CHAP. XXIII.] SOUTHERN STEAM-BOAT. 47 



piled up. This upper deck is chiefly occupied with 

 a handsome saloon, about 200 feet long, the ladies 

 cabin at one end, opening into it with folding doors. 

 Sofas, rocking-chairs, tables, and a stove are placed in 

 this room, which is lighted by windows from above. 

 On each side of it is a row of sleeping apartments, each 

 communicating by one door with the saloon, while 

 the other leads out to the guard, as they call it, a 

 long balcony or gallery, covered with a shade or 

 verandah, which passes round the whole boat. The 

 second class, or deck passengers, sleep where they 

 can on the lower floor, where, besides the engine and 

 the cotton, there are prodigious heaps of wood, which 

 are devoured with marvellous rapidity by the furnace, 

 and are as often restored at the different landings, a 

 set of negroes being purposely hired for that work. 



These steamers, notwithstanding their size, draw 

 very little water, for they are constructed for rivers 

 which rise and fall very rapidly. They cannot quite 

 realise the boast of a Western captain, te that he 

 could sail wherever it was damp;&quot; but I was as 

 sured that some of them could float in two-foot 

 water. The high-pressure steam escapes into the air, 

 by a succession of explosions alternately from the pipes 

 of the two engines. It is a most unearthly sound, like 

 that of some huge monster gasping for breath ; and 

 when they clear the boilers of the sediment collected 

 from the river-water, it is done by a loud and pro 

 tracted discharge of steam, which reminded us of the 

 frightful noise made by the steam gun exhibited at 

 the Adelaide Gallery in London. Were it not for 

 the power derived from the high-pressure principle, 



