wood, with a barque so heavily laden, was worse than the encounter with the alligator. I was young, brave and enthusiastic. Directing the negroes to place themselves in the bottom of the boat, and not to stir hand or foot at the risk of being knocked overboard with the paddle, I headed our little barque for the light in the cabin, which gave us a course quartering down stream. To have held her square across the stream, she would have undoubtedly filled with water. The night was dark, but the air was still as the inaudible breath of time.

Knowing that the perils of the sea, without wind, are abated one hundred fold, I made the venture, and landed safely at the Mississippi cabin.

Eighteen miles below Helena, and on the opposite side of the river, I passed the night, with a determination to be on the race ground the next day at twelve o'clock. I was up early in the morning. As I passed out the cot of my friend, in front of me the great father of waters rolled on in his majesty to the bosom of the ocean.

On the background the foliage of the forest cast a green shade upon the gray light of the morning. Every animal on the premises had sought refuge in the cane brakes from the ravages of the green-head fly and the gallinipper. Like Richard the Third—I was ready to cry, a horse—a horse—my kingdom for a horse.

Through the dim distance, half concealed by the cane, I discovered a mule, and was fortunate enough to bridle him. He was an old mule; some said the first Chickasaw Frenchman that ever settled in St. Louis rode him from the north of Mexico to the Mississippi river.

Others said that he was in the army of the First Napoleon, and had been imported across the water. Be this as it may, he was a good saddle mule, for I arrived upon the race ground fifteen minutes ahead of time.

I obtained the desired signature and saw the Spotted Buck win the race. But many said it was a jockey race, and that Silver Heels was the fleetest horse. The races continued through the evening. I had no desire to bet, but if I had, I should have bet on the fast man and not the fast horse.

After this event, and nearly half a century ago, I was standing on the street in Vicksburg. It was early in the morning, and the city unusually quiet. My attention was attracted in the direction of the jail by women running indoors and men rushing along the street; I saw sticks, stones, and bricks flying, and men running as in pursuit of some wild animal, and as I caught a glimpse of the figure of the retreating man, the sharp sound of a rifle gun rang out upon the morning air.

Following on to a spot on the street where a large crowd of men had collected, I saw the face of a dead man as the body was being turned over by one of the bystanders. The lineaments of the cold, marble face, spoke in a language not to be mistaken—that the dead was, in life, a brave man.

I soon learned that the name of the dead man was "Alonzo Phelps," and that he had been tried for the crime of murder and sentenced by the court to be hanged by the neck until he was dead, and this was the day for his execution; that he had broken, or found an opportunity to leave the jail, and nothing would stop him but the rifle-gun in the hands of an officer of the law.

I also learned that he had written a confession of his crimes, the manuscript of which was then in the jail, for he had knocked the keeper down with a stone ink-stand, with which he had been furnished to write his confession.

By the politeness of the jailor I was permitted to examine the confession, which closed with these remarkable words,

"To-morrow is the day appointed for my execution, but I will not hang."

The confession was afterward published. I read it many times, but have forgotten most of it. I remember he said the first man he ever murdered was in Europe, and that he was compelled, for safety, to flee the country and come to America. There was nothing so unusual in this, but the manner in which he disposed of his victim was singular, and more particularly the revelation he gave of his thoughts at the time.

He said he carried the body to a graveyard, and, with a spade that had been left there, he shoveled all of the dirt out of a newly-made grave until he came to the coffin. He then laid the body of the murdered man on the coffin and refilled the grave. "I then," says he, "left the graveyard, and spent the balance of the night in reflections. How strange, I thought, it would be for two spirits, on the last day, to find themselves in the same grave."

"I thought," says he, "if the relatives of the rightful owner of the grave should, in after years, conclude to move the bones of their kinsman, when they dug them up there would be two skulls, four arms, and so on, and how it would puzzle them to get the bones of their kinsman."

After reading this confession I regretted very much that I had never seen Alonzo Phelps while living, for there was blended in his composition many strange elements. But that part of his confession that gives interest to our story was the papers taken from the man he murdered in Europe, of which we have spoken. He concealed the papers, in a certain place, on the night he buried the man, and, as he was compelled to flee the country, said papers were, a long time afterward, discovered by reading his confession made in America.

With the settlement of the West, the navigation of the western waters was one of the principal industries. Keel and flat bottom boats were the first used. Keel boats were propelled against the stream with long poles, placed with one end on the bottom of the stream and a man's shoulder at the other end, pushing the boat from under him, and consequently against the stream. Flat bottom boats only drifted with the current, sometimes bearing large cargoes.

Louisville, Kentucky, was one of the principal points between Pittsburg and New Orleans. Here the placid waters of the beautiful river rushed madly over some ledges of rocks, called the falls of Ohio. Many reshipments in an early day were performed at this point, and if the boat was taken over the falls her pilot for the trip to New Orleans was not considered competent to navigate the falls. Resident pilots, in Louisville, were always employed to perform this task.

And few of the early boatmen were ever long upon the river without having acquaintances in Louisville.

Beargrass creek emptied its lazy waters into the Ohio at a point called, at the time of which we write, the suburbs of Louisville.

In a long row of cottages on the margin of Beargrass creek, that has long since given place to magnificent buildings, was the home of a friend with whom I was stopping.

Rising early one morning, I found the neighborhood in great excitement; a woman was missing. It was Daymon's wife. She had no relatives known to the people of Louisville. She was young, intelligent, and as pure from any stain of character as the beautiful snow.

Daymon was also young. He was a laborer, or boat hand, frequently assisting in conducting boats across the falls. But he was dissipated, and in fits of intoxication frequently abused his wife.

All who knew Daymon's wife were ready to take the dark fiend by the throat who had consigned her beautiful form to the dark waters of Beamrass creek.

Everyone was busy to find some sign or memento of the missing woman.

A large crowd had gathered around a shop, where a large woden boot hung out for a sign—a shoe shop. When I arrived on the spot a workman was examining a shoe, and testified that it was one of a pair he had previously made for Daymon's wife. The shoe had been picked up, early that morning, on the margin of Beargrass creek. Suspicion pointed her finger at Daymon, and he was arrested and charged with drowning his wife in Beargrass creek.

Daymon was not a bad-looking man, and, as the evidence was all circumstantial, I felt an uncommon interest in the trial, and made arrangements to attend the court, which was to sit in two weeks.