A DARING ££J5D. C9
* Jim, how did you run Plum Point, coming up ? *
' It was in the night, there, and 1 ran it the way one of the boys
on the " Diana " told me; started out about fifty yards above the
wood pile on the false point, and held on the cabin under Plum Point
till I raised the reef—quarter less twain—then straightened up for
the middle bar till I got well abreast the old one-limbed cotton-wood
in the bend, then got my stern on the cotton-wood and head on the
low place above the point, and came through a-booming—nine and a
half/
* Pretty square crossing, an't it %'
* Yes, but the upper bar's working down fast/
Another pilot spoke up and said—
'I had better water than that, and ran it lower down; started
out from the false point—mark twain—raised the second reef abreast
the big snag in the bend, and had quarter less twain/
One of the gorgeous ones remarked—
* I don't want to find fault with your leadsmen, but that's a good
deal of water for Plum Point, it seems to me/
There was an approving nod all around as this quiet snub dropped
on the boaster and * settled' him. And so they went on talk-talk-
talking. Meantime, the thing that was running in my mind was,
* ISTow if my ears hear aright, I have not only to get the names of all
the towns and islands and bends, and so on, by heart, but I must
even get up a warm personal acquaintanceship with every old snag
and one-limbed cotton-wood and obscure wood pile that ornaments
the banks of this river for twelve hundred miles; and more than
that, I must actually know where these things are in the dark, unless
these guests are gifted with eyes that can pierce through two miles of
solid blackness; I wish the piloting business was in Jericho and I
had never thought of it/
At dusk Mr. Bixby tapped the big bell three times (the signal to
land), and the captain emerged from his drawing-room in the forward
end of the texas, and looked up inquiringly. Mr. Bixby said—
' "We will lay up here all night, captain/
* "Very well, sir/
That was all The boat came to shore and was tied up for the
uight. It seemed to me a fine thing that the pilot could do as he