I asked Mr. Roberts about the famous poker games on the river boats.
"I antedate poker," he said. "The old river card game was called 'Brag.' It was out of brag that the game of poker developed. A steward on one of the boats once told me that he and the other boys had picked up more than a hundred dollars from the floor of a room in which Henry Clay and some friends had been playing brag."
Golden days indeed!—and for every one. The steamboat companies made fabulous returns on their investments.
Mr. Roberts is a wonder—nothing less. There's a book in him, and I hope that somebody will write it, for I should like to read that book
"In '54 and '55," said Mr. Roberts, "I worked for the St. Louis & Keokuk Packet Company, a line owning three boats, which weren't worth over $75,000. That company cleaned up as much as $150,000 clear profit in one season. And, of course, a season wasn't an entire year, either. It would open about March first and end in December or, in a mild winter, January.
"But I tell you we used to drive those boats. We'd shoot up to the docks and land our passengers and mail and freight without so much as tying up or even stopping. We'd just scrape along the dock and then be off again.
"The highest fare ever charged between St. Louis and Keokuk was $4 for the 200 miles. That included a berth, wine, and the finest old Southern cooking a man ever tasted. The best cooks I've ever seen in my life were those old steamboat cooks. And we gave 'em good stuff to cook, too. We bought the best of everything. You ought to see the steaks we had for breakfast! The officers used to sit at the ladies' end of the table and serve out of big chafing dishes. I tell you those were meals!
"There was lots going on all the time on the river. I remember one trip I made in '52 in the old 'Di Vernon'—all the boats in the line were named for characters in Scott's novels. We were coming from New Orleans with 350 German immigrants on deck and 100 Californians in the cabin. The Californians were sports and they had a big game going all the time. We had two gamblers on board, too—John McKenzie and his partner, a man named Wilburn. They used to come on to the boats at different places, and make out to be farmers, and not acquainted with each other, and there was always something doing when they got into the game.