"See what I have killed," enthusiastically cried the Doctor in German.
"Yaas," chimed in the darkey, "dat squi'l him swimmin' de ribber an' de
Doc, he shot an' shot an' den I kill um wid de oah."
After leaving Quincy, the Doctor again distinguished himself, by firing into some ducks that he saw in a slough on the Missouri side. The negro had encouraged him to shoot and to his intense satisfaction, he accidentally killed one. He made the darkey row in and pick it up, and a few moments later, a gruff voice was heard on the bank:
"Pull ashore; nigger."
Looking up they saw a gigantic Missourian with his rifle pointed at them and the negro pulled in as though he was trying to escape another lightning storm.
"Mister; I want six bits fur that er pet duck of mine," the man remarked to the Doctor.
The price demanded was promptly paid and the Doctor was glad to get away from that wicked looking weapon which the Missourian handled as though familiar with its use. After that adventure, he lost all interest in hunting.
On June nineteenth, the party pulled into St. Louis, where they were welcomed by a crowd of about thirty-thousand people, and the screaming of whistles was something deafening. The Mayor was on one of the steamboats and extended Paul the freedom of the city. He was hospitably entertained, and after a short visit, began the last stretch of his journey, two-hundred miles to Cairo, which he intended to finish without a stop; the longest continuous run he ever made. On this trip he had a great deal of trouble with the boat as both the Doctor and the darkey would persist in sleeping, after they had been on the route a short time. On one occasion, after the boat had been lost from him for a couple of hours, Boyton saw something limping down the river in a lopsided manner, which he could not believe was the boat; but on its nearing him, he saw it was the Doctor pulling away as though his life depended on it, with one oar and a little staff to one end of which was fastened a small German flag. Both occupants had gone to sleep and lost an oar, and the Doctor had utilized the flag staff that had been proudly placed at the boat's stern. They arrived safely at Cairo, forty-one hours from St. Louis. The Doctor poorer in clothes and the darkey much richer in wardrobe, parted with each other and Paul at this point.
At Cairo, Boyton met a friend who was going up the Mississippi to St. Paul on his own private steamer, a handsome little boat fitted up with every luxury. He invited Paul to accompany him and knowing no more congenial way to rest, he consented. They made the trip by easy stages stopping at places where good hunting promised and thoroughly enjoyed themselves. The little steamer was full of pets they picked up at various points; coons, foxes, opossum, crows and squirrels.
Above Burlington they ran across somewhat of a snag in the shape of a pilot's union. They were compelled to hire a pilot to see them up the river, (though they were perfectly able to handle the boat themselves), or be compelled to pay a fine of fifty dollars. They were hauled up at the wharf of an Iowa village when they heard this, and rather than have any trouble, they concluded to hire a pilot. On inquiry, they learned that there was no pilot in the village except the editor of the weekly paper. He had a license and could do the work if he was so inclined. This placed them in a rather awkward position. They did not feel like asking so distinguished a gentleman as the editor of the paper to pilot them. Several conferences were held on the subject; but the stubborn fact still stared them in the face, that the editor was the only man in the village who could do the work and if they proceeded to the next town without a licensed pilot they would have to pay a fifty dollar fine. At last in a fit of desperation, Paul said he would call on the editor and see what kind of a man he was, anyway, and if he proved to be all right, he might be induced to join them as a guest, which would be a more polite way to put it. They were willing to give twenty-five or thirty dollars; but they felt a delicacy in making such a proposition to an editor.