May 3i, ig02. ] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
428 
fishing, and did not notice us at first. "Keep still," 
whispered the boy, and we will get away behind the 
rocks. Immediately the Indians saw us. "Go forward," 
I said, making a violent gesture with my hand, to indi- 
cate the way I wished to go. The men obeyed immedi- 
ately; perhaps they thought 'that I had some special 
means of defense to be so confident; but in truth, my 
heart was beating the wrong way from fright; some- 
times up in my throat and again down in my boots. A 
moment of suspense and the canoes came together. I 
stood up, looked the men over gravely, asked to see 
their fish, and told the boy to buy some for me, which 
he did. Perhaps my apparent confidence impressed 
them, and for a time we floated lazily on the waves, I 
keeping them busy answering questions, and presently, 
while we were still interested in each other, I motioned 
to my men to go on, and they obeyed immediately. For 
a moment or two the other Indians watched us intently; 
then they went quietly to work again fishing, and the 
danger was over. 
I asked the boy to take me on shore, where we walked 
about a little, examining the rocks and getting speci- 
mens. The Indians would not let me go far from the 
boat, saying that across the ridge they had enemies, and 
it would not be safe. Soon I had all the specimens I 
wanted, and we went back to the canoe; and after 
paddling about a little more, went over to the hut again, 
where my men seemed much relieved at our coming. 
I paid the men in sugar, fifteen cents worth to each, 
and gave the boy a string of beads with his share of 
the sugar. He was much pleased, but presently came 
and asked me gravely if I would allow him to give the 
beads to his little sister, as he had a string for himself, 
and then he added, apologetically: "The beads are a 
suitable kind for girls, but not for men." I was sur- 
prised to find such sensibility and honor in an Indian 
boy, and gave him two other strings of beads for his 
little sister and a bright colored handkerchief for him- 
self, which was quite suited to a man's use, and he was 
well contented. 
Presently he came running up to me, saying that his 
father would be willing to sell him, and wouldn't I like 
to buy him for myself; and he began telling me all the 
work he could do, and how well he would serve me; 
but I could not take him, and he was deeply disappointed. 
Perhaps I made a mistake. He was a strong, well-built 
lad of fifteen to sixteen, and a faithful, daring companion 
such as he promised to become, cannot often be found. 
A few days later I returned to Rio Hacha and then 
went on to other places. 
Francis C. Nicholas. 
A Walk Down South— XXXL 
I considered the mate's words a moment, and then con- 
cluded that I'd investigate Hades for a week anyhow. I 
told the mate so, but he still argued. 
"You can't stand it," he said. "Down the river there s 
500 200-pound sacks of guano to put on board." 
"Well," I said, "I'm not after money. You take me 
and let me dodge the big stuff." 
"All right," he said, and I went to work.^ 
Wagons were being driven down to the river side into 
the water loaded down with groceries and farm im- 
plements. The stuff was being carried across a barge to 
the steamer by a gang of roustabouts. I joined the un- 
laden line and walked to where two darkies were piling 
four quarter sacks of flour 0.9 the shoulders of the lug- 
gers. To them I presented my left shoulder, and they 
put four sacks on it. The pile reached more than a foot above 
my head, but it was not so heavy to the feel as I thought 
96 pounds would be. Then came boxes of tomatoes, a 
hundred-pound box of coffee, a bale of rope, some kegs of 
nails, all going to the main deck of the steamer, where 
two other darkies relieved me and my mates of our bur- 
dens. Burros or pack horses would have had as little to 
say as to the loading as we did. 
The one thing that bothered me was barbed wire, yet 
the other rousters rolled it in, even carried it in on their 
shoulders without a scratch or a tear. My third bale of it 
was handled comfortably. Fifty pounds of plow points 
on a single wire cut my fingers.- 
The time passed rapidly, and as time went on we worked 
faster. The whistle blew, and the bell rang. One last 
wagon came over the hill with the darky in it waving his 
hand full of lines at us and whipping his mules with a 
black snake in the other fist. A couple of boxes were 
rushed across the barge. 
"Cast off that line there. All right, Bill !" to the pilot. 
