I rowed out of the canal on to the lake; but finding that the strong wind and rough waves were too much for my boat, I beat a hasty retreat into the port of refuge, and, securing my bow-line to a pile, and my stern-line to the bob-stay of a wood-schooner, the “Felicit,” I prepared to ride out the gale under her bow.  The skippers of the little fleet were very civil men.  Some of them were of French and some of Spanish origin, while one or two were Germans.  My charts interested them greatly; for though they had navigated their vessels for years upon the Gulf of Mexico, they had never seen a chart; and their astonishment was unbounded when I described to them the bottom of the sea for five hundred miles to the eastward, over a route I had never travelled.

Night settled down upon us, and, as the wind lulled, the evening became lovely.  Soon the quiet hamlet changed to a scene of merriment, as the gay people of the city drove out in their carriages to have a “lark,” as the sailors expressed it; and which seemed to begin at the hotels with card-playing, dancing, drinking, and swearing, and to end in a general carousal.  Men and women joined alike in the disreputable scene, though I was informed that this was a respectable circle of society, compared with some which at times enlivened the neighborhood of Lake Pontchartrain.  Thinking of the wonderful grades of society, I tried to sleep in my boat, not imagining that my peace was soon to be invaded by the lowest layer of that social strata.

In spite of all my precautions an article had appeared that day in a New Orleans paper giving a somewhat incorrect account of my voyage from Pittsburgh.  The betting circles hearing that there was no bet upon my rowing feat,—­if such a modest and unadventurous voyage could be called a feat,—­decided that there must be some mystery connected with it; and political strife being uppermost in all men’s minds, strangers were looked upon with suspicion, while rumors of my being a national government spy found ready belief with the ignorant.  Such a man would be an unwelcome visitor in the troubled districts where the “bull-dozing” system was compelling the enfranchised negro to vote the “right ticket.”  I had received an intimation of this feeling in the city, and had exerted myself to leave the neighborhood that day; but the treacherous east wind had left me in a most unprotected locality, floating in a narrow canal, at the mercy of a lot of strange sailors.  The sailor, though, has a generous heart, and usually demands fair play, while there is a natural antagonism between him and a landsman.  I was, so to speak, one of them, and felt pretty sure that in case of any demonstration, honest “Jack Tar” would prove himself my friend.

It seemed at one time as though such an occasion was imminent.

First came the sound of voices in the distance; then, as they came nearer, I heard such questions as, “Where is the feller?” “Show us his boat, and we’ll soon tell if he’s a humbug!”