedar Keys, still lives at West Creek, builds yachts as well as he does sneak-boxes, and puts to the blush younger gunners by the energy displayed and success attained in the vigorous pursuit of wild- fowl shooting in the bays which fringe the coast of Ocean County, New Jersey. A few years since, this ingenious man invented an improvement on the marine life-saving car, which has been adopted by the United States government; and during the year 1875 ^^ con- structed a new ducking-punt with a low paddle- 8 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. wheel at its stern, for the purpose of more easily and secretly approaching flocks of wild-fowl. The peculiar advantages of the sneak-box were known to but few of the hunting and shooting fraternity, and, with the exception of an occasional visitor, were used only by the oystermen, fishermen, and v.'ild-fowl shooters of Barnegat and Little Egg Harbor bays, until the New^ Jersey Southern Railroad and its connect- ing branches penetrated to the eastern shores of New Jersey, wdien educated amateur sportsmen from the cities quickly recognized in the little gunning-punt all they had long desired to com- bine in one small boat. Mr. Charles Hallock, in his paper the " Forest and Stream," of April 23, 1874, gave drawings and a description of the sneak-box, and fairly presented its claims to public favor. The sneak-box is not a monopoly of any par- ticular builder, but it requires peculiar talent to build one, — the kind of talent which enables one man to cut out a perfect axe-handle, while the master-carpenter finds it difhcult to accomplish the same thing. The best yacht-builders in Ocean Count}' generally fail in modelling a sneak-box, while many second-rate mechanics along the shore, who could not possibly con- struct a yacht that would sail well, can make a perfect sneak-box, or gunning-skifl'. All this may be accounted for by recognizing the fact FOUR MONTHS IX A SNEAK-BOX. 9 that the water-Hnes of the sneak-box are peculiar, and differ materially from those of row-boats, sail- boats, and 3achts. Having a spoon-shaped bot- tom and bow, the sneak-box moves rather over the water than through it, and this peculiarity, together with its broad beam, gives the boat such stiffness that two persons may stand up- right in her while she is moving through the water, and troll their lines while fishing, or dis- charge their guns, without careening the boat; a valuable advantage not possessed by our best cruising canoes. The boat sails well on the wind, though hard to pull against a strong head sea. A tin-shaped centre-board takes the place of a keel. It can be quickly removed from the trunk, or centre- board well, and stored under the deck. The flatness of her floor permits the sneak-box to run in very shallow water while being rowed or when sailino;- before the wind without the centre- board. Some of these boats, carrying a weight of three hundred pounds, will float in four to six inches of water. The favorite material for boat-building in the United States is white cedar ( Citpressiis tJiyoi- des), which grows in dense forests in the swamps along the coast of New Jersey, as well as in other parts of North America. The wood is both white and brown, soft, fine-grained, and very light and durable. No wood used in boat-building can lO FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. compare with the white cedar in resisting the changes from a wet to a dry state, and vice versa. The tree grows tall and straight. The lower part of the trunk with the diverging roots fur- nish knee timbers and carlines for the sneak-box. The ribs or timbers, and the carlines, are usually \\ X \\ inches in dimension, and are placed about ten inches apart. The frame above and below is covered with half-inch cedar sheathing, which is not less than six inches in width. The boat is strong enough to support a heavy man upon its deck, and when well built will rank next to the seamless paper boats of Mr. Waters of Troy, and the seamless wooden canoes of Messrs. Herald, Gordon & Stephenson, of the province of Ontario, Canada, in freedom from leakage. During a cruise of twenty-six hundred miles not one drop of water leaked through the seams of the Centennial Republic. Her under planking was nicely joined, and' the seams calked with cotton wicking, and afterwards filled with white- lead paint and putty. The deck planks, of seven inches width, were not joined, but were tongued and grooved, the tongues and grooves being well covered with a thick coat of white-lead paint. The item of cost is another thing to be consid- ered in regard to this boat. The usual cost of a first-class canoe of sevent}' pounds' weight, built after the model of the Rob Roy or Nautilus, with FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. II all its belonsrinfrs, is about one hundred and twenty-five dollars; and these figures deter many a young man from enjo3'ing the ennobling and healthful exercise of canoeing. A first-class sneak-box, with spars, sail, oars, anchor, &c., can be obtained for seventy-five dollars, and if several were ordered by a club the}' could prob- ably be bought for sixty-five dollars each. The price of a sneak-box, as ordinarily built in Ocean Count}', New Jersey, is about forty dol- lars. The Centennial Republic cost about seventy-five dollars, and