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Show 82 Early Western Travels [ Vol. 26 V " The gioves were God's first temples." BRYANT. " Oh! if a hame, and it's hame, it's hame wad I be, Hame, hame, hame, to my ain countrie." CUNNINGHAM. " Those Sabbath bells, those Sabbath bells, I hear them wake the hour of prime." LAMB. " She walks the waters like a thing of life." BYRON. IT was late before we had passed the confluence of the Ohio with the dark- rolling tide of the " endless river/ 9 and the mellow gorgeousness of summer sunset had gently yielded to the duskiness of twilight, and that to the inky pall of night. The moon had not risen, and the darkness became gradually so dense that doubts were entertained as to the prudence of attempting to stem the mighty current of the Mississippi on such a night. These, however, were overruled; and, sweeping around the low peninsula of Cairo, our steamer met the torrent and quivered in every limb. A convulsed, motionless struggle ensued, in which the heavy labouring of the engine, the shrill whistle of the safety- valve, the quick, querulous crackling of the furnaces, the tumultuous rushing of the wheels, and the stem roar of the scape- pipe, gave evidence of the fearful power summoned up to overcome the flood. At length we began very slowly to ascend the stream. [ 52] Our speed was about five miles an hour, and the force of the current nearly the same, which so impedes advancement that it requires as long to ascend from the confluence to St. Louis as to descend to the same point from the Falls, though the distance is less than half. All night our steamer urged herself slowly onward against the current, and the morning found us threading a narrow channel amid a |