Chapter 23 - Page 2

was selling.
A random remark, connecting Irishmen and beer, brought this nugget of
information out of him--

They don't drink it, sir. They can't drink it, sir.
Give an Irishman lager for a month, and he's a dead man.
An Irishman is lined with copper, and the beer corrodes it.
But whiskey polishes the copper and is the saving of him, sir.'

At eight o'clock, promptly, we backed out and crossed the river.
As we crept toward the shore, in the thick darkness, a blinding
glory of white electric light burst suddenly from our forecastle,
and lit up the water and the warehouses as with a noon-day glare.
Another big change, this--no more flickering, smoky, pitch-dripping,
ineffectual torch-baskets, now: their day is past. Next, instead of
calling out a score of hands to man the stage, a couple of men and a
hatful of steam lowered it from the derrick where it was suspended,
launched it, deposited it in just the right spot, and the whole thing
was over and done with before a mate in the olden time could have
got his profanity-mill adjusted to begin the preparatory services.
Why this new and simple method of handling the stages was not thought
of when the first steamboat was built, is a mystery which helps one to
realize what a dull-witted slug the average human being is.

We finally got away at two in the morning, and when I turned out
at six, we were rounding to at a rocky point where there was an old
stone warehouse--at any rate, the ruins of it; two or three decayed
dwelling-houses were near by, in the shelter of the leafy hills;
but there were no evidences of human or other animal life to be seen.
I wondered if I had forgotten the river; for I had no recollection whatever
of this place; the shape of the river, too, was unfamiliar; there was
nothing in sight, anywhere, that I could remember ever having seen before.
I was surprised, disappointed, and annoyed.

We put ashore a well-dressed lady and gentleman, and two well-dressed,
lady-like young girls, together with sundry Russia-leather bags.
A strange place for such folk! No carriage was waiting.
The party moved off as if they had not expected any, and struck
down a winding country road afoot.

But the mystery was explained when we got under way again;
for these people were evidently bound for a large town which lay
shut in behind a tow-head (i.e., new island) a couple of miles
below this landing. I couldn't remember that town; I couldn't
place it, couldn't call its name. So I lost part of my temper.
I suspected that it might be St. Genevieve--and so it proved
to be. Observe what this eccentric river had been about:
it had built up this huge useless tow-head directly
in front of this town, cut off its river communications,