“As if he were in it! in what? in the boiler?”
“Certing! Don’t folks sometimes go into bilers, manny?”
“I should think there’d be other parts of the boat more comfortable.”
“That’s right; poking fun at me at once’t; but wait till we get through this brush with the old Flame and I’ll tell ye of a regular fixin scrape that a man may get into. It’s true, too, every word of it—as sure as my name’s Ben Blower.”
• • • • • •
“You have seen the Flame then afore, Stranger? Six year ago, when new upon the river, she was a real out and outer, I tell ye. I was at that time a hand aboard of her. Yes, I belonged to her at the time of her great race with the ‘Go-liar.’ You’ve heern, mayhap, of the blow-up by which we lost it? They made a great fuss about it; but it was nothing but a mere fiz of hot water after all. Only the springing of a few rivets, which loosened a biler plate or two, and let out a thin spirting upon some niggers that hadn’t sense enough to get out of the way. Well, the ‘Go-liar’ took off our passengers, and we ran into Smasher’s Landing to repair damages, and bury the poor fools that were killed. Here we laid for a matter of thirty hours or so, and got things to rights on board for a bran new start. There was some carpenter’s work yet to be done, but the captain said that that might be fixed off jist as well when we were under way—we had worked hard—the weather was sour, and we needn’t do any thing more jist now—we might take that afternoon to ourselves, but the next morning he’d get up steam bright and airly, and we’d all come out new. There was no temperance society at Smasher’s Landing, and I went ashore upon a lark with some of the hands.”
I omit the worthy Benjamin’s adventures upon land, and, despairing of fully conveying his language in its original Doric force, will not hesitate to give the rest of his singular narrative in my own words, save where, in a few instances, I can recall his precise phraseology, which the reader will easily recognize.
“The night was raw and sleety when I regained the deck of our boat. The officers, instead of leaving a watch above, had closed up every thing, and shut themselves in the cabin. The fire-room only was open. The boards dashed from the outside by the explosion had not yet been replaced. The floor of the room was wet and there was scarcely a corner which afforded a shelter from the driving storm. I was about leaving the room, resigned to sleep in the open air, and now bent only upon getting under the lee of some bulkhead that would protect me against the wind. In passing out I kept my arms stretched forward to feel my way in the dark, but my feet came in contact with a heavy iron lid; I stumbled, and, as I fell, struck one of my hands into the ‘manhole,’ (I think this was the name he gave to the oval-shaped opening in the head of the boiler,) through which the smith had entered to make his repairs. I fell with my arm thrust so far into the aperture that I received a pretty smart blow in the face as it came in contact with the head of the boiler, and I did not hesitate to drag my body after it, the moment I recovered from this stunning effect and ascertained my whereabouts. In a word, I crept into the boiler resolved to pass the rest of the night there. The place was dry and sheltered. Had my bed been softer, I would have had all that man could desire; as it was, I slept and slept soundly.
“I should mention though, that, before closing my eyes, I several times shifted my position. I had gone first to the farther end of the boiler, then again I had crawled back to the manhole, to put my hand out and feel that it was really still open. The warmest place was at the farther end, where I finally established myself, and that I knew from the first. It was foolish in me to think that the opening through which I had just entered could be closed without my hearing it, and that, too, when no one was astir but myself; but the blow on the side of my face made me a little nervous perhaps; besides, I never could bear to be shut up in any place—it always gives a wild-like feeling about the head. You may laugh, Stranger, but I believe I should suffocate in an empty church, if I once felt that I was so shut up in it that I could not get out. I have met men afore now just like me, or worse rather—much worse. Men that it made sort of furious to be tied down to anything, yet so soft-like and contradictory in their natures that you might lead them anywhere so long as they didn’t feel the string. Stranger, it takes all sorts of people to make a world! and we may have a good many of the worst kind of white-men here out west. But I have seen folks upon this river—quiet looking chaps, too, as ever you see—who were so teetotally carankterakterous that they’d shoot the doctor who’d tell them they couldn’t live when ailing, and make a die of it, just out of spite, when told they must get well. Yes, fellows as fond of the good things of earth as you or I, yet who’d rush like mad right over the gang-plank of life, if once brought to believe that they had to stay in this world whether they wanted to leave it or not. Thunder and bees! if such a fellow as that had heard the cocks crow as I did—awakened to find darkness about him—darkness so thick you might cut it with a knife—heard other sounds, too, to tell that it was morning, and scrambling to fumble for that manhole, found it, too, black—closed—black and even as the rest of the iron coffin around him, closed, with not a rivet-hole to let God’s light and air in—why—why—he’d ’a swounded right down on the spot, as I did, and I ain’t ashamed to own it to no white-man.”
The big drops actually stood upon the poor fellow’s brow, as he now paused for a moment in the recital of his terrible story. He passed his hand over his rough features, and resumed it with less agitation of manner.