The little steamer rushed madly into the opening, with her screw turning at its most rapid rate. When she had reached the fall she made a tremendous dive, as it were, burying her bowsprit in the muddy tide. Tons of the yellow fluid, loaded with sediment, flowed in on the forecastle and swept aft. I judged by the shock that she struck her fore-foot into the earth. The muddy water swashed up, and entirely covered the windows of the pilot-house, leaving enough of the soil to make the glass as opaque as the levee itself. We could not see a thing outside after this volume of mud was discharged upon the windows. But in another instant I felt the bow of the steamer rising. The screw was still shaking the vessel, and I felt that no great injury had been done to her. "Open the windows, if you please, Washburn," I said, trying to keep as cool as possible. "We are all right now," added the pilot. "One of our river steamers would never have come up after that dive." I rang the speed-bell as soon as I felt that we were fairly through the cut in the levee. A yell from the people assured us that we were all right, if we did not find it out before. "I suppose you are not a pilot in these waters!" I continued, turning to Mr. Bell, for that was his name. "Well, hardly, in these waters: at any rate I never took a steamboat over this ground before. But I reckon I can do it as well as any other man, for I was raised along here, and I know the lay of the land as well as the water," replied the pilot. The escape of steam from the safety-valve showed me that the engineers had slowed down, though I could not yet perceive it in the motion of the vessel. We were approaching the two men on the oars, and I rang to stop and back her. There was no difficulty in steering the steamer after we were out of the swiftest of the current, and I left the pilot-house. The Sylvania looked as though she had been buried in yellow mud for a year, and had just been dug out. The water had all passed out at the scupper-holes and swinging-ports; but the deck and a considerable portion of the deck-house were covered with the mud from the water. All hands except the chief engineer and one fireman had come out of the hiding-places, and were ready for duty. "Clear away the starboard quarter-boat," I called. "Mr. Washburn, you will pick up those men, and do it as quick as possible, for we are needed at those plantations." The crew got into the boat and lowered it into the water. In a moment more they were pulling with all their might for the two men, who were some distance apart. They picked them up, one at a time, and came back to the Sylvania. They hooked on the falls, and with the help of Ben Bowman and Hop Tossford, hoisted the boat up to the davits. The two men rescued from the water seemed to be very much exhausted, and we helped them on deck.