United States or Tanzania ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Colonel Elliott, of the Second Iowa Cavalry, sent with two of his companies by General Pope at dawn of the 8th from Watson's up the river-bank, captured two hundred prisoners, deck-hands and laborers as well as soldiers, the wharf-boat and steamers, great quantities of ordnance and other stores, and standing camps.
"Now let her out, and run for Green Cove Springs," I interposed. The deck-hands wound up the lines; we were soon out of the lake, and again headed up the St. Johns River. All the party were exhilarated by the fine sport we had had on the lake, and they were devoting themselves to a particular examination of the fish.
Lawry gave the helm to one of the deck-hands, and went below to make some entries in his account-book. He had been paid, that day, fifty dollars for the boat, and thirty dollars for dinners. Mrs. Light had expended twenty-six dollars for provisions and groceries, but he still had one hundred and twenty-eight dollars.
Sandy sat on the pile of trunks watching with great interest the novel sight of hurrying passengers, different from any people he ever saw before; black "roustabouts," or deck-hands, tumbling the cargo and the firewood on board, singing, shouting, and laughing the while, the white mates overseeing the work with many hard words, and the captain, tough and swarthy, superintending from the upper deck the mates and all hands.
Passengers from Fort Benton said that the lands on the Upper Missouri were parched for want of water, and the sluggish currents of the Big Muddy were "as slow as cold molasses," as one of the deck-hands said to Sandy, when he was peering about the lower deck of the steamboat. It began to look as if the water would not hold.
He now called my attention to the flags, and I am certain that I saw the sailing-master hide his mouth with his hand. Some of the deck-hands seemed to gather delicately nearer to us. "Sunday, of course," I said; and I pointed to the Jack flying from a staff at the bow. But Charley did not wish me to tell him about the flags, he wished to tell me about the flags.
Hawthorne speaks of him as an innocent man, the victim of criminal brutality little less than murder; it is certainly difficult to account for such severe ill-treatment, but the man was clearly a bad character, and it is also true that sea-captains do not interfere with their deck-hands without some kind of provocation.
The Captain, cowed by the steadily levelled muzzle of that pistol, obeyed this order and stood still; but at the same time he yelled for any of the transport's crew who might be within hearing to tumble aft in a hurry. In another minute they came mates, deck-hands, engineers, stewards, and stokers blocking the narrow gangways on either side of the deck-house.
"Now listen, Captain," Eddring persisted. "I am listening," blurted out Wilson. "Say, man, if I had your nerve, and what I know about poker on this river, I'd own the country." "But listen " "No. I just want to set here and admire you a few minutes before I tell the deck-hands to throw you into the river."
With the carriages it was an affair of mere muscle, but the horses required to be managed with brain. No sooner had one of them placed his fore feet on the gangway plank than he protested by backing up over a mass of patient Canadians, carrying with him half a dozen grooms and deck-hands.
Word Of The Day