a city boat-builder would not duplicate her for less than one hun- dred and twenty-five dollars. The builders of the sneak-boxes have not yet acquired the art of overcharging their customers; they do not expect to receive more than one dollar and fifty cents or two dollars per day for their labor; and some of them arc even so unwise as to risk their reputation by offering to furnish these boats tor twenty-five dollars each. Such a craft, after a little hard usage, would leak as badly as most cedar canoes, and would be totally unfit for the trials of a long cruise. The diajrram oriven of the Centennial Republic will enable the reader of aquatic proclivities to understand the general principles upon which these boats are built. As they should be rated as third-class freight on railroads, it is more economical for the amateur to purchase a first- 12 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. class boat at Barnegat, Manahawkcn, or West Creek, in Ocean Count}-, New Jerse}-, along the Tuckerton Railroad, than to have a workman elsewhere, and one unacquainted w-ith this pe- culiar model, experiment upon its construction at the purchaser's cost, and perhaps loss. One bright morning, in the early part of the fall of 1875, ■'■ trudged on foot down one of the level roads which lead from the villasfe of INIana- hawken through the swamps to the edge of the extensive salt marshes that frins^e the shores of the bay. This road bore the euphonious name of £el Street^ — so named by the boys of the town. When about half-way from its end, I turned off to the right, and followed a wooded lane to the house of an honest surf-man, Captain George Bogart, who had recently left his old home on the beach, beside the restless waves of the Atlantic, and had resumed his avocation as a sneak-box builder. The house and its small fields of low, arable land were environed on three sides by dense cedar and whortleberry swamps, but on the eastern boundary of the larm the broad salt marshes opened to the view, and beyond their limit were the salt waters of the bay, which were shut in from the ocean by a long, narrow, sandy island, known to the fishermen and wreckers as Long Beach, — the low, white sand-dunes of FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. I3 which were lifted above the horizon, and seemed suspended in the air as by a mirage. Across th3 wide, savanna-like plains came in gentle breezes the tonic breath of the sea, while hun- dreds, aye, thousands of mosquitoes settled qui- etly upon me, and quickly presented their bills. In this sequestered nook, far from the bustle of the town, I found " Honest George," so much occupied in the construction of a sneak-box, under the shade of spreading willows, as to be wholly unconscious of the presence of the myr- iads of phlebotomists which covered every avail- able inch of his person exposed to their attacks. The appropriate surroundings of a surf-man's house were here, scattered on every side in delisrhtful confusion. There were piles of old rigo-inor, iron bolts and rinses, tarred parcelling, and cabin-doors, — in fact, all the spoils that a treacherous sea had thrown upon the beach; a sea so disastrous to many, but so friendly to the Barnesat wrecker, — who, bv the wav, is not so black a character as Mistress Rumor paints him. A tar-like odor everywhere prevailed, and I won- dered, while breathing this wholesome air, why this surf-man of daring and renown had left his proper place upon the beach near the life-saving station, v/here his valuable experience, brave heart, and strong, brawny arms were needed to rescue from the ocean's grasp the poor victims of misfortune whose dead bodies are washed 14 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. upon the hard strand of the Jersey shores every 3'ear from the wrecks of the many vessels which- pound out their existence upon the dreaded coast of Barnegat? A question easily answered, — political preferment. His place had been tilled by a man who had never pulled an oar in the surf, but had followed the occupation of a tradesman. Thus Honest George, rejected by " the ser- vice," had left the beach, and crossing the wide bays to the main land, had taken up his abode under the willows by the marshes, but not too far from his natural element, for he could even now, while he hammered away on his sneak-boxes, hear the ceaseless moaning of the sea. A verbal contract was soon made, and George agreed to build me for twenty-live dollars the best boat that had ever left his shop; he to do all the work upon the hull and spars, while the fu- ture owner was to supply all the materials at his own cost. The oars and sail were not included in the contract, but were made by other parties. In November, when I settled all the bills of construction, cost of materials, oar-locks, oars, spars, sail, anchor, &c., the sum-total did not exceed seventy-five dollars; and when the ac- counts of more than tw^enty boats and canoes built for me had been looked over, I concluded that the little craft, constructed by the surf-man, was, for the amount it cost and the advantages Rowlock on a iTiovo,ble stunchion ^Rurlderpost l/^XliiXlSin bneak-box Uentennial Republic Length I2feet Weight 200 pourids. w 1A»<5 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 1 5 it gave me, the best investment