nted tobacco-sheds are straggling about, over the
hills; and here and there a white patch in the corner of a gray field
indicates a nursery of tobacco plants, soon to be transplanted into
ampler soil.

It is not uncommon to find upon a hillside a freshly-built log-cabin,
set in the midst of a clearing, with bristling stumps all around,
reminding one of the homes of new settlers on the far-away
logging-streams of Northern Wisconsin or Minnesota; the resemblance
is the closer, for such notches cut in the edge of the Indiana and
Kentucky wilderness are often found after a row of many miles through
a winding forest solitude apparently but little changed from primeval
conditions. Now and then we come across quarries, where stone is slid
down great chutes to barges which lie moored by the rocky bank;
and frequently is the stream lined with great boulders, which stand
knee-deep in the flood that eddies and gurgles around them.

On the upper edge of the great Louisville plain, we pitched tent
in the middle of the afternoon; and, having brought our bag of
land-clothes with us in the skiff, from Cincinnati, took turns under
the canvas in effecting what transformation was desirable, preparatory
to a visit in the city. In the early twilight we were floating past
Towhead Island, with its almost solid flank of houseboats, threading
our way through a little fleet of pleasure yachts, and at last
shooting into the snug harbor of the Boat Club. The good-natured
captain of the U. S. Life Saving Station took Pilgrim and her cargo
in charge for the night, and by dusk we were bowling over metropolitan
pavements _en route_ to the house of our friend--strange contrast,
this lap of luxury, to the soldier-like simplicity of our canvas home.
We have been roughing it for so long,--less than a month, although
it seems a year,--that all these conveniences of civilization, these
social conventionalities, have to us a sort of foreign air. Thus
easily may man descend into the savage state.

CHAPTER XVII.

Storied Louisville--Red Indians and white--A night on Sand
Island--New Albany--Riverside hermits--The river falling--A
deserted village--An ideal camp.

Sand Island, Tuesday, May 29th.--Our Louisville host is the best
living authority on the annals of his town. It was a delight and an
inspiration to go with him, to-day, the rounds of the historic places.
Much that was to me heretofore foggy in Louisville story was made
clear