Then the mate shoved both hands into his overcoat 
pockets, settled his ears into the collar of the coat, the 
darkies oozed aft, where I followed them into the engine 
room with its clink-clank, cheou-ugh, and the fast chug of 
the great water wheel across the stern very close to us. 
I looked around at my mates and found that there were 
seventeen of us, one white, four yellow and several red- 
bones. One asked me if I was a "detector." Another 
sidled up to me and said, "These yere niggahs daon Souf 
all rabble. Ah'm from Philladelfee." A third demanded 
to borrow a quarter. Another said that he would buy 
my coat after the trip. 
It was then nearly 11 o'clock, and I went out to watch 
the river, for The Suck, the Boiling Pot and the other 
bad places in the stream are only a few miles below 
Chattanooga. I saw some bad water, a few two-foot 
waves where the river, narrowed by rocks, shot between 
them and created fast whirls below, but nothing like what 
I had been led to believe was there. 
A little after noon a darky came forward wiping his big 
soft lips round to one side with his hands. 
"Had yo' dinnah?" he asked, 
"No," I said. 
"Bettah go get it." 
I went back. Some of the roustabouts were eating 
from pans, others, with hungry eyes, stood by. I couldn't 
see where the grub came from at first, but I watched an 
empty plate go from one darky to another, and then up a 
steep ladder at the engineer's work bench on the port 
side of the engine room. It came down loaded with grub. 
I went up the ladder to a little hole and asked for some 
grub of a big darky, whose feet were on the ladder — the 
one who had tried to borrow a quarter. "Ain't no plate," 
he said. It was true. For the seventeen roustabouts 
there were nine tin plates of assorted age and shapes. At 
some meals there were fewer, presumably due to the exi- 
gencies of the steward's department. I got a handful of 
biscuit, fried pork and sweet potatoes, and went down 
to the deck again. 
That negro up the ladder was a subject of much in- 
terest to me. I sat down where I could watch him. His 
feet were wonderful, coming down through that trap 
doorway and resting on the flat ladder stair. A water 
bucket could have been rested on each shoe toe and a 
tomatoe can on the heels. Then the knees, with shreds 
of three pairs of trousers on each, and the blue-lipped black 
face into which the great ladling spoon went with which 
he served the beans, the krout, the puddings to all, to 
himself with the rest. I recalled a darky who came into 
the down-town Herald office in New York one night 
while I was there. He had a thick, long, wide vegetable 
dish of large restaurant size. He stood before the ad- 
vertisement window. He smiled; then he put the 
vegetable dish into the smile and out of sight. Then 
he smiled again. But' Joe, on the N. B. Forrest, didn't 
smile. In fact, he looked sad all the while I was on 
board, but he got that ladling spoon bowl, five inches long 
by three wide, I judged, into his mouth, and some of the 
handle, too, when there was sweet plum duff gravy above 
the bowl on the handle, a sad, hopeless expression com- 
ing into his eyes when his lips wouldn't reach to the last 
crumb — which is literally true. 
"Here, you white man," said the mate, "can you check 
goods?" 
I said I didn't know, but could try. "Well, take this 
bill and find it. Here, you black man, help find these 
goods !" 
There were ten bales of hay, ten bags of bran and a 
barrel of molasses to go off at McNabb's Mine Landing, 
the first freight stop. These the darky helped me find in 
the pile of cargo. 
At the Foot of , the Pan we took a sand barge in tow. 
They tow boats in front on the Tennessee and Ohio. The 
bow of the steamer has a square guard rail, against which 
the scow is lashed end on; then they push the scow up 
or down, as the case may be. 
Then came McNabb's. The proprietor was on board. 
He didn't like to see a white man working with negroes, 
and liked the white man less, if anything. "It's a pretty 
low-down, ornery, no-account white man that'll 'sociate 
with a nigger," but no one said so to me, though they 
looked it. The freight was carried ashore by the darkies 
on their backs, while the "company" got coal ready to 
put aboard the steamer. 
The coal was chuted down on the forward deck, and 
then carried in coal boxes or wheelbarrows to the. bin in 
front of the boilers and piled up around the two boilers. 
It was measured by bushels — eight to ten carloads of 
seventy-five bushels each being put on board each round 
trip. We put on say fifteen ton's. In a few hours we 
were ready to go on again. 
