At sunset I reached Maysville, where the celebrated Daniel Boone, the pioneer of Kentucky backwoods life, once lived; and as the wind began to fall, I pulled into a fine creek about four miles below the village, having made twenty-nine miles under most discouraging circumstances. The river was here, as elsewhere, lighted by small hand-lanterns hung upon posts. The lights were, however, so dull, and, where the channel was not devious, at such long intervals, that they only added to the gloom.
As the wind generally rose and fell with the sun, it became necessary to adopt a new plan to expedite my voyage, and the river being usually smooth at dawn of day, an early start was an imperative duty. At four o'clock in the morning the duck-boat was under way, her captain cheered by the hope of arriving in Cincinnati, the great city of the Ohio valley, by sunset. I plied my oars vigorously all day, and when darkness settled upon the land, was rewarded for my exertions by having my little craft shoot under the first bridge that connects Cincinnati with Kentucky. Here steamers, coal-barges, and river craft of every description lined the Ohio as well as the Kentucky shore. Iron cages filled with burning coals were suspended from cranes erected upon flatboats for the purpose of lighting the river, which was most effectually done, the unwonted brilliancy giving to the busy scene a strange weirdness, and making a picture never to be forgotten.
The swift current now carried me under the suspension-bridge which connects Cincinnati and Covington, and my boat entered the dark area below, when suddenly the river was clouded in snow, as fierce squalls came up the stream, and I eagerly scanned the high, dark banks to find some inlet to serve as harbor for the night. It was very dark, and I hugged the Kentucky shore as closely as I dared. Suddenly a gleam of light, like a break in a fog-bank, opened upon my craft, and the dim outlines of the sides of a gorge in the high coast caught my eye. It was not necessary to row into the cleft in the hillside, for a fierce blast of the tempest blew me into the little creek; nor was my progress stayed until the sneak-box was driven several rods into its dark interior, and entangled in the branches of a fallen tree.
In the blinding snowfall it was impossible to discern anything upon the steep banks of the little creek which had fairly forced its hospitality upon me; so, carefully fastening my painter to the fallen tree, I hastily disappeared below my hatch. During the night the mercury fell to six degrees above zero, but my quarters were so comfortable that little inconvenience from the cold was experienced until morning, when I attempted to make my toilet with an open hatch. Then I discovered the unpleasant fact that my boat was securely frozen up in the waters of the creek! Being without a stove, and finding that my canned provisions—not having been wrapped in several coverings like their owner, and having no power to convert oxygen into fuel for warmth—were solidifying, I locked my hatch, and scrambled up the high banks to seek the comforts of that civilization which I had so gladly left behind when I embarked at a point five hundred miles further up the river, thinking as I went what a contrary mortal man was, myself among the number, for I was as eager now to find my human brother as I had been to turn my back upon him a short time before. The poetry of solitude was frozen into prose, and the low temperature around me made life under a roof seem attractive for the time being, though, judging from the general aspect of things, there was not much to look forward to, in either a social or comfortable light, in my immediate vicinity. I was, however, too cold and too hungry to be dainty, and felt like Dickens's Mrs. Bloss, that I "must have nourishment."
A turnpike crossed the ravine a few rods from my boat, and the tollgate-keeper informed me that I was frozen up in Pleasant Run, near which were several small houses. Upon application for "boarding" accommodations I discovered that breakfast at Pleasant Run was a movable feast, that some had already taken it at seven A. M., and that others would not have it ready till three P. M. This was anything but encouraging to a cold and hungry man; but I at length obtained admission to the house of a German tailor, and, explaining my condition, offered to pay him liberally for the privilege of becoming his guest until the cold snap was over. He examined me closely, and having made, as it were, a mental inventory of my features, dress, &c., exclaimed, "Mine friend, in dese times nobody knows who's which. I say, sar, nobody knows who's what. Fellers land here and eats mine grub, and den shoves off dere poats, and nevar says 'tank you, sar,' for mine grub. Since de confederate war all men is skamps, I does fully pelieve. I fights twenty-doo pattles for de Union, nots for de monish, but because I likes de free government; but it is imbossible to feeds all de beebles what lands at Pleasant Run."
I assured this patriotic tailor and adopted citizen that I would pay him well for the trouble of boarding me, but he answered in a surly way:
"Dat's vat dey all says. It's to be all pay, but dey eats up de sour- crout and de fresh pork, and drinks de coffee, and ven I looks for de monish, de gentlemens has disappeared down de rivver. Now you don't looks as much rascal as some of dem does, and as it ish cold to-day, I vill make dish corntract mid you. You shall stay here till de cold goes away, and you shall hab de pest I've got for twenty-five cents a meal, but you shall pays me de twenty-five cents a meal down in advance, beforehand."
"Here is a character," I thought, "a new type to study, and perhaps, after all, being frozen up in Pleasant Run may not be a fact to regret."
My landlord's proposition was at once accepted, and I offered to pay him for three meals in advance, to which he replied, "Dat dree pays at one time was not in de corntract." "You have forgotten one point," I said, addressing him as he led me to the kitchen, where "mine frau" was up to her elbows in work. "And what ish dat?" he asked, rather suspiciously eying me. "You have not fixed a price for my lodgings." "De use of de peddothes costs me notting, so I never charges for de lodgings wen de boarder WASHES himself every day," answered mine host. Having settled this point, and ordered his wife, in commanding terms, "to gib dish man his breakfast," he withdrew. The woman treated me very kindly, apologizing for her husband's exacting demands by assuring me that "Nobody knows WHO'S when nowadays. Seems as if everybody had got 'moralized by de war." The coffee the good lady made me, though thoroughly boiled, was excellent, and I complimented her upon it. "Yes," she replied, "my coffee IS coffee. De 'Merican beeble forgets de coffee wen dey makes it, and puts all water. Oh, wishy- washy is 'Merican coffee. It's like peas and beans ground up. De German beebles won't drink de stuff."
A generous repast of sausage, fresh pork, good bread, butter, and coffee, was placed before me, when the tailor returned with darkened brow, and rudely demanded the whereabouts of my boat. "I looks everywhere," he said, "and don't finds de poat. Hab you one poat, or hab you not?" I carefully described the exact location of the sneak- box in the rear of the tollgate-house, when he hastily disappeared. The old lady and I had fully discussed the wishy-washy coffee question, when mine host returned. This time he wore a pleasant countenance, and took me into his shop, where he introduced me to three of his apprentices. At night I was given a bed in an unfinished attic, under a shingled roof, which was not even ceiled, so the constant draughts of air whistling through the interstices overhead and at the sides of my apartment, kept up a ventilation more perfect than was desirable; and I should have suffered from the cold had it not been for my German coverlet, which was a feather-bed about twenty inches in thickness. It, of course, half smothered me, but there seemed no choice between that and freezing to death, so I patiently accepted my fate.