r boat and half across her deck, a gap had
opened, impossible to leap. They halted in rage as the more compact
youth on the moving steamer's roof, catching their attention, pointed a
good two miles up the river front. Yet what he said they would not have
known had not her mate repeated from the forecastle:

"Post forty-six! Drive up thah! We stop thah fo' a load of emigrants!"

They fled back to the cab. Aboard the receding boat the ruthless engine
bells jingled on; the broad waterside and the city behind it seemed,
from her decks, to draw away into the western clouds, and the yellow
river spread wide its shores in welcome to her swinging form. Now its
mighty current seemed to quicken and quicken as she gradually overcame
her down-stream drift, the ship-lined shores ceased to creep
up-stream--began to creep down--and her black crew, standing close about
the capstan, broke majestically into song:

"Oh, rock me, Julie, rock me."

From the forecastle her swivel pealed, her burgee ran down the
jack-staff, a soft, continuous tremor set in among all her parts, her
scape-pipes ceased their alternating roars, her engines breathed quietly
through her vast funnels, the flood spurted at her cutwater, white
torrents leaped and chased each other from her fluttering wheels, her
own breeze fanned every brow, and the _Votaress_ was under way.

IV

THE FIRST TWO MILES

The youth whom we have called short, square, and so on crossed to the
starboard derrick post. Several passengers had come up to the roof, and
one who, he noticed, seemed, by the many kind glances cast upon her, to
be already winning favor, was the tallish lass with the red curls.

The nurse was still at her back. She drew close up beside him and stood
in the wind that ruffled her hat and pressed her draperies against her
form. Her servant betrayed a faint restiveness to be so near him, but
the girl, watching the steamer's watery path as it seemed of its own
volition to glide under the boat's swift tread, ignored him as
completely as if he were a part of the woodwork. The very good-looking
man who was "taking out" the boat returned from a short tour of the deck
and halted by the great bell over the foremost skylights; but soon he
moved away again in mild preoccupation. The maiden's frank scrutiny
followed him a step or two and then turned squarely to the youth. Her
attendant stirred uncomfortably and breathed some inarticulate protest,
but in a tone