er to New Orleans, than
any other man of his time--going down on the boat, and returning on
foot. It is said that he made over twenty trips of this character,
which is certainly a marvelous record at a time when there were only
Indian trails through the more than a thousand miles of dense forest
between Vevay and New Orleans, and when a savage enemy might be
expected to lurk behind any tree, ready to slay the rash pale-face.
Picket's must have been a life of continuous adventure, as thrilling
as the career of Daniel Boone himself; yet he is now known to but
a local antiquarian or two, and one stumbles across him only in
foot-notes. The border annals of the West abound with incidents as
romantic as any which have been applauded by men. Daniel Boone is not
the only hero of the frontier; he is not even the chief hero,--he is
but a type, whom an accident of literature has made conspicuous.

The Kentucky River (541 miles) enters at Carrollton, Ky.,--a
well-to-do town, with busy-looking wharves upon both streams,--through
a wide and rather uninteresting bottom. But, over beyond this, one
sees that it has come down through a deep-cut valley, rimmed with
dark, rolling hills, which speak eloquently of a diversified landscape
along its banks. The Indian Kentucky, a small stream but half-a-dozen
rods wide, enters from the north, five miles below--"Injun Kaintuck,"
it was called by a jovial junk-boat man stationed at the mouth of the
tributary. There are, on the Ohio, several examples of this peculiar
nomenclature: a river enters from the south, and another affluent
coming in from the north, nearly opposite, will have the same name
with the prefix "Indian." The reason is obvious; the land north of the
Ohio remained Indian territory many years after Kentucky and
Virginia were recognized as white man's country, hence the convenient
distinction--the river coming in from the north, near the Kentucky,
for instance, became "Indian Kentucky," and so on through the list.

Houseboats are less frequent, in these reaches of the river. The towns
are fewer and smaller than above; consequently there is less demand
for fish, or for desultory labor. Yet we seldom pass a day, in the
most rustic sections, without seeing from half-a-dozen to a dozen
of these craft. Sometimes they are a few rods up the mouths of
tributaries, half hidden by willows and overhanging sycamores; or, in
picturesque little openings of the willow fringe along the main shore;