<h2>CHAPTER XVI.</h2>
<h4>New Switzerland—An old-time river
pilot—Houseboat life, on the lower
reaches—A philosopher in rags—Wooded
solitudes—Arrival at Louisville.</h4>
<p><span class="smcap">Near Madison, Ind.</span>, Sunday, May 27th.—At
supper last night, a houseboat fisherman,
going by in his skiff, parted the willows fringing
our beach, and offered to sell us some of
his wares. We bought from him a two-pound
catfish, which he tethered to a bush overhanging
the water, until we were ready to dress it;
giving us warning, that meanwhile it would be
best to have an eye on our purchase, or the
turtles would devour it. Hungry thieves, these
turtles, the fisherman said; you could leave
nothing edible in water or on land, unprotected,
without constant fear of the reptiles—which
reminds me that yesterday the Doctor
and the Boy found on the beach a beautiful
box tortoise.</p>
<p>Our fish was swimming around finely, at
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page203" id="page203"></SPAN></span>
the end of his cord, when the executioner arrived,
and when finally hung up in a tree was
safe from the marauders. This morning the
fisherman was around again, hoping to obtain
another dime from the commissariat; but
though we had breakfasted creditably from
the little "cat," we had no thought of stocking
our larder with his kind. So the grizzly
man of nets took a fresh chew of tobacco, and
sat a while in his boat, "pass'n' th' time o'
day" with us, punctuating his remarks with
frequent expectorations.</p>
<p>The new Kentucky houseboat law taxes each
craft of this sort seven-and-a-half dollars, he
said: five dollars going to the State, and the
remainder to the collector. There was to be
a patrol boat, "to see that th' fellers done
step to th' cap'n's office an' settle." But the
houseboaters were going to combine and fight
the law on constitutional grounds, for they had
been told that it was clearly an interference
with commerce on a national highway. As
for the houseboaters voting—well, some of
them did, but the most of them didn't. The
Indiana registry law requires a six months'
residence, and in Kentucky it is a full year, so
that a houseboat man who moves about any,
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page204" id="page204"></SPAN></span>
"jes' isn't in it, sir, thet's all." However, our
visitor was not much disturbed over the practical
disfranchisement of his class—it seemed,
rather, to amuse him; he was much more concerned
in the new tax, which he thought an
outrageous imposition. In bidding us a cheery
good-bye, he noticed my kodak. "Yees be
one o' them photygraph parties, hey?" and
laughed knowingly, as though he had caught
me in a familiar trick. No child of nature so
simple, in these days, as not to recognize a
kodak.</p>
<p>Warsaw, Ky. (524 miles), just below, has
some bankside evidences of manufacturing, but
on the whole is rather down at the heel. A
contrast this, to Vevay (533 miles), on the
Indiana shore, which, though a small town on
a low-lying bottom, is neat and apparently
prosperous. Vevay was settled in 1803, by
John James Dufour and several associates,
from the District of Vevay, in Switzerland,
who purchased from Congress four square
miles hereabout, and, christening it New Switzerland,
sought to establish extensive vineyards
in the heart of this middle West. The Swiss
prospered. The colony has had sufficient vitality
to preserve many of its original
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page205" id="page205"></SPAN></span>
characteristics unto the present day. Much of the
land in the neighborhood is still owned by the
descendants of Dufour and his fellows, but the
vineyards are not much in evidence. In fact,
the grape-growing industry on the banks of
the Ohio, although commenced at different
points with great promise, by French, Swiss,
Germans, and Americans alike, has not realized
their expectations. The Ohio has proved
to be unlike the Rhine in this respect. In the
long run, the vine in America appears to fare
better in a more northern latitude.</p>
<p>Three miles above Vevay, near Plum Creek,
I was interested in the Indiana farm upon
which Heathcoat Picket settled in 1795—some
say in 1790. In his day, Picket was a notable
flatboat pilot. He was credited with having
conducted more craft down the river to New Orleans,
than any other man of his time—going
down on the boat, and returning on foot. It is
said that he made over twenty trips of this character,
which is certainly a marvelous record at a
time when there were only Indian trails through
the more than a thousand miles of dense forest
between Vevay and New Orleans, and when a
savage enemy might be expected to lurk behind
any tree, ready to slay the rash pale-face.
