Double crews were carried,so that all work could be quickly done.
The chosen date being come,and all things in readiness,the two great steamers back into the stream,and lie there jockeying a moment,and apparently watching each other's slightest movement,like sentient creatures;flags drooping,the pent steam shrieking through safety-valves,the black smoke rolling and tumbling from the chimneys and darkening all the air.
People,people everywhere;the shores,the house-tops,the steamboats,the ships,are packed with them,and you know that the borders of the broad Mississippi are going to be fringed with humanity thence northward twelve hundred miles,to welcome these racers.
Presently tall columns of steam burst from the 'scape-pipes of both steamers,two guns boom a good-bye,two red-shirted heroes mounted on capstans wave their small flags above the massed crews on the forecastles,two plaintive solos linger on the air a few waiting seconds,two mighty choruses burst forth--and here they come!
Brass bands bray Hail Columbia,huzza after huzza thunders from the shores,and the stately creatures go whistling by like the wind.
Those boats will never halt a moment between New Orleans and St.Louis,except for a second or two at large towns,or to hitch thirty-cord wood-boats alongside.You should be on board when they take a couple of those wood-boats in tow and turn a swarm of men into each;by the time you have wiped your glasses and put them on,you will be wondering what has become of that wood.
Two nicely matched steamers will stay in sight of each other day after day.
They might even stay side by side,but for the fact that pilots are not all alike,and the smartest pilots will win the race.If one of the boats has a 'lightning'pilot,whose 'partner'is a trifle his inferior,you can tell which one is on watch by noting whether that boat has gained ground or lost some during each four-hour stretch.The shrewdest pilot can delay a boat if he has not a fine genius for steering.Steering is a very high art.
One must not keep a rudder dragging across a boat's stem if he wants to get up the river fast.
There is a great difference in boats,of course.For a long time I was on a boat that was so slow we used to forget what year it was we left port in.
But of course this was at rare intervals.Ferryboats used to lose valuable trips because their passengers grew old and died,waiting for us to get by.This was at still rarer intervals.I had the documents for these occurrences,but through carelessness they have been mislaid.
This boat,the 'John J.Roe,'was so slow that when she finally sunk in Madrid Bend,it was five years before the owners heard of it.
That was always a confusing fact to me,but it is according to the record,any way.She was dismally slow;still,we often had pretty exciting times racing with islands,and rafts,and such things.
One trip,however,we did rather well.We went to St.Louis in sixteen days.
But even at this rattling gait I think we changed watches three times in Fort Adams reach,which is five miles long.A 'reach'is a piece of straight river,and of course the current drives through such a place in a pretty lively way.
That trip we went to Grand Gulf,from New Orleans,in four days (three hundred and forty miles);the 'Eclipse'and 'Shotwell'did it in one.We were nine days out,in the chute of 63(seven hundred miles);the 'Eclipse'and 'Shotwell'went there in two days.Something over a generation ago,a boat called the 'J.M.White'went from New Orleans to Cairo in three days,six hours,and forty-four minutes.
In 1853 the 'Eclipse'made the same trip in three days,three hours,and twenty minutes.
Some authorities add 1hour and 16minutes to this.]>In 1870the 'R.E.Lee'did it in three days and ONE hour.
This last is called the fastest trip on record.
I will try to show that it was not.For this reason:
the distance between New Orleans and Cairo,when the 'J.M.White'ran it,was about eleven hundred and six miles;consequently her average speed was a trifle over fourteen miles per hour.
In the 'Eclipse's'day the distance between the two ports had become reduced to one thousand and eighty miles;consequently her average speed was a shade under fourteen and three-eighths miles per hour.
In the 'R.E.Lee's'time the distance had diminished to about one thousand and thirty miles;consequently her average was about fourteen and one-eighth miles per hour.
Therefore the 'Eclipse's'was conspicuously the fastest time that has ever been made.
THE RECORD OF SOME FAMOUS
TRIPS
(From Commodore Rollingpin's Almanack.)
FAST TIME ON THE WESTERN WATERS
FROM NEW ORLEANS TO NATCHEZ--268MILES
D.H.M.
1814Orleans made the run in 66401814Comet ""5101815Enterprise ""411201817Washington ""4
1817Shelby ""3201818Paragon ""381828Tecumseh ""31201834Tuscarora ""1211838Natchez ""1171840Ed.Shippen ""181842Belle of the West "1181844Sultana ""19451851Magnolia ""19501853A.L.Shotwell ""19491853Southern Belle ""2031853Princess (No.4)"20261853Eclipse ""19471855Princess (New)""18531855Natchez (New)""17301856Princess (New)""17301870Natchez ""17171870R.E.Lee ""1711FROM NEW ORLEANS TO CAIRO--1,024MILES
D.H.M.
1844J.M.White made the run in 36441852Reindeer ""312451853Eclipse ""3441853A.L.Shotwell ""33401869Dexter ""36201870Natchez ""34341870R.E.Lee ""31FROM NEW ORLEANS TO LOUISVILLE--1,440MILES
D.H.M.
1815Enterprise made the run in 252401817Washington ""25
1817.Shelby ""204201818Paragon ""18101828Tecumseh ""841834Tuscarora ""7161837Gen.Brown ""6221837Randolph ""6221837Empress ""6171837Sultana ""6151840Ed.Shippen ""5141842Belle of the West "6141843Duke of Orleans""5231844Sultana ""5121849Bostona ""581851Belle Key ""34231852Reindeer ""420451852Eclipse ""4191853A.L.Shotwell ""410201853Eclipse ""4930FROM NEW ORLEANS TO DONALDSONVILLE--78MILES
H.M.