I had ever made in things that float upon the water. Without a name painted upon her hull, and, like the " Maria Theresa " paper canoe, without a flag to decorate her, but with spars, sail, oars, rudder, anchor, cushions, blankets, cooking-kit, and double- barrelled gun, with ammunition securely locked under the hatch, the Centennial Republic, my future travelling companion, was ready by the middle of November for the descent of the west- ern rivers to the Gulf of Mexico. Captain George Bogart, attentive to the last to his pet craft, atlectionately sewed her up in a covering of burlap, to protect her smooth surface from scratches during the transit over railroads. The two light oaken strips, which had been screwed to the bottom of the boat, kept the hull secure from injury by contact with nails, bolt- heads, &c., while she was being carried in the freight-cars of the Tuckerton, New Jersey, South- ern and Pennsylvania railroads to Philadelphia, where she was delivered to the freight agent of the Pennsylvania Railroad, to be sent to Pitts- burgh, at the head of the Ohio River. Here I must speak of a subject full of interest to all owners of boats, hoping that when our large corporations have their attention drawn to the fact they will make some provision for it. There appears to be no fixed freighting tariff established for boats, and the aquatic tourist is l6 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. placed at the mercy of agents who too frequently, in their zeal for the interests of their employers, heavily tax the owner of the craft. The agent of the Pennsylvania Railroad in Philadelphia was sorely puzzled to know what to charge for a BOAT. He had loaded thousands of cars for Pittsburgh, but could iind only one precedent to guide him. " We took a boat once to Pitts- burgh," he said, " for twenty-five dollars, and yours should be charged the same." The ship- ping-clerk of a mercantile house, who had over- heard the conversation, mterrupted the agent with a loud laugh. " A charge of twenty-five dollars freight on a little thing like that! Why, MAN, THAT SUM IS NEARLY HALF HER VALUE ! How LARGE was the boat you shipped last fall to Pittsburgh for twenty-five dollars?" "Oh, about twice the size of this one," answered the agent; "but, size or no size, a boat's a boat, and we handle so few of them that we have no special tarift'on them." "But," said the clerk, "3'ou can easily and honestly establish a tariff" if 5'ou will treat a boat as you do all other freight of the same class. Now, for instance, how do common boats rank, as first or third class freight? " "Third class, I should think," slowly responded the agent. " Ease your conscience, my friend," continued the clerk, " by weighing the boat, and charg-ing: the usual tariff" rate for third class freight." FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 1 7 The boat, with its cargo still locked up inside, was put upon the scales, and the total weight was three hundred and ten pounds, for which a charge of sevent3'-two cents per one hundred pounds was made, and the boat placed on some barrels in a car. Thus did the common-sense and business-like arrangement of the friendly clerk secure for me the freio'ht charsre of two dollars and twenty-three cents, instead of twenty- tive dollars, on a little boat for its carriage three hundred and fifty-three miles to Pittsburgh, and saved me not only from a pecuniary loss, but also from the uncomfortable feeling of being im- posed upon. In these days of canoe and boat vo3'ages, when portages by rail are a necessary evil, a fixed tariff for such freight would save dollars and tempers, and some action in the matter is anx- iously looked for by all interested parties. I gave a parting look at my little craft snugly ensconced upon the top of a pile of barrels, and smiled as I turned away, thinking how precious she had already become to me, and philosophiz- ing upon the strange genus, man, who could so readily twine his alTections about an inanimate object. Upon consideration, it did not seem so strange a thing, however, for did not this boat rep- resent the work of brains and hands for a generation past? Was it not the result of the study and hard- earned experiences of many men for many years? 2 1 8 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. Men whose humble • lives had been spent along the rough coast in daily struggles with the storms of ocean and of life? Many of them now slept in obscure graves, some in the deep sea, others under the tender, green turf; but here was the concentration of their ideas, the ultimatum of their labors, and I inwardl}' resolved, that, since to me was given the enjoyment, to them should be the honor, and that it should be through no fault of her captain if the Centennial Republic did not before many months reach her far-dis- tant point of destination, twenty-six hundred miles away, on the white strands of the Gulf of Mexico. FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 1 9 CHAPTER II. SOURCES OF THE OHIO RIVER. DESCRIPTION OF THE MONONGAHELA AND ALLEGHANY RIVERS. — THE OHIO RIVER. — EXPLORATIONS OF CAVELIER DE LA SALLE. — NAMES GIVEN BY ANCIENT CARTOGRAPHERS TO THE OHIO. — ROUTES OF THE ABORIGINES FROM THE GREAT LAKES TO THE OHIO RIVER.