One of the darkies speaking of his sweetheart said: 
"She walks stylish as a blamed mewl." It was his no- 
tion of a compliment. 
Soon after dark we reached Pryor's Landing. A fire 
was burning there, round which were several men. I 
came up with the bills to leave there while the negroes 
carried up the boxes. 
"Here, yo' !" said a man to me. I looked, and he held a 
gray squirrel toward me. I took it, said "Thank you, sir." 
He tried to get a closer look at me. I gave the squirrel 
to one of the darkies, who gave me the tail after he had 
skinned the beast. 
As soon as we left the landing the negroes hurried 
aft and laid down on the floor around the red-hot stove 
and began to sleep. It was an odd sight. Some were 
sprawled out, some curled up, others on sides, faces or 
their backs. Probably a man never looks mpre like a 
beast than when he is asleep, and these figures on the 
floor looked more and more like creatures of the stables 
and forests as one caught the semblance in their attitudes. 
It was interesting, but it was disheartening, too. "Just 
like a lot of animals," "Beasts of burden," said the whites 
in that region, but not once did I hear a tone of pity for 
the lot of the negroes. 
It was an odd feeling the plowing down stream in the 
black night gave one, and for a few minutes, while I 
stood at the bow of the boat, where all was dark, it 
seemed as if we were running very close to nature. Re- 
turning to the engine room with its bright electric lights, 
its red-hot stove and gleaming machinery, with a tall old 
engineer roaming round it, stepping over or on negroes 
as the case may be, going about the machinery, in his 
hand a wad of cotton and a can of oil — certainly the con- 
trast was striking. 
I went to sleep in a chair after a while, only to be 
awakened for another landing by the order to hunt out 
some goods in the cargo. We stopped after a bit at a 
warehouse to load with phosphate— 550 200-pound sacks 
of guano were to be carried on to a barge alongside the 
steamer. That was none of my work, however, as I 
observed thankfully. The negroes took the stuff off a 
sliding incline, two lifting it on their shoulders. At 
first nothing could be heard in the night except the 
scuffling of feet. Then some one called: 
"Oh-o-oh-00 !" 
Then another: 
"Oh-h— Joe— Oh-h— Joe !" 
Pretty soon : 
"Oh— Captain! Captain! Cayan't yo* see 
Joe pile Iandin' is about to kill me? 
Ef yo' don' like me don't dog me roun', 
Give mc mah money an' Ah'll go to town." 
One's eyes grew accustomed to the night; the light 
shed by the lantern (one of which the nice little watch 
boy with a white collar thought I was trying to steal) 
cast a glow over the figures, which swayed te the wail of 
the song, swayed under the merciless weight of the sacks 
till the rhythm and monotony of the scene made one 's head 
swim round. After two long hours of this, they were 
ready to start again. 
At 4:30 o'clock A. M. the old gray-whiskered, round- 
shouldered engineer sat drooning a song, the negroes 
were lying on the floor, the hum of the electric motor and 
the glow of the lights were in the air — of the strange 
places I had been in, this engine room was for the mo- 
ment the strangest of all. 
Daylight came cool, dusky. I was in Alabama. For 
breakfast (I gathered a plate somewhere) we had oat- 
meal, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, greasy, dripping 
fried pork and coffee in the black, beside biscuit. How 
to eat mashed potato, with neither knife, fork or spotm 
was a problem. I tried my jackknife; it was a partial 
success, but I cut my lip with its keen edge. Before noon 
I whittled out a paddle nearly an inch wide and twice as 
long — it worked so charmingly that passengers eyed my 
feeding with twisting jaws. 
We loaded cotton at some of the landings. I kept tally 
after there had been a little dispute as to the number on 
the barge. They ran from 450 to 650 pounds to the 
bale, and I who had never seen a cotton land before 
watched the loading with interest. The landings were on 
the edge of broad_ flats, slightly undulating, with fences of 
wire hung with jetsam debris, and there were trees all 
along the river bank — sycamores and river willows chiefly. 
Cotton bales were scattered round the landing — a mere 
trail up the bank in the mud leading to the bottomland 
where the cotton was. With cotton hooks, from one to 
four or five darkies would seize a bale and start it down 
the bank toward the two three-inch thick planks that ran 
to the deck. Sometimes heaving till their thick lips 
stretched into furrows', sometimes leaping to stop a run- 
away bale, the roustabouts worked at the bales, anywhere 
from one to eight bales being kept moving at a time. 
