the waiter dodged into
the pantry, "I shan't have time to get my trunk down."

"How far up do you go?" inquired Captain Drawler.

"To Cincinnati, if you can carry me about right," replied Uncle Nathan,
with an eye to business.

"Well, as you are going clear through, I will wait a few minutes for
you," suggested the captain.

Uncle Nathan thought him very obliging, and after some little
"dickering" (for he had heard that Western steamboats were not
particularly uniform in their charges), he engaged a passage, applying
to the bargain the trite principle that "no berth is secured till paid
for," which had been reduced to writing, and occupied a conspicuous
place in the cabin. Without waiting to see the berth he had paid for, he
hastened to the hotel for the large hair trunk, which contained his
travelling wardrobe.

Our worthy farmer made it a point never to cause any one an unnecessary
inconvenience; never to read the morning paper more than half an hour
when an impatient crowd was waiting to see it; and never in his life
stopped his five-cattle team in the middle of a narrow, much-frequented
road, to the annoyance of others. So the captain did not have to wait
more than five minutes beyond the stated time. Depositing his trunk upon
a heap of baggage in the cabin, and turning with pious horror from the
gaming-tables there, Uncle Nathan seated himself in an arm-chair on the
boiler deck, to await the departure of the boat, and, in anticipation,
to feast his vision with the wonders of the Father of Waters. He waited
very long and very patiently, for Uncle Nathan considered patience a
cardinal virtue, and strove manfully against every feeling of
uneasiness. The tongue of the hugs bell over him at intervals banged
forth its stunning cadence, the hissing steam let loose from its pent-up
cells, the water which the wheels sent surging far up upon the levee,
all were indications, to his unsophisticated mind, of a speedy
departure.

Two hours he waited, with the same exemplary patience; but still the
Chalmetta was a fixture.

Night came, and the music of the bell, and the steam, and the surging
water, ceased. Uncle Nathan, thinking patience no longer a virtue,
cardinal or secondary, hastened to the captain, with some appearance of
indignation on his honest features. The worthy officer very coolly
informed him that, owing to the non-arrival of the mail, he should be
unable to get off till the next morning.

Uncle Nathan u