^ THE southerly branch of the Ohio River, and one of its chief affluents, is made by the union of the West Fork and Tygart Valle}' riv- ers, in the county of Marion, state of Virginia, the united waters of which flow nortli into Penn- sylvania as the Monongahela River, and is there joined by the Cheat River, its principal trib- utary. The Monongahela unites with the Alle- ghany to form the Ohio, at Pittsburgh, Pennsyl- vania. The length of the Monongahela, without computing that of its tributaries, is about one hundred and fifty miles; but if we include its eastern fork, the Tygart Valley River, which flows from Randolph Count}', Virginia, the whole length of this tributary of the Ohio may exceed three hundred miles. It has a width at its union with the Alleghany of nearly one-fourth of a mile, and a depth of water sufficient for large 20 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. steamboats to ascend sixty miles, to Brownsville, Pennsylvania, while light-draught vessels can reach its head, at Fairmont, Virginia. The northern branch of the Ohio, known as the Alleghany River, has a length of four hun- dred miles, and its source is in the county ot Potter, in northern Pennsylvania. It takes a very circuitous course through a portion of New York state, and re-enters Pennsylvania flowing through a hilly region, and at the flourishing city of Pittsburgh mingles its waters with its southern sister, the Monongahela. The region traversed by the Alleghany is wild and mountainous, rich in pine forests, coal, and petroleum oil; and the extraction from its rocky beds of the last-named article is so enormous in quantity, that at the present time more than four million barrels of oil are awaiting shipment in the oil districts of Pennsylvania. The smaller steamboats can ascend the river to Olean, about two hundred and fifty miles above Pittsburgh. At Olean, the river has a breadth of twenty rods. In consequence of its high latitude, the clear waters of the Alleghany usually freeze over by the 25th of December, after having trans- ported upon its current the season's work, from the numerous saw-mills of the great wilderness through which it flows, in the form of rafts con- sistinof of two hundred million feet of excellent lumber. FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 21 The Ohio River has a width of about half a mile below Pittsburgh, and this is its medial breadth alons^ its windinof course to its mouth at Cairo; but in places it narrows to less than twenty-five hundred feet, while it frequently widens to more than a mile. A geographical writer says, that, '^ In tracing the Ohio to its source, we must regard the Alleghany as its proper continuation. A boat may start with suf- ficient water within seven miles of Lake Erie, in siirht sometimes of the sails which whiten the approach to the harbor of Buffalo, and float securely down the Conewango, or Cassadaga, to the Alleghany, down the Alleghany to the Ohio, and thence uninterruptedly to the Gulf of Mexico." There are grave reasons for doubting that part of the statement which refers to a boat starting from a point within seven miles of Lake Erie. It is to be hoped that some member of the New York Canoe Club will explore the route men- tioned, and give the results of his investigations to the public. He would need a canoe light enough to be easily carried upon the shoulders of one man, with the aid of the canoeist's indis- pensable assistant — the canoe-yoke. It will be seen that the Ohio with its affluents drains an immense extent of country composed of portions of seven large states of the Union, rich in agricultural wealth, in timber, iron, coal, 2 2 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. petroleum, salt, clays, and building-stone. The rainfall of the Ohio Valley is so great as to give the river a mean discharge at its mouth (accord- ing to the report of the United States government engineers) of one hundred and fifty-eight thou- sand cubic feet per second. This is the drainage of an area embracing two hundred and fourteen thousand square miles. The head of the Ohio River, at Pittsburgh, has an elevation of eleven hundred and fifty feet above the sea, while in the long descent to its mouth there is a gradual fall of only four hundred feet; hence its current, excepting during the seasons of freshets, is more gentle and uniform than that of any other North American river of equal length. During half the year the depth of water is sufficient to float steamboats of the largest class along- its entire leno^th. Between the low- est stage of water, in the month of September, and the highest, in March, there is sometimes a range of fifty feet in depth. The spring freshets in the tributaries will cause the waters of the ofreat river to rise twelve feet in twelve hours. Durino; the season of low water the current of the Ohio is so slow, as flatboat-men have in- formed me, that their boats are carried by the flow of the stream only ten miles in a day. The most shallow portion of the river is between Troy and Evansville. Tro}^ is twelve miles be- low the historic Blennerhasset's Island, which lies FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 23 between the states of Ohio and Virginia. Here the water sometimes shoals to a depth of only two feet. Robert Cavelier de la Salle is credited with having made the discovery of the Ohio River. From the