didn’t notice the wreck till we was right on it; and so we saddle-baggsed; but all of us was saved but Bill Whipple—and oh, he was the best cretur!—I most wish ’t it had been me, I do.”
“My George! It’s the beatenest thing I ever struck. And then what did you all do?”
“Well, we hollered and took on, but it’s so wide there we couldn’t make nobody hear. So pap said somebody got to get ashore and get help somehow. I was the only one that could swim, so I made a dash for it, and Miss Hooker she said if I didn’t strike help sooner, come here and hunt up her uncle, and he’d fix the thing. I made the land about a mile below, and been fooling along ever since, trying to get people to do something, but they said, ‘What, in such a night and such a current? There ain’t no sense in it; go for the steam ferry.’ Now if you’ll go and—”