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page206" id="page206"></SPAN></span>
Picket's must have been a life of continuous
adventure, as thrilling as the career of Daniel
Boone himself; yet he is now known to but a
local antiquarian or two, and one stumbles
across him only in foot-notes. The border
annals of the West abound with incidents as
romantic as any which have been applauded
by men. Daniel Boone is not the only hero
of the frontier; he is not even the chief hero,—he
is but a type, whom an accident of literature
has made conspicuous.</p>
<p>The Kentucky River (541 miles) enters at
Carrollton, Ky.,—a well-to-do town, with
busy-looking wharves upon both streams,—through
a wide and rather uninteresting bottom.
But, over beyond this, one sees that it
has come down through a deep-cut valley,
rimmed with dark, rolling hills, which speak
eloquently of a diversified landscape along its
banks. The Indian Kentucky, a small stream
but half-a-dozen rods wide, enters from the
north, five miles below—"Injun Kaintuck," it
was called by a jovial junk-boat man stationed
at the mouth of the tributary. There are, on
the Ohio, several examples of this peculiar
nomenclature: a river enters from the south,
and another affluent coming in from the north,
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page207" id="page207"></SPAN></span>
nearly opposite, will have the same name with
the prefix "Indian." The reason is obvious;
the land north of the Ohio remained Indian
territory many years after Kentucky and Virginia
were recognized as white man's country,
hence the convenient distinction—the river
coming in from the north, near the Kentucky,
for instance, became "Indian Kentucky," and
so on through the list.</p>
<p>Houseboats are less frequent, in these
reaches of the river. The towns are fewer
and smaller than above; consequently there
is less demand for fish, or for desultory labor.
Yet we seldom pass a day, in the most rustic
sections, without seeing from half-a-dozen to
a dozen of these craft. Sometimes they are
a few rods up the mouths of tributaries, half
hidden by willows and overhanging sycamores;
or, in picturesque little openings of the willow
fringe along the main shore; or, boldly planted
at the base of some rocky ledge. At the
towns, they are variously situated: in the
water, up the beach a way, or high upon the
bottom, whither some great flood has carried
them in years gone by. Occasionally, when
high and dry upon the land, they have a bit
of vegetable garden about them, rented for a
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page208" id="page208"></SPAN></span>
time from the farmer; but, even with the
floaters, chickens are commonly kept, generally
in a coop on the roof, connected with the
shore by a special gang-plank for the fowls;
and the other day, we saw a thrifty houseboater
who had several colonies of bees.</p>
<p>There was a rise of only two feet, last night;
evidently the flood is nearly at its greatest.
We are now twenty feet above the level of ten
days ago, and are frequently swirling along
over what were then sharp, stony slopes, and
brushing the topmost boughs of the lower
lines of willows and scrub sycamores. Thus
we have a better view of the country; and,
approaching closely to the banks, can from
our seats at any time pluck blue lupine by the
armful. It thrives mightily on these gravelled
shores, and so do the bignonia vine, the
poison ivy, and the Virginia creeper. The
hills are steeper, now, especially in Indiana;
many of them, although stony, worked-out,
and almost worthless, are still, in patches,
cultivated to the very top; but for the most
part they are clothed in restful green. Overhead,
in the summer haze, turkey-buzzards
wheel gracefully, occasionally chased by audacious
hawks; and in the woods, we hear the
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page209" id="page209"></SPAN></span>
warble of song-birds. Shadowy, idle scenes,
these rustic reaches of the lower Ohio, through
which man may dream in Nature's lap, all
regardless of the workaday world.</p>
<p>It was early evening when we passed Madison,
Ind. (553 miles), a fairly-prosperous factory
town of about twelve thousand souls.
Scores of the inhabitants were out in boats,
collecting driftwood; and upon the wharf was
a great crowd of people, waiting for an excursion
boat which was to return them to Louisville,
whence they had come for a day's outing.
It was a lifeless, melancholy party, as excursion
folk are apt to be at the close of a gala
day, and they wearily stared at us as we paddled
past.</p>
<p>Just below, on the Kentucky shore, on my
usual search for milk and water, I landed at a
cluster of rude cottages set in pleasant market
gardens. While the others drifted by with
Pilgrim, I had a goodly walk before finding
milk, for a cow is considered a luxury among
these small riverside cultivators; the man who
owns one sells milk to his poorer neighbors.
Such a nabob was at last found. The animal
was called down from the rocky hills, by her
barefooted owner, who, lank and malaria-skinned,
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page210" id="page210"></SPAN></span>
leaned wearily against the well-curb,
while his wife, also guiltless of hose and shoes,
milked into my pail direct from the lean and
hungry brindle.</p>
<p>By the time the crew were reunited, storm-clouds,
thick and black, were fast rising in the
west. Scudding down shore for a mile, with
oars and paddle aiding the swift current, we
failed to find a proper camping-place on the
muddy bank of the far-stretching bottom.