St. Lawrence country he went to On- ondaga, and reaching a tributary of the Ohio River, he descended the great stream to the "Falls," at Louisville, Kentucky. His men bav- in"- deserted him, he returned alone to Lake Erie. This exploration of the Ohio was made in the winter of 1669-70, or in the following spring. The director of the Depot des Cartes of the Marine and Colonies, at Paris, in 1S72 possessed a rich mass of historical documents, the collec- tion of which had covered thirty years of his life. This material related chiefly to the French rule in North America, and its owner had oflcred to dispose of it to the French government on condition that the entire collection should be published. The French government was, how- ever, only willing to publish parts of the whole, and the director retained possession of his prop- erty. Through the etTorts of Mr. Francis Park- man, the truthful American historian, supported by friends, an appropriation was made by Con- gress, in 1873, for the purchase and publication of this valuable collection of the French director; and it is now the property of the United States government. All that relates to the Sieur de la 24 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. Salle — his journals and letters — has been pub- lished in the original French, in three large volumes of six hundred pages each. La Salle discovered the Ohio, yet the possession of the rich historical matter referred to throws but little light upon the details of this important event. The discoverer of the great w^est, in an address to Frontenac, the governor of Canada, made in 1677, asserted that he had discovered the Ohio, and had descended it to a fall which obstructed it. This locality is now known as the " Falls of the Ohio," at Louisville, Kentucky. The second manuscript map of Galinee, made about the year 1672, has upon it this inscription: " River Ohio, so called by the Iroquois on ac- count of its beauty, which the Sieur de la Salle descended." It was probably the interpretation of the Iroquois word Ohio which caused the French frequently to designate this noble stream as '' La belle riviere." A little later the missionary Marquette de- signed a map, upon which he calls the Ohio the " Ouabouskiaou." Louis Joliet's first map gives the Ohio without a name, but supplies its place with an inscription stating that La Salle had descended it. In Joliet's second map he calls the Ohio ''- Ouboustikou." After the missionaries and other explorers had given to the world the knowledge possessed at that early day of the great west, a young and FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 2K, talented engineer of the French government, liv- ing in Quebec, and named Jean Baptiste Louis Franquelin, completed, in 1684, the most elabo- rate map of the times, a carefully traced copy of which, through the courtesy of Mr. Francis Parkman, I have been allowed to examine. The original map of Franquelin has recently disap- peared, and is supposed to have been destroyed. This map is described in the appendix to Mr. Parkman's "Discovery of the Great West,'' as being- " six feet long and four and a half wide." On it, the Ohio is called " Fleuve St. Louis, ou Chucagoa, ou Casquinampogamou; '' but the ap- pellation of " River St. Louis " was dropped ver}' soon after the appearance of Franquelin's map, and to the present time it justly retains the Iro- quois name given it by its brave discoverer La Salle. It would be interesting to know b}^ which of the routes used by the Indians in those early days La Salle travelled to the Ohio. After the exist- ence of the Ohio was made known, the first route made use of in reaching that river by the coureurs de hois and other French travellers from Canada, was that from the southern shore of Lake Erie, from a point near where the town of Westfield now stands, across the wilderness by portage southward about nine miles to Chautaugue Lake. These parties used light bark canoes, which were easily carried upon the shoulders 26 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. of men whenever a "carry" between the two streams became necessary. The canoes were paddled on the lake to its southern end, out of which flowed a shallow brook, w^hich aftbrded water enough in places to float the frail craft. The shoal water, -and the obstructions made by fallen trees, necessitated frequent portages. This wild and tortuous stream led the voyagers to the Alleghany River, where an ample depth of water and a propitious current carried them into the Ohio. The French, finding this a laborious and tedious route, abandoned it for a better one. Where the town of Erie now stands, on the southern shore of the lake of the same name, a small stream flows from the southward into that inland sea. Opposite its mouth is Presque Isle, which pro- tects the locality from the north winds, and, act- inof as a barrier to the turbulent waves, offers to the mariner a safe port of refuge behind its shores. The French ascended the little stream, and from its banks made a short portage to the Riviere des bccuf, or some tributary of French Creek, and descended it to the Alleghany and the Ohio. This Erie and French River route finally be- came the military highway of the Canadians to the Ohio V^alley, and may be called the second route from Lake Erie. The third route