106 THE HIVE OF THE BEE-HUNTER. 



famous lor their ambitious puffings, noisy captains, and 

 gigantic placards — boats that run up little streams that 

 empty into the Mississippi — boats that go beyond places 

 never dreamed of in geography — never visited by travel- 

 lers, or even marked down in the scrutinizing book of 

 the tax collector. 



The first time one finds himself in one of these 

 boats, he looks about him as did Gulliver when he got 

 in Lilliput. It seems as if you are larger and more 

 magnificent than an animated colossus — you find, on 

 going on the boat, that your feet are on the lower deck 

 and your head up-stairs ; the after-cabin is so disposed 

 of that you can sit inside of it, and yet be near the 

 bows. The ladies' cabin has but one berth in it, and 

 that only as wide as a shelf. 



The machinery is tremendous ; two large kettles 

 firmly set in brick, attached to a complicated-looking 

 coffee mill, two little steampipes and one big one. 



And then the way that the big steam-pipe will smoke, 

 and the little ones let off steam, is singular. Then the 

 puffing of the little coffee-mill ! why it works as spite- 

 fully as a tom-cat with his tail caught in the crack of a 

 door. 



Then the engineer, to see him open " the furnace " 

 doors, and pitch in wood, and open the little stop-cocks 

 to see if the steam is not too high, all so much like a big 

 steamer. Then the name of the craft, "^ the u. s. mail, 

 EMPERORj" the letters covering over the whole side of 



