CHAPTER XXII
IN THE FOG
The boat was now in a part of the river where the land on both sideslies very low, behind very high levees. These are the richest cottonlands in the world, and their owners have tried to reclaim all of themfrom the river floods instead of taking only part of them forcultivation. Along other parts of the stream there are levees only hereand there, leaving the river a chance to spread out over great areas ofunreclaimed land, thus relieving the levees of much of the pressure uponthem. Here, however, the line of embankment is continuous on both sidesof the stream. For long distances the river is held between the twolines of artificially made banks.
The water was now within a few inches of the top of the levees, andtwenty or thirty feet above the level of the lands in the rear. Thestrain upon the embankments was almost inconceivably great, while thedestruction which any break in that long line of earthworks wouldinvolve was appalling even to think of.
The boys could see gangs of men at work wherever any weakness showeditself in the embankments, while sentinels, armed with shotguns, wereeverywhere on guard to prevent mischief-makers from cutting the levees.For, incredible as it may seem, men have sometimes been base enough todo this in order to let the river out of its banks, and thus reduce thedanger of a break farther up stream where their own interests lay. For,of course, when a crevasse occurs at any point it lets so much water runsuddenly out of the banks that the river falls several inches for manymiles above, and the strain on the levees is greatly reduced.
As the boys were floating down the middle of the flood, watching thework on the levees with keen interest, the air began to grow thick. Afew minutes later a great bank of dense fog settled down upon them,covering all things as with a blanket. The shores and the great treesthat grew upon them were blotted out. Then as the fog grew thicker andthicker, even the river disappeared, except a little patch of itimmediately around the boat. On every side was an impenetrable wall ofmist, and ragged fragments of it floated across the deck so that whenthey stood half the boat's length apart the boys looked like spectres toeach other.
"I say, Phil, hadn't we better go ashore or anchor?" said Constant.
"Where is the shore?" asked Phil, quietly.
"Why, there's a shore on each side of us."
"Certainly. But in what direction? Which way is across the river, whichway up the river, which way down the river?"
"Why, the current will tell that," said Constant.
"How are we going to find out which way the current runs?" asked Phil,with a quizzical smile.
"Easy enough; by looking at the driftwood floating by," said the boy,going to the side of the boat to peer at the surface of the riverthrough the fog. Presently he called out in amazement:--
"Why, the whole thing has stopped--the drift, the river, and theflatboat! We're lying here just as still as if we were on solidground."
"On the contrary," said Phil, "we're floating down stream at the rate ofseveral miles an hour."
"But--"
"Think a minute, Constant," said Phil. "We are floating just as fast asthe river runs. The drift-wood is doing the same thing. The water, thedrift, and the flatboat are all moving in the same direction atprecisely the same speed."
"Oh, I see," said Constant, with an astonished look in his eyes. "We'venothing to measure by. We can't tell which way we're going, or how fast,or anything about it."
"Why not come to anchor, then?" asked Irv. "If we keep on floating,nobody knows where we may go to. If there should be any gap in the lineof levees anywhere, we might float into it. It would just tickle thisflatboat to slip off on an expedition of that sort. Why not anchor tillthe fog lifts?"
"First, because we can't," said Phil. "The water is much too deep. Buteven if we could, it would be the very worst thing we could do. It wouldbring us to a standstill, while everything else afloat would keep onswirling past us, some of it running into us. If we should anchor herein the strong current, _The Last of the Flatboats_ would soon have asmany holes in her as a colander."
"Then what do you intend to do, Phil?" asked Ed.
"Precisely nothing whatever," answered the young captain. "Anything wemight do would probably make matters worse. You see we were almostexactly in the middle of the river when the fog came down on us. Now, ifwe do nothing, the chances are that the current will carry us alongsomewhere near the middle, or at least well away from the shores. If itdon't, we can't help it. The only thing we can do is to keep as close awatch as we can all around the boat, for we don't know which end orwhich side of her is in front now. I want one fellow to go to the bow,one to the stern, and one to each side, and watch. If we are about torun into a bank or anything else, call out, and we may save ourselves atthe last minute. That's all we can do for the present. So go now!"
