freight, are sometimes vexatious, and the journey may require double the time that was expected at the start. In the season of low water the boat is liable to get aground, and may lie there for hours, days, or even for weeks, before she is again afloat.
The dangers of the western waters are greater than those of the east. The boats are more liable to take fire, owing to their form of construction, and, as their engines are on the high-pressure principle, the chance of explosion of the boilers is much greater. The navigation of the rivers is hazardous, as the sand-banks are constantly shifting, and the course to be followed by the pilots is rarely the same for three months at a time. Snags and sawyers present dangers quite unknown to eastern waters, and in the Missouri river especially they are very numerous. A snag is a log or tree-trunk imbedded in the bottom of a river, with one end at or near the surface. The current causes it to incline down stream, and it is more dangerous to an ascending boat than to a descending one. The flat bottom of the boat is pierced by it, and sometimes the craft is impaled as one might impale a fly with a pin. On one occasion, on the Missouri river, some twenty years ago, a snag pierced the hull of a steamer, passed through the deck and cabin, and actually killed the pilot in the wheel-house. The sawyer is a tree that is loosely held by the roots at the bottom of the river, while its branches are on the surface; the current causes it to assume a sort of sawing motion, and hence its name. It is nearly if not quite as dangerous as the snag, and some of the pilots hold it in greater dread, for the reason that sawyers frequently change their position, while the snags, being more firmly imbedded, are less likely to drift away.
The current of the lower Mississippi is very strong, and it is a common remark that when a man falls into that stream his chances of escape are small. Many good swimmers have been drowned in it, and the great majority of those who dwell on its banks have a wholesome dread of attempting to bathe in its waters.
When we go westward beyond the valley of the Mississippi we find very few inland lakes and streams that are navigable. Great Salt Lake maintains a steamer or two for excursion purposes, and the waters of California had at one time a fair-sized fleet of boats that navigated San Francisco bay and the streams flowing into it. Their importance has diminished since the construction of the railway, and at present the steamboats of the Golden State are of no great consequence. Those that exist are managed more on the eastern than on the Mississippi system, but the rates are generally higher than on the Atlantic coast.
The Columbia river and its navigable tributaries have some thirty odd boats, most of them of small size, and intended to run where there is little water. The models in use are a modification of those of the Hudson and Long Island sound, and the rooms on the boats intended for night travel are generally large and comfortable. In going up the river from Portland, Oregon, the regular boats leave at five o'clock in the morning, and travelers making that journey will find it to their advantage to sleep on board instead of spending the night at the hotel and rising at an unseasonable hour in the morning.
On all the river steamers of America it is advisable to get a forward room rather than one near the stern. There is less jarring of the machinery, less heat from the engines, and, when the water is rough, there is less "pitching." On the other hand, there is more danger from collisions, and, on the Mississippi boats, a greater chance of being blown up. You pay your money, and you take your choice. But don't trouble yourself about accidents; don't put on your life-preserver before you go to sleep, as timid persons have been known to do; and if anything should happen try to face the danger coolly, and do the best you can. If you have occasion to don a life-preserver, be sure to fasten it well up under the arms, and not around the waist. In the proper position it will support the head above water, while, if fastened around the waist, it is apt to sustain the lower part of the body and submerge the head. If compelled to take to the water, divest yourself of the greater part of your clothing, and have your feet bare, or, at best, only stockinged. Ladies should reject their corsets under such circumstances, as they are serious hindrances to breathing in the water, and it is hardly necessary to say that long skirts are great impediments to swimming, or even to floating. Some persons have recommended their retention, on account of their buoyancy; but this only lasts for a few moments. As soon as they become soaked with water they become heavy, and have a tendency to drag the wearer down, rather than to support her.
CHAPTER IV.
SEA AND OCEAN TRAVEL.
The landsman who has never been on a sea-voyage looks with more or less hesitation at the prospect of making one. His thoughts are occupied with what he has heard or read of the perils of the great deep, and he regards with a feeling akin to veneration the bronzed sailor who has plowed every ocean on the globe, and tasted the delights of every climate. He questions his friends who have been to sea before him, and from their varied experience lays up a store of knowledge more or less useful. He wonders how he will enjoy sailing over the blue waters, how the spectacle will impress him, and more than all else he wonders whether or no he will be sea-sick. He busies himself with procuring a suitable outfit for his nautical journeys, and in nine cases out of ten selects a quantity of articles he never uses, and which it is not always easy to give away.
Before the days of steamships a sea voyage was an affair of considerable moment, as it implied an uncertain period on the waters, and the passenger was obliged to take along a good many articles of necessity or comfort, or go without them altogether. Nowadays the principal preparation is to secure your place and pay for your ticket, and, unless you are very eccentric in your wishes and desires, you will find everything you want to eat or drink on board the ship that is to carry you. In selecting your place, if you are inexperienced in sea travel, try and get as near the middle of the ship as you possibly can, and if you are forward of "amidships" you are better off than if the same distance "aft." In the middle of the ship there is less motion than elsewhere in a pitching sea, and the further you can get from the screw the less do you feel the jarring of the machinery. The rolling is the same all over the craft, and there is no position that will rid you of it. Several devices in the shape of swinging-berths have been tried, for the benefit of persons with tender heads and stomachs, and some of them have been quite successful in smoothing the rough ways of the ocean, but the steamship companies have been slow to adopt them, and the old salts do not regard them with a friendly eye.
Close all your business and have everything ready the day before your departure. It is better to sit around and be idle for a few hours than to have the worry of a lot of things that have been deferred till the last.
If you are going on a long voyage by sailing ship and expect to pass through the torrid and both temperate zones, you should provide yourself with thick and thin clothing suitable to all latitudes. If you are a society man of course you will carry your dress suit and a goodly stock of fine linen to match, but if you are "roughing it," and have no letters of introduction nor social designs, the dress suit will be superfluous. Take three or four suits of linen for wearing on shore in hot countries, a medium suit of woolen for temperate lands and a thick suit of the same material for high latitudes north or south. The roughest clothing procurable is what you need for wearing on shipboard, thin for the torrid zone and thicker for the temperate. Woolen or "hickory" shirts are the proper things for sea wear, and the only occasion when you need a white shirt is when you go on shore. Your own judgment must be your guide as to the proper supply of collars, handkerchiefs, and the like; don't forget to be well provided with underclothing, and remember that wool is a much safer article to wear against the skin than cotton or linen. Take plenty of woolen undershirts of the lightest texture for hot climates, and of course you will have thick ones for the cold regions. An umbrella and a cane are desirable for protection against sun and rain, or dogs and beggars, when going on shore. A sun hat, or sola topee, as it is called in India, is desirable in the tropics, but there is no need of taking it along at the start. It can be bought in the first tropical port you visit, and will be found there at a lower price than where it is not in regular use.
