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182 Johnny?' And so they eat their day's food, sleep in their floating homes, saw their old broken fiddles or pump wheezy accordeons, and are happy. Or sometimes as we often saw, an honest mechanic will build a cozy floating house, furnish it in comfortable style and moor it near his factory, saving rent and owning his home."

Several significant social changes wrought by the Civil War have been noted; it put an end to the days of the "coasting" trade of the flat-boats and to the "deckoneering" of white men. It also marked the passing of the old gambling days in the steam-boat business. The three previous decades were famous days for a swarm of recognized banditti which may be said to have almost lived upon the Ohio–Mississippi boats. The opulence and chivalry of Southern planters who traveled largely by steam-packets made gambling a source of immense revenue to such as always won.

It was always cards, and the steamboat is the ideal hunting-ground of the gambler and card-sharp; here is money, and those who have it are utterly at leisure. Back in the days of the third generation of river-