The wisdom of Phil's decision to do nothing except watch alertly wasclear to all his comrades, so they took the places he had assigned them,while he busied himself first at one point and then at another,thinking all the while whether there might not be something else thathe could do--some precaution not yet thought of that he could take. Hewent to the pump now and then and worked it till no more water came up.He went below two or three times to see that nothing was wrong with thecargo. The boys, meanwhile, were walking back and forth on their beats,each carrying a boat-hook with which to "fend off" the larger bits ofdrift which the eddies, cross currents, and those strange disturbancesin the stream called "boils," sometimes drove against the gunwales.
The "boils" referred to are peculiar to the Mississippi, I believe. Theyare whirlpools, caused by the conflict of cross currents, and, as WillMoreraud said during this day of close watching, they are "sometimesright side up and sometimes upside down." That is to say, sometimes acurrent from beneath comes to the surface like water in a boiling kettleand seems to pile itself up in a sort of mound for a half minute or so,while sometimes there is a genuine whirlpool strong enough even to sucka skiff down, as old-time flatboatmen used to testify.
These were anxious hours for the young captain and his crew, but worsewas to come. For night fell at last with the fog still on, and betweenthe fog and the darkness it was no longer possible to see even the waterat the sides of the boat from the deck.
The crew had eaten no dinner that day. They had forgotten all abouttheir meals in the eagerness of their watching. Now that watching was nolonger possible they remembered their appetites, and had an eveningdinner instead of supper.
They set their lights of course, though it was of little use from anypoint of view. They could not be seen at a distance of twenty yards, andmoreover there was nobody to see them.
"There's not much danger of any steamboat running into us now," saidPhil, who had carefully thought the matter out.
"Why not?" asked Ed.
"Because this fog has lasted for nearly twelve hours now, and by thistime every steamboat is tied up to some bank or tree. For no pilot wouldthink of running in such a cloud after finding any shore to which hecould make his boat fast."
"But how can a steamboat find the shore when we can't?" asked Will.
"Because she can keep running till she finds it; and if she runs slowlyshe can back when she finds it till she makes an easy landing. She haspower, and power gives her control of herself. We have none, except whatthe sweeps give us. In fogs like this steamboats always hunt for theshores and tie up till the fog lifts. So after ten or twelve hours ofit, there are no steamboats prowling around to run into us."
"Another advantage the steamboats have in hunting for the shore," saidWill, "is that they can blow their whistles and listen for echoes. Theycan tell in that way not only in which direction the shore is, but abouthow far away it is."
"How do steamships manage in fogs out at sea?" asked Constant.
"Theoretically," replied Ed, "they slow down and blow their whistles ortheir 'sirens,' as they call the big steam fog-horns that can be heardfor many miles. But in fact the big ocean steamships drive ahead at fullspeed--twenty miles an hour o
r more--blowing their sirens--till theyhear some other ship's siren. Then they act according to fixed rules,each ship turning her helm to port--that is to say to the left--so thatthey sail well away from each other."
"But what if there are sailing vessels in the way?"
"They also have fog-horns, but they sometimes get themselves run down bysteamships, and once in a great while one of them runs into the side ofa steamship. The Cunard steamer _Oregon_ was sunk in that way by asailing craft. That sort of thing would happen oftener if the bigsteamships were to stop or run very slowly in fog. By running at fullspeed they make it pretty sure that they will themselves do any runningdown that is to be done. With their enormous weight and great speed theycan cut a sailing vessel in two without much danger of serious damage tothemselves, and as they have hundreds of people on board while a sailingship has a very few, the steamship captains hold that it is right toshift the danger in that way."
The night dragged slowly along. Now and then a little conversation wouldspring up, for the boys were sleeping very little, but often there wouldbe no word spoken for an hour at a time.
The fog made the air very chill, and the boys, who remained on deck allnight, had to stir about frequently to keep reasonably warm.
The fog began whitening at last as the daylight dawned, and all the boysstrained their eyes to see through it.
But it showed no sign of lifting.
The Last of the Flatboats Page 23