Sometimes a bale "got away" and had to be fished out of 
the water; several times darkies were hauled over the 
top of the bale when it rolled and dropped scrambling in 
front of the mass. Once a darky landed in front of a 
bale on his hands and knees. The bale was not stopped 
till it stood balancing on his. back — 500 pounds weight. 
"Huh! Huh!" the darky said, "cut it off; cut it off 
— don' let this bale into the rivah! What you doin' 
thah?" 
They had just been loading on a cow and a calf at a 
landing with wiW yells of laughter when one of the 
darkies, a very black man, whose head hung over his 
shoulders, and wbtose lips drew down at the corners — 
sure sign of a man hopeless, helpless and plodding on 
only because there is no standing still — sat down in the 
engineer's chair, a tired and dejected figure. 
'•Nothing but work all day long and all night long — 
work, work all the while," he said, his words drooping. 
"Well, you're sitting down now," the engineer said. 
"You ain't working now." 
It wasn't a rebuke — the old engineer didn't mean it as 
one — but the darky thought it meant "git out of that 
chair," which other white men would have said. He 
rose with a heavy lift and sighed as he dragged himself 
— literally dragged — to the stove, where he sat down on 
the floor and buried his face in his knees. When he 
turned from the chair, the old engineer noticed the weari- 
ness of the negro, a heart weariness that I saw in the 
faces of many other negroes. For a moment the engi- 
neer seemed about to speak, about to tell the black man 
to stay seated, but years of prejudice were too strong. 
That was the nearest to an expression of sympathy for a 
colored man that I saw in the features of a Southern 
white man while I was there. 
But the engineer's thought gave me courage. I was 
white sure enough, but I was working and feeding with 
negroes. I went forward and found the mate. 
"Cap'n," I Said, "don't you s'pose I could have a plate 
to-night to eat off of?" 
Whereupon he turned and looked at me. Evidently I 
had tempted fate. Raymond S. Spears. 
A Bear in the Water, 
The bear has one trait especially that is most danger- 
ous to the uneducated hunter, and that is when found 
swimming a lake or river he invariably goes in a straight 
.line from where he left the shore. Any obstacle in the 
way he clambers over, he it a log, boat or canoe. 
Should the place where he reaches the further shore 
be a high rocky bluff, he climbs this, rather than turn 
from his direct course. This may be pigheadedness or 
stupidity ; be it as it may, he will not turn to a low-shelv- 
ing beach a few yards at one side, but it never enters his 
head to take the easier landing. 
I once saw a bear swimming across near the discharge 
of a lake. There was a string of booms hanging down 
stream near the other shore and at right angles to where 
he was heading. He simply clambered over the boom 
logs and took the water again on the other side, instead 
of trotting along the boom to the shore. 
I was acquainted with an old Indian, who, knowing this 
trait of bears to land where they head for, did a deed of 
great nerve for a man of over sixty. He was visiting his 
fish net' on the shore of a narrow lake, when he saw a 
large bear enter the water on the opposite side a little 
above, and head for the shore the old man was on. Old 
Pete had no gun, but he did not hesitate a moment, but 
caught up his hunting ax, and ran along shore to where 
the bear would land. The old man was plainly visible to 
the bear from the first, but Bruin kept on his direct 
course. Old Pete waded out from the shore nearly 
to his waist with ax uplifted, and waited. Everything de- 
pended on striking true, and at the proper and precise 
moment.. He had the bear, it is true, at a disadvantage. 
Still, many a younger and stronger man would have de- 
clined the risk. 
Pete was successful; he buried the ax clean into the 
skull the'; first blow. 
Another instance I witnessed of a bear not turning 
aside for any obstacle: We were later than usual one 
evening' on the water ; my men were anxious to get to the 
portage before camping, and were tracking the canoe up 
the last \nile at deep dusk. There were four men on 
the line ashore, and the bow and steersmen standing up 
in the canoe fending> her off the rocks and shallows. My 
companion and I were sitting very quietly in the middle 
compartment of our large canoe; the men also were not 