to the Ohio from Lake Erie commenced at the extreme southwestern end ol FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 27 that inland sea. The voyagers entered Maumee Ba}' and ascended the Maumee River, hauling their birch canoes around the rapids between Maumee Cit}-" and Perrysburgh, and between Providence and Grand Rapids. Surmounting these obsta- cles, they reached the site of Fort Wayne, where the St. Joseph and St. Mary rivers unite, and make, according to the author of the " History of the :Maumee Valley," the "Maumee," or "Mother of Waters," as interpreted from the Indian tongue. At this point, when ninety-eight miles from Lake Erie, the travellers were forced to make a portage of a mile and a half to a branch called Little River, which they descended to the Wabash, which stream, in the early days of French exploration, was thought to be the main river of the Ohio sys- tem. The Wabash is now the boundary line for a distance of two hundred miles between the states of Indiana and Illinois. Following the Wabash, the vovager would enter the Ohio River about one hundred and forty miles above its junction with the Mississippi. The great Indian diplomatist, " Little Turtle," in making a treaty speech in 1795, when confront- ing Anthony Wayne, insisted that the Fort Wayne portage was the " key or gateway " of the tribes *having communication with the inland chain ot lakes and the gulf coast. It is now claimed by many persons that this was the principal and favorite route of communication between the 28 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. high and low latitudes followed by the savages hundreds of years before Europeans commenced the exploration of the great west. There was a fourth route from the north to the tributaries of the Ohio, which was used by the Seneca Indians frequently, though rarely by the whites. It was further east than the three ah-eady described. The Genesee River flows into Lake Ontario about midway between its eastern shores and the longitude of the eastern end of Lake Erie. In using this fourth route, the savages followed the Genesee, and made a portage to some one of the affluents of the Alleghany to reach the Ohio River. FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 29 CHAPTER III. FROM PITTSBURGH TO BLENNERHASSET'S ISLAND. THE START FOR THE GULF. — CAUGHT IN THE ICE-RAFT. — CAMPING ON THE OHIO. — THE GRAVE CREEK MOUND. — AN INDIAN SEPULCHRE. — BLENNERHASSET's ISLAND. — AARON burr's CONSPIRACY. — A RUINED FAMILY. UPON arriving at Pittsburgh, on the morning of December 2cl, 1875, after a dreary night's ride by rail from the Atlantic coast, I found m}^ boat — it having preceded me — safely perched upon a pile of barrels in the freight- house of the railroad company, w^hich w^as con- veniently situated within a few rods of the muddy waters of the Monongahela. The sneak-box, with the necessary stores for the cruise, was transported to the river's side, and as it was already a little past noon, and only a few hours of daylight left me, prudence demanded an in- stant departure in search of a more retired camp- ing-ground than that afforded by the great city and its neighboring towns, with the united pop- ulation of one hundred and eighty thousand souls. There was not one friend to give me a cheering word, the happy remembrance of which might 30 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. encourage me all through my lonely vo3^age to the Gulf of Mexico. The little street Arabs fouijht amons^ them- selves for the empty provision-boxes left upon the bank as I pushed my well-freighted boat out upon the whirling current that caught it in its strong embrace, and, like a true friend, never deserted or lured it into dano-er while I trusted to its vigorous help for more than two thousand miles, until the land of the orange and sugar-cane was reached, and its fresh, sweet waters were exchanged for the restless and treacherous waves of the briny sea. Ah, great river, you were in- deed, of all material things, my truest friend for many a day! The rains in the south had filled the gulches of the Virginia mountains, the sources of the Monono^ahela, and it now exhibited a o^reat de- gree of turbulence. I was not then aware of the tumultuous state of the sister tributary, the Alle- ghany, on the other side of the city. I supposed that its upper affluents, congealed during the late cold weather, were quietly enjo3'ing a winter's nap under the heavy coat in w^hich Jack Frost had robed them. I expected to have an easy and im interrupted passage down the river in ad- vance of floating ice; and, so congratulating m3-self, I drew near to the confluence of the Monongahela and Alleghany, from the union of which the great Ohio has its birth, and rolls FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 31 steadily across the country a thousand miles to the mightier ^Mississippi. The current of the Monongahela, as it flowed from the south, covered with mists rising into the wintry air, — for the temperature was but a few degrees above zero, — had not a particle of ice upon its turbid bosom. I rowed gayly on, pleased with the auspicious The ^tart. — J^ead of the pnio J^iyer. 32 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. beginning of the voyage, hoping at the close of the month to be at the mouth of the river, and