amid the curses of the mates, and fairly flew past these men who were hunting me. I kept on up the high bank and over the levee, and when I threw my plow in the pile with the others, made off for the cotton fields and laid flat on my back until the boat got again under way, and the burning pine in the torches on deck had been extinguished. It was a close call, I can assure you. Bill met me at Vicksburg the next day and brought the boodle, which we divided. He said the crowd took lights and searched the boat's hold for me after we left the landing. Bill must have played his part well, as he told me afterward that they never suspicioned him. Yes, I could tell many of my exploits. The river was for the greater portion of my gambling career my strongest hold. But it's all over now. Even should a man strike a big winning, there are always too many smart Alecks about, and you would have to whack up with so many that there would be little left for the winner." The days of gambling on the river boats are not altogether gone but the days of the inland-water pirate are days of the distant past. In the time of the keel- and flat-boat the Ohio, and its tributaries to a certain extent, were infested with gangs of cut-throats and robbers whose exploits challenge the pen of a Scott. In certain portions of the river boatmen never dared to tie up at night, but kept their craft fairly in the swiftest current in order to hasten by these haunts. It was the common tradition among boatmen that their craft floated faster at night than in daylight; whatever the ground for this belief, it is certain the fastest current was all too slow if night found a _voyageur_, for instance, in the neighborhood of the notorious Hurricane Island between Illinois and Kentucky. Near here one Wilson, according to the Kentucky historian Collins, fitted up a "home" in famed Cave-in-Rock on the Illinois shore. This great cavern measures two hundred feet in length, eighty in width, the entrance being twenty-five feet high. Wilson's "place" was known as "Liquor Vault and House of Entertainment." "Its very novelty attracted the attention of the boats descending the river, and the crews generally landed for refreshments and amusements. Idle characters after awhile gathered here, and it soon became infamous for its licentiousness and blasphemy. Wilson ... formed a band of robbers, and laid plans of the deepest villainy...."[74] Some of the gang escaped when they found public vengeance aroused against them, but some were taken prisoners; Wilson himself lost his life at the hands of one of his own gang, tempted by the large reward offered for his head. Not long after, in the upper part of this mysterious cavern, were found sixty skeletons, confirming the tale of systematic confidence, betrayal, and murder. CHAPTER VI THE NAVIGATION OF THE OHIO