Page:Life on the Mississippi (IA lifeonmississipptwai).pdf/131

 Rh "Well, the water is just up to the roots of it. You must make a note of that."

"Why?"

"Because that means that there's seven feet in the chute of 103."

"But 103 is a long way up the river yet."

"That 's where the benefit of the bank comes in. There is water enough in 103 now, yet there may not be by the time we get there, but the bank will keep us posted all along. You don't run close chutes on a falling river, up-stream, and there are precious few of them that you are allowed to run at all down-stream. There 's a law of the United States against it. The river may be rising by the time we get to 103, and in that case we 'll run it. We are drawing—how much?"

"Six feet aft,—six and a half forward."

"Well, you do seem to know something."

"But what I particularly want to know is, if I have got to keep up an everlasting measuring of the banks of this river, twelve hundred miles, month in and month out?"

"Of course!"

My emotions were too deep for words for a while. Presently I said,—

"And how about these chutes? Are there many of them?"

"I should say so. I fancy we shan't run any of the river this trip as you've ever seen it run before—so to speak. If the river begins to rise again, we 'll go up behind bars that you 've always seen standing out of the river, high and dry like the roof of a house; we 'll cut across low places that you 've never noticed at all, right through the middle of bars that cover three hundred acres of river; we 'll creep through cracks where you 've always thought was solid land: we 'll dart through the woods and leave twenty-five miles of river off to one side; we 'll see the hind-side of every island between New Orleans and Cairo."