far enough south to escape any inconvenience from a sudden freezing of its surface, for along its course between its source at Pittsburgh and its debouchure at Cairo the Ohio makes only two hundred and twelve miles of southing, or a difference of about two and a half degrees of latitude. It is not surprising, therefore, that this river during exceedingly cold winters some- times freezes over for a few days, from the state of Pennsylvania to its junction with the Missis- sippi. In a few minutes my boat had passed nearly the whole length of the Pittsburgh shore, when suddenly, upon looking over my shoulder, I beheld the river covered with an ice-raft, which was passing out of the Alleghany, and wh'ich completely blocked the Ohio from shore to shore. French Creek, Oil Creek, and all the other tributaries of the Alleghany, had burst from their icy barriers, thrown off the wintry coat of mail, and were pouring their combined wrath into the Ohio. This unforeseen trouble had to be met without much time for calculating the results of entering the ice-pack. A light canoe would have been ground to pieces in the multitude of icy cakes, but the half-inch skin of soft but elastic white swamp-cedar of the decked sneak-box, with its FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. ^^^ light oaken runner-strips firmly screwed to its bottom, was fully able to cope with the difficul- ty; so I pressed the boat into the floating ice, and by dint of hard work forced her several rods be3^ond the eddies, and fairly into the steady flow of the strong current of the river. There was nothing more to be done to expe- dite the journey, so I sat down in the little hold, and, wrapped comfortably in blankets, watched the progress made by the receding points of in- terest upon the high banks of the stream. To- wards night some channel-ways opened in the pack, and, seizing upon the opportunit}', I rowed along the ice-bound lanes until dusk, when hap- pily a chance was ofiered for leaving the frosty surroundings, and the duck-boat was soon resting on a shelving, pebbly strand on the left bank of the river, two miles above the little village of Freedom. The rapid current had carried me twenty-two miles in four hours and a half. Not having slept for thirty-six hours, or eaten since morning, I was well prepared physically to retire at an early hour. A few minutes sufficed to securel}^ stake my boat, to prevent her being carried off by a sudden rise in the river during m}' slumbers; a few moments more were occu- pied in arranging the thin hair cushions and a thick cotton coverlet upon the floor of the boat. The bag which contained my wardrobe, consist- 3 34 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. ing of a blue flannel suit, &c., served for a pillow. A heav}^ shawl and two thin blankets furnished sufficient covering for the bed. Bread and but- ter, with Shakers' peach-sauce, and a generous slice of Wilson's compressed beef, a tin of water from the ic}^ reservoir that flowed past my boat and within reach of my arm, all contributed to furnish a most satisfactory meal, and a half hour afterwards, when a soft, damp fog settled down upon the land, the atmosphere became so quiet that the rubbing of every ice-cake ao'ainst the shore could be distinctly heard as I sank into a sweeter slumber than I had ever experienced in the most luxurious bed of the daintiest of auest- chambers, for my apartment, though small, was comfortable, and with the hatch securely closed, I was safe from invasion by man or beast, and enjoyed the well-earned repose with a full feel- ing of security. The owl softl}^ winnowed the air with his feathery pinions as he searched for his prey along the beach, sending forth an occa- sional to-hoot! as he rested for a moment on the leafless branches of an old tree, reminding me to take a peep at the night, and to inquire " what its signs of promise " were. All was silence and security; but even while I thought that here at least Nature ruled su- preme. Art sent to my listening ear, upon the dense night air, the shrill whistle of the steam- freighter, trjing to enter the ice-pack several miles down the river. FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 35 So the peaceful night wore awa}', and in the earl}' dawn, enveloped in a thick fog, I hastily dispatched a cold breakfast, and at half-past eight o'clock pushed off into the floating ice, which became more and more disintegrated and less troublesome as the da}^ advanced. The use of the soft bituminous coal in the towns along the river, and also by the steamboats navigating it, filled the valley with clouds of smoke. These clouds rested upon everything. Your live senses were fully aware of the presence of the disagree- able, impalpable something surrounding you. Eyes, ears, taste, touch, and smell, each felt the presence." Smoky towns along the banks gave smoky views. Smoky chimne3's rose high above the smoky foundries and forges, where smoke-be- grimed men toiled day and night in the smoky atmosphere. Ah, how I sighed for a glimpse of God's blessed sunlifrht! and even while I irazed saw in memory the bright pure valle3's of the north-east; the sparkling waters of lakes George and Champlain, and the majestic scener}', with the life-giving atmosphere, of the Adirondacks. The contrast seemed to increase the