"Well, that was an adventure worth while!" remarked Jack, as he settled down to look after his engine and hit up a livelier pace; for Memphis was a long ways off, and that had been settled on as their next station.
"I do be having to laugh whin I think of poor Buster," observed Jimmie, with a broad grin on his good-natured countenance.
"Why about the Hippopotamus?" queried the skipper, without looking up.
"What d'ye suppose he will be afther saying now, whin he hears what happened till us again? Didn't ye listen whin he said, 'Oh, splash! nothin' iver happens till the wan of us save Jack and Jimmie!' And by the token it do same to be thrue. We're the broth of boys that git in the ruction ivery toime."
"I wonder if Buster has been overboard again?" mused Jack, smiling at the recollection of the tremendous splash the fat boy had made the time he dropped into the Mississippi, and held on by the trailing rope.
"I do be thinkin' ivery toime a big wave comes along; 'there's Buster takin' wan of his headers again, and makin' the river quake!'" chuckled Jimmie.
So they beguiled the minutes while lunch was being prepared; which, since it was only a cold one, did not take much time. Then they sat and enjoyed themselves, while the Tramp bustled merrily on her way, and the speeding shore panorama interested them constantly, on account of the changes taking place.
Occasionally Jack consulted his maps, in order to find out what the name of some town they were passing might be, and in this way locate their position.
"Will we make it, do yees think?" asked Jimmie, after one of these periods of study on the part of the skipper.
"I think so; I hope so," replied the other. "Because, you see, we ought to pull up there and get ready for a fresh start. So far we've done just elegant work; but there's no telling what trouble is waiting for us below. The river gets bigger all the time, until there are places where you can hardly see across to the low shore on the other side. And those false cut-off channels will give us the time of our lives, maybe."