Rain-drops were now pattering on our rubber
spreads, and it was evident that a blow was
coming; but despite this, we bent to the work
with renewed vigor, and shot across to the lee
shore of Indiana—finally landing in the midst
of a heavy shower, and hurriedly pitching
tent on a rocky slope at the base of a vertical
bank of clay. Above us, a government beacon
shines brightly through the persistent
storm, with the keeper's neat little house and
garden a hundred yards away. In the tree-tops,
up a heavily-forested hill beyond, the
wind moans right dismally. In this sheltered
nook, we shall be but lulled to sleep with the
ceaseless pelting of the rain.</p>
<hr />
<p><span class="smcap">Louisville</span>, Monday, May 28th.—At
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page211" id="page211"></SPAN></span>
midnight, the heavens cleared, with a cold north
wind; the early morning atmosphere was
nipping, and we were glad of the shelter of
the tent during breakfast. The river fell eight
inches during the night, and on either bank is
a muddy strip, which will rapidly widen as
the water goes down.</p>
<p>Below us, twenty rods or so, moored to the
boulder-strewn shore, was a shanty-boat. In
the bustle of landing, last night, we had not
noticed this neighbor, and it was pitch-dark
before we had time to get our bearings. I
think it is the most dilapidated affair we have
seen on the river—the frame of the cabin is
out of plumb, old clothes serve for sides and
flap loudly in the wind; while two little boys,
who peered at us through slits in the airy walls,
looked fairly miserable with cold.</p>
<p>The proprietor of the craft came up to visit
us, while breakfast was being prepared, and remained
until we were ready to depart—a tall,
slouchy fellow, clothed in shreds and patches;
he was in the prime of life, with a depressed
nose set in a battered, though not unpleasant
countenance. None of our party had ever
before seen such garments on a human being—old
bits of flannel, frayed strips of bagging-stuff,
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page212" id="page212"></SPAN></span>
and other curious odds and ends of fabrics,
in all the primitive colors, the whole
roughly basted together with sack-thread. He
was a philosopher, was this rag-tag-and-bob-tail
of a man, a philosopher with some mother-wit
about him. For an hour, he sat on his
haunches, crouching over our little stove, and
following with cat-like care W——'s every movement
in the culinary art; she felt she was under
the eye of a critic who, though not voicing his
opinions, looked as if he knew a thing or two.</p>
<p>As a conversationist, our visitor was fluent
to a fault. It required but slight urging to
draw him out. His history, and that of his
fathers for three generations back, he recited
in much detail. He himself had, in his best
days, been a sub-contractor in railway construction;
but fate had gone against him, and
he had fallen to the low estate of a shanty-boatman.
His wife had "gone back on him,"
and he was left with two little boys, whom he
proposed to bring up as gentlemen—"yaas,
sir-r, gen'lem'n, yew hear me! ef I <i>is</i> only a
shanty-boat feller!"</p>
<p>"I thote I'd come to visit uv ye," he had
said by way of introduction; "ye're frum a
city, ain't yer? Yaas, I jist thote hit. City
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page213" id="page213"></SPAN></span>
folks is a more 'com'dat'n' 'n country folks.
Why? Waal, yew fellers jist go back 'ere in
th' hills away, 'n them thar country folks
they'd hardly answer ye, they're thet selfish-like.
Give me city folks, I say, fer get'n' long
with!"</p>
<p>And then, in a rambling monologue, while
chewing a straw, he discussed humanity in
general, and the professions in particular. "I
ain't got no use fer lawyers—mighty hard show
them fellers has, fer get'n' to heaven. As fer
doctors—waal, they'll hev hard sledd'n, too;
but them fellers has to do piles o' dis'gree'bl'
work, they do; I'd jist rather fish fer a liv'n',
then be a doctor! Still, sir-r, give me an eddicated
man every time, says I. Waal, sir-r,
'n' ye hear me, one o' th' richest fellers right
here in Madison, wuz born 'n' riz on a shanty-boat,
'n' no mistake. He jist done pick up his
eddication from folks pass'n' by, jes' as yew
fellers is a passin', 'n' they might say a few
wuds o' information to him. He done git a
fine eddication jes' thet way, 'n' they ain't no
flies on him, these days, when money-gett'n'
is 'roun'. Jes' noth'n' like it, sir-r! Eddication
does th' biz!"</p>
<p>An observant man was this philosopher, and
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page214" id="page214"></SPAN></span>
had studied human nature to some purpose.