smoke, and no cheerfulness was added to the scene b}' the dismal-looking holes in the mountain-sides I now passed. They were the entrances to mines from which the bituminous coal was taken. Some of them were being actively worked, and long, trough-like shoots were used to send the coal by ^6 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. its own gravity from the entrance of the mine to the hold of the barge or coal-ark at the steam- boat landing. Some of these mines were worked by three men and a horse. The horse drew the coal on a little car along the horizontal gallery from the heart of the mountain to the light of day. During the second day the current of the Ohio became less violent. I fought a passage among the ice-cakes, and whenever openings appeared rowed briskly along the sides of the chilly raft, with the intent of getting below the frosty zone as soon as possible. About half-past eight o'clock in the evening, when some distance above King's Creek, the struggling starlight enabled me to push my boat on to a muddy flat, destined soon to be over- flowed, but offering me a secure resting-place for a few hours. Upon peeping out of my warm nest under the hatch the next day, it was a cause of great satisfaction to note that a rise in the tem- perature had taken place, and that the ice was disappearing by degrees. An open-air toilet, and a breakfast of about the temperature of a family refrigerator, with sundry other inconveniences, made me wish for just enough hot water to remove a little of the begrim- ing results of the smoky atmosphere through which I had rowed. At eleven o'clock, a. m., the first bridge that FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 37 spans the Ohio River was passed. It was at Steubenville, and the property of the Pan-Handle Railroad. Soon after four o'clock in the afternoon the busy manulacturing city of Wheeling, West Virginia, with its great suspension bridge crossing the river to the state of Ohio, loomed into sight. This city of Wheeling, on the left bank of the river, some eighty miles from Pittsburgh, was the most impressive sight of that dreary day's row. Above its masses of brick walls hung a dense cloud of smoke, into which shot the flames emitted from the numerous chimneys of forges, glass-works, and factories, which made it the busy place it was. Ever and anon came the deafening sound of the trip-hammer, the rap-a- tap-tap of the rivet-headers' tools striking upon the heavy boiler-plates; the screeching of steam- whistles; the babel of men's voices; the clanging of deep-toned bells. Each in turn striking upon my ear, seemed as a whole to furnish sufficient noise-tonic for even the most ardent upholder of that remedy, and to serve as a type for a second Inferno, promising to vie with Dante's own. Yet with all this din and dirt, this ever-present cloud of blackness settling down each hour upon clean and unclean in a sooty coating, I was told that hundreds of families of wealth and refinement, whose circumstances enabled theni to select a home where they pleased, lingered here, appar- 38 FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. ently well satisfied with their surroundings. We are, indeed, the children of habit, and singularl}' adaptable. It is, perhaps, best that it should be so, but I thought, as I brushed off the thin la3'er of soot with which the Wheeling cloud of enterprise had discolored the pure white deck of my little cralt, that if this was civilization and enterprise, I should rather take a little less of those two commodities and a little more of cleanliness and quiet. At Wheeling I left the last of the ice-drifts, but now observed a new feature on the river's sur- face. It was a floating coat of oil from the pe- troleum regions, and it followed me many a mile down the stream. The river being now free from ice, numerous crafts passed me, and among them many steam- boats with their immense stern-wheels beating the water, being so constructed for shallow streams. They were ascending the current, and pushing their "^^ tows " of two, four, and six long, wide coal-barges fastened in pairs in Iront ot them. How the pilots of these stern-wheel freighters manaired to guide these heavilv loaded baro-es ao-ainst the treacherous current was a myster}^ to me. It suddenl}' grew dark, and wishing to be se- cure from molestation by steamboats, I ran into a narrow creek, with high, muddy banks, which were so steep and so slippery that my boat slid FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX. 39 into the water as fast as I could haul her on to the shore. This difficulty was overcome by dig- ging wnth my oar a bed for her to rest in, and she soon settled into the damp ooze, where she qui- etly remained until morning. During this part of my journey particularly, the need of a small coal-oil stove was felt, as the usual custom of making a camp-fire could not be followed for many da3's on the upper Ohio River. The rains had wet the fire-wood, which in a settled and cultivated coun- try is found only in small quantities poAi.-pij^ •' , "^ ^ ^ gXOVE. on the banks of the stream. The drift- wood thrown up b}' the river was almost satu- rated with water, and the damp, wild trees of the swamp afforded only green wood. In a less settled countrv, or where there is an old forest sfrowth, as alon