we took our final plunge.

It is sad, this bidding good-bye to the stream which has floated us so
merrily for a thousand miles, from the mountains down to the plain. We
elders linger long by the last camp-fire, to talk in fond reminiscence
of the six weeks afloat; while the Boy no doubt dreams peacefully
of houseboats and fishermen, of gigantic bridges and flashing
steel-plants, of coal-mines and oil-wells, of pioneers and Indians,
and all that--of six weeks of kaleidoscopic sensations, at an age when
the mind is keenly active, and the heart open to impressions which can
never be dimmed so long as his little life shall last.

* * * * *

Cairo, Monday, 11th.--At our island camp, last night, we were but nine
miles from the mouth of the Ohio, a distance which could easily have
been made before sundown; but we preferred to reach our destination in
the morning, the better to arrange for railway transportation, hence
our agreeable pause upon the Towhead.

Before embarking for the last run, this morning, we made a neat heap
on the beach, of such of our stores, edible and wearable, as had been
requisite to the trip, but were not worth the cost of sending home.
Feeling confident that some passing fisherman would soon be tempted
ashore to inspect this curious landmark, and yet might be troubled
by nice scruples as to the policy of appropriating the find, we
conspicuously labeled it: "Abandoned by the owners! The finder is
welcome to the lot."

Quickly passing Mound City, now bustling with life, Pilgrim closely
skirted the monotonous clay-banks of Illinois, swept rapidly under the
monster railway bridge which stalks high above the flood, and
loses itself over the tree-tops of the Kentucky bottom, and at
a quarter-past eight o'clock was pulled up at Cairo, with the
Mississippi in plain sight over there, through the opening in the
forest. In another hour or two, she will be housed in a box-car;
and we, her crew, having again donned the garb of landsmen, will be
speeding toward our northern home, this pilgrimage but a memory.

Such a memory! As we dropped below the Towhead, the Boy, for once
silent, wistfully gazed astern. When at last Pilgrim had been hauled
upon the railway levee, and the Doctor and I had gone to summon a
shipping clerk, the lad looked pleadingly into W----'s face. In tones
half-choked with tears, he expressed the sentiment of all: "Mother,
is it really ended? Why can't we go back to B