Page:A La California.djvu/227

Rh bound for?" called out one of the party as John was swept swiftly past. "Me no shabbe!" was John's prompt but half-despairing-reply. Let us hope that he brought up in some safe harbor at last. Another of the group told, with an evident hearty relish and keen appreciation of the absurdity of the matter, how he had passed on a raft in the immediate vicinity of a country house, which, firmly anchored to two giant trees, held its own stiffly against the flood. The water stood four feet deep on the ground floor, and the children were looking composedly out of the chamber window at the old lady, who, armed with a long pole, was wading around armpit deep in the water some distance from the house. From time to time, she would turn the end of the pole downwards and feel about in the water for something. The party on the raft hailed her to know if any of her family had been drowned, intending if such was the case to offer to stop and help her search for the body. "No, thank you; family all safe, but the child'n is terribly dry, an' I never like to let 'em drink river water, 'cause its so agery, an' I'm jest try in' to find the confounded well. If I don't think hit's gone an' floated away, drown me, stranger; an' it cost us a heap o' money!" was the poor distressed woman's half-despairing reply. This prejudice against river water is doubtless to some extent justifiable, as, in the summer season, the amount of vegetable matter held in solution in it must be considerable; nevertheless, I incline to the impression that the old lady was rather running it into the ground under all the circumstances.