As they went southward the character of the country changed. The high, heavily timbered bluffs, often bold with jutting rocks, so characteristic of the upper river, began to give way to more easy slopes. The stream broadened and the level rose higher each day. Often, as the “Gazelle” sped along, a river steamer was met ploughing along up the great stream. Her long gangways raised up before her like horns (long gangways made necessary by the gently sloping banks and absence of docks); her tall stacks, side by side, running athwartships, bore between them the insignia of the line, an anchor or a wheel. The stacks ended in a fancy top, which Ransom said reminded him of pictures of the trimming the little girls of long ago wore round the end of their pantalettes. The river boats are very shallow, and very wide for their length, but in spite of their unboatlike appearance and their great thrashing wheels, they make good time. Sometimes a speed of fifteen miles an hour against the current, and twenty-five with the stream, is attained.
Kenneth congratulated himself repeatedly that he had started on this trip, for he realized that in no other way could he have gained so much information about shipping.
They stopped several days at Memphis, partly to give Arthur a quiet rest, partly because the weather conditions were against them.
At the levee a number of boats were nosing the bank, their long gangplanks outstretched before them like great arms. A constant stream of roustabouts trundling bales of cotton, rolling barrels, lugging boxes, went up the gangways. The mate stood near at hand, in a conspicuous spot, where he could see and be seen, and so belabored the toiling men with torrents of words, that it seemed as if he was the motive power of the entire procession. The negroes seemed not to notice him at all, but moved along at a steady, rhythmical gait.
Frank and Clyde stood watching. They marvelled at the amount of stuff carried aboard. “I bet they work the same racket that the spectacular shows employ,” Clyde said after a while. “If you look aft there somewhere, you would see the same niggers carrying the same bundles and things ashore again.”
“Oh, come off!” exclaimed the other.
“Yes, sure; they form an endless chain.”
Frank vouchsafed him no further reply, but suggested that they try to get on board and see for themselves.
“Can we come aboard?” Frank shouted to the mate when he stopped to take breath.
“I reckon you can,” was the answer. “Look out, you yellow-livered son of a bale of cotton! Do you want to knock the young gentlemen overboard?”