He described the condition of the poor farmers
along the river, as being pitiful; they had no
money to hire help, and were an odd lot, anyway—the
farther back in the hills you get, the
worse they are.</p>
<p>He loved to talk about himself and his lowly
condition, in contrast with his former glory as
a sub-contractor on the railway. When a
man was down, he said, he lost all his friends—and,
to illustrate this familiar phase of life,
told two stories which he had often read in a
book that he owned. They were curious, old-fashioned
tales of feudal days, evidently written
in a former century,—he did not know the
title of the volume,—and he related them in
what evidently were the actual words of the
author: a curious recitation, in the pedantic
literary style of the ancient story-teller, but in
the dialect of an Ohio-river "cracker." His
greatest ambition, he told us, was to own a
floating sawmill; although he carefully inquired
about the laws regulating peddlers in our State,
and intimated that sometime he might look
us up in that capacity, in our Northern home.</p>
<p>As we approach Louisville to-day, the settlements
somewhat increase in number,
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page215" id="page215"></SPAN></span>
although none of the villages are of great size;
and, especially in Kentucky, they are from
ten to twenty miles apart. The fine hills continue
close upon our path until a few miles
above Louisville, when they recede, leaving
on the Kentucky side a broad, flat plain several
miles square, for the city's growth. For
the most part, these stony slopes are well
wooded with elm, buckeye, maple, ash, oak,
locust, hickory, sycamore, cotton-wood, a few
cedars, and here and there a catalpa and a
pawpaw giving a touch of tropical luxuriance
to the hillside forest; while blackberry bushes,
bignonia vines, and poison ivy, are everywhere
abundant; otherwise, there is little of
interest to the botanist. Redbirds, catbirds,
bluebirds, blackbirds, and crows are chattering
noisily in the trees, and turkey-buzzards
everywhere swirl and swoop in mid-air.</p>
<p>The narrow little bottoms are sandy; and
on lowland as well as highland there is much
poor, rock-bewitched soil. The little whitewashed
farmsteads look pretty enough in
the morning haze, lying half hid in forest
clumps; but upon approach they invariably
prove unkempt and dirty, and swarming with
shiftless, barefooted, unhealthy folk, whom
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page216" id="page216"></SPAN></span>
no imagination can invest with picturesque
qualities. Their ragged, unpainted tobacco-sheds
are straggling about, over the hills; and
here and there a white patch in the corner of
a gray field indicates a nursery of tobacco
plants, soon to be transplanted into ampler
soil.</p>
<p>It is not uncommon to find upon a hillside
a freshly-built log-cabin, set in the midst of a
clearing, with bristling stumps all around, reminding
one of the homes of new settlers on
the far-away logging-streams of Northern
Wisconsin or Minnesota; the resemblance is
the closer, for such notches cut in the edge of
the Indiana and Kentucky wilderness are often
found after a row of many miles through a
winding forest solitude apparently but little
changed from primeval conditions. Now and
then we come across quarries, where stone is
slid down great chutes to barges which lie
moored by the rocky bank; and frequently is
the stream lined with great boulders, which
stand knee-deep in the flood that eddies and
gurgles around them.</p>
<p>On the upper edge of the great Louisville
plain, we pitched tent in the middle of the
afternoon; and, having brought our bag of
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page217" id="page217"></SPAN></span>
land-clothes with us in the skiff, from Cincinnati,
took turns under the canvas in effecting
what transformation was desirable, preparatory
to a visit in the city. In the early twilight
we were floating past Towhead Island,
with its almost solid flank of houseboats,
threading our way through a little fleet of
pleasure yachts, and at last shooting into the
snug harbor of the Boat Club. The good-natured
captain of the U. S. Life Saving Station
took Pilgrim and her cargo in charge for
the night, and by dusk we were bowling over
metropolitan pavements <i>en route</i> to the house
of our friend—strange contrast, this lap of
luxury, to the soldier-like simplicity of our
canvas home. We have been roughing it for
so long,—less than a month, although it seems
a year,—that all these conveniences of civilization,
these social conventionalities, have to
us a sort of foreign air. Thus easily may man
descend into the savage state.</p>
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="page218" id="page218"></SPAN></span>
<div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />