landing at unseasonable hours of the night.  Thanks also to the great commercial activity of the larger towns above, the monotony of the river is occasionally relieved by the sight of steam-boats, barges, coal-boats, salt-boats, &c.  Now and then one’s heart is cheered and one’s spirits fortified by the sight of a vessel or two that has been snagged, and which the indignant stream appears to have left there as a gentle hint for travellers.

Thus the day passes on, and, when night closes in, you bid adieu to your friends, not with “Pleasant dreams to you!” but with a kind of mysterious smile, and a “I hope we sha’n’t be snagged to-night!” You then retire to your cabin, and ... what you do there depends on yourself; but a man whose mind is not sobered when travelling on these waters is not to be envied.

When you leave your cabin in the morning, as you enter the saloon, you fancy a cask of spirits has burst.  A little observation will show you your mistake, and the cause of it; which is merely that the free and enlightened are taking their morning drink at the bar.  Truly they are a wonderful race; or, as they themselves sometimes express it, “We are a tall nation, sir; a big people.”  Though they drink on all occasions, whether from sociability or self-indulgence, and at all times, from rosy morn to dewy eve, and long after;—­though breath and clothes are “alive” with the odour of alcohol, you will scarcely ever see a passenger drunk.  Cards are also going all day long, and there is generally a Fancy-man—­or blackleg—­ready to oblige a friend.  These card-playings are conducted quietly enough at present; but an old traveller told me he remembered, some fifteen years ago, when things were very different, and when every player came armed with a pistol and bowie-knife, by which all little difficulties as to an odd trick or a bet were speedily settled on the spot.  In those days the sun never rose and set without witnessing one or more of these exciting little adjustments of difficulties, with which the bystanders were too good judges ever to interfere.  In fact, they seem to have been considered as merely pleasing little breaks in the monotony of the trip.

As it may interest some of my readers, I will endeavour to retail for their amusement a sketch which was given me of a scene of boat-racing in the olden time.  The “Screecher” was a vessel belonging to Louisville, having a cargo of wild Kentuckians and other passengers on board, among whom was an old lady, who, having bought a winter stock of bacon, pork, &c., was returning to her home on the banks of the Mississippi.  The “Burster” was a St. Louis boat, having on board a lot of wild back-woodsmen, &c.  The two rivals met at the confluence of the Ohio and the Mississippi.  Beat or burst was the alternative.  Victory hung in one scale; in the other, defeat and death.  The “Screecher” was a little ahead; gradually the “Burster” closes.  The silence of a death-struggle prevails.