and New Orleans 2,585 tons
4 between Florence and New Orleans 1,617 tons
4 in St. Louis local trade 1,001 tons
7 in local cotton trade 2,016 tons
River "tramps" and unclassified 23,206 tons

It may be noted that in all the years of the development of the
Mississippi shipping, there was comparatively little increase in the size
of the individual boats. The "Vesuvius," built in 1814, was 480 tons
burthen, 160 feet long, 28.6 feet beam, and drew from five to six feet.
The biggest boats of later years were but little larger.

[Illustration: THE MISSISSIPPI PILOT]

The aristocrat of the Mississippi River steamboat was the pilot. To him
all men deferred. So far as the river service furnished a parallel to the
autocratic authority of the sea-going captain or master, he was it. All
matters pertaining to the navigation of the boat were in his domain, and
right zealously he guarded his authority and his dignity. The captain
might determine such trivial matters as hiring or discharging men, buying
fuel, or contracting for freight; the clerk might lord it over the
passengers, and the mate domineer over the black roustabouts; but the
pilot moved along in a sort of isolated grandeur, the true monarch of all
he surveyed. If, in his judgment the course of wisdom was to tie up to an
old sycamore tree on the bank and remain motionless all night, the boat
tied up. The grumblings of passengers and the disapproval of the captain
availed naught, nor did the captain often venture upon either criticism or
suggestion to the lordly pilot, who was prone to resent such invasion of
his dignity in ways that made trouble. Indeed, during the flush times on
the Mississippi, the pilots were a body of men possessing painfully
acquired knowledge and skill, and so organized as to protect all the
privileges which their attainments should win for them. The ability to
"run" the great river from St. Louis to New Orleans was not lightly won,
nor, for that matter, easily retained, for the Mississippi is ever a
fickle flood, with changing landmarks and shifting channel. In all the
great volume of literature bearing on the story of the river, the
difficulties of its conquest are nowhere so truly recounted as in Mark
Twain's _Life on the Mississippi_, the humorous quality of which does not
obscure, but rather enhances its value as a pictures