I was now only thirty-seven miles from New Orleans. Rowing rapidly down the broad river, now shrouded in gloom, with the fleecy scuds flying overhead in the stormy firmament, I fully realized that I was soon to leave the noble stream which had borne me so long and so safely upon its bosom. A thunder-shower rose in the west--its massive blackness lighted by the vivid flashes which played over its surface. The houses of the planters along the river's bank were enveloped in foliage, and the air was so redolent with the fragrance of flowers that I seemed to be floating through an Eden. The wind and the clouds disappeared together, and a glorious sunrise gave promise of a perfect day. With the light came life. Where all had been silent and restful, man and beast now made known their presence. The rising sun seemed to be the signal for taking hold where they had let go the night before. The crowing of cocks, the cries of plantation hands, the hungry neigh of horses, the hundred and one sounds of this work-a-day world, greeted my ears, while my eyes, taking a rapid survey of the surrounding steamers, coal-arks, and barges of every description, carried quickly to my brain the intelligence that I was near the Crescent City of the Gulf. Soon forests of masts rose upon the horizon, for there were vessels of all nations ranged along the levee of this once prosperous city. Anxious to escape the officious kindness always encountered about the docks of southern cities, I peered about, hoping to find some quiet corner in which to moor my floating home. Near the foot of Louisiana Avenue I saw the fine boat-house of the "Southern Boat Club," and being pleasantly hailed by one of its members, hove to, and told him of my perplexity. With the ever ready hospitality of a southerner, he assured me that the boat-house was at my disposal; and calling a friend to assist, we easily hauled the duck-boat out of the water, up the inclined plane, into her new quarters. The row upon the Mississippi from its junction with the Ohio down to New Orleans, including many stoppages, had occupied nineteen days, and had been accelerated by considerable night voyaging. The flow of the Mississippi was about one third faster than that of the Ohio. Lloyd's River Map gives the distance from the mouth of the Ohio to the centre of New Orleans as ten hundred and fifty-five miles, but the surveys of the United States Engineer Corps make this crooked route ten hundred and twenty miles only. My floating home being now in good hands, its captain turned his back on the water, and took a turn on land, leaving the river bounded by its narrow horizon, but teeming with a strange, nomadic life, the various types of which afforded a field where much gleaning would end in but a scanty harvest of good. Already my ears caught, in fancy, the sound of the restless waves of the briny waters of the Gulf of Mexico, and my spirits rose at the prospect of the broader experiences about to be encountered.