Daybreak saw the clumsy craft with its heterogeneous cargo float slowly forth from the shadows of the creek mouth to the tune of a mighty creaking of its great sweeps, till it was caught by the river current outside, and the long trip of two thousand miles began.
With the river running five or six miles an hour, it would seem that a hundred miles a day might be made; but snags and shifting mud banks rendered it hazardous to float by night, save when the moon was full. Slack water, too, at the numerous bends, and the necessity of frequently crossing over to avoid islands and rafts of drift, consumed much time, so that often twenty miles in a day was as much as could be accomplished with a due regard for safety.
They tied up the first night in a creek mouth on the Virginia bank, fifteen miles below Blennerhassett’s Island, having spent an hour there, viewing the mansion and the flower gardens.
For this beautiful island, so sadly associated with the early history of the Ohio, was then in the heyday of its prosperity. Harman Blennerhassett and his accomplished wife had come there five years previously, and wonderful accounts of their luxurious home, their wealth and culture had spread up and down the two great rivers, from Pittsburgh to New Orleans.
The ark made good progress during the next day and the day following. By three o’clock of this third afternoon it reached Letart’s “Falls.” Here the sweeps were double-manned, and the boat was about to run down this bit of quick water when the sudden onset of a thunder-squall led Marion Royce to countermand his order, and pole the ark to the shelter of the trees on an island just above the rapids.
The delay bade fair to be brief, but it was fraught with grave consequences. While lying-by there, waiting for the gust of rain to spend itself, Shadwell Lincoln espied a new barge on rough timber ways, masked by cedar shrubbery, upon the Virginia side of the river. The wind and rain, waving the cedar aside, gave them glimpses of it, otherwise it would have escaped notice.
They hailed it, but received no answer. Moses Ayer then fired his rifle to attract the attention of those ashore. At the report a flock of buzzards rose from close by the barge.
“That’s queer,” said Lewis Hoyt. “Let’s have a look at that barge, Cap’n.”
Marion nodded. Lewis and Moses Ayer climbed into the small skiff, which the ark towed astern, and pulled into the bank, distant no more than a hundred yards. Landing a little above the barge, they pushed through a tangled thicket of cedar and wild grape-vines, and disappeared from view; but Moses soon came off again in haste.