Chapter 49

Chapter 49
Episodes in Pilot Life

IN the course of the tug-boat gossip, it came out that out
of every five of my former friends who had quitted the river,
four had chosen farming as an occupation. Of course this was not
because they were peculiarly gifted, agriculturally, and thus
more likely to succeed as farmers than in other industries:
the reason for their choice must be traced to some other source.
Doubtless they chose farming because that life is private
and secluded from irruptions of undesirable strangers--
like the pilot-house hermitage. And doubtless they also chose
it because on a thousand nights of black storm and danger
they had noted the twinkling lights of solitary farm-houses,
as the boat swung by, and pictured to themselves the serenity
and security and coziness of such refuges at such times,
and so had by-and-bye come to dream of that retired and peaceful
life as the one desirable thing to long for, anticipate, earn, and
at last enjoy.

But I did not learn that any of these pilot-farmers had astonished anybody
with their successes. Their farms do not support them: they support
their farms. The pilot-farmer disappears from the river annually,
about the breaking of spring, and is seen no more till next frost.
Then he appears again, in damaged homespun, combs the hayseed
out of his hair, and takes a pilot-house berth for the winter.
In this way he pays the debts which his farming has achieved during
the agricultural season. So his river bondage is but half broken;
he is still the river's slave the hardest half of the year.

One of these men bought a farm, but did not retire to it.
He knew a trick worth two of that. He did not propose to pauperize
his farm by applying his personal ignorance to working it.
No, he put the farm into the hands of an agricultural
expert to be worked on shares--out of every three loads
of corn the expert to have two and the pilot the third.
But at the end of the season the pilot received no corn.
The expert explained that his share was not reached. The farm
produced only two loads.

Some of the pilots whom I had known had had adventures--
the outcome fortunate, sometimes, but not in all cases.
Captain Montgomery, whom I had steered for when he was a pilot,
commanded the Confederate fleet in the great battle before Memphis;
when his vessel went down, he swam ashore, fought his way through
a squad of soldiers, and made a gallant and narrow escape.
He was always a cool man; nothing could disturb his serenity.
Once when he was captain of the 'Crescent City,' I was bringing
the boat into port at New Orleans, and momently expecting orders
from the hurricane deck, but received none. I had stopped
the wheels, and there my