Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1882-01-18

boy, but a ffteen-horse-pow engine
on end in The narrow space, and ready
for service at the turn of your wrist.
In other dark hooks the mechanism of
a powerful pump or donkey" engine
can be noted. In the engine-room q
quantity named machine, the doctor, !"
is constantly at work pumping water
into the boilers The doctor" is pos
sessed of digni6ed slowness of motion,
and halts not day or night while the
fires roar in the furnace If it did, the
good steamer would be in danger of
ascending skyward piecemeal The
prettiest occupant of the engine-room
has the power Of half dozen horses,
and possesses owl-like traits. It's
strength goes forth at night only, and
its whirr is the signal for a stream of
lurid, intense light to pour from the
locomotive reflector on the hurricane
roof" two hundred feet away. 1t is
the radiance Of electricity, that shames
the brightest glare of the furnaces, and
rales the CLEAN of the ordinary lamp.
Workmen far out on the tow go about
their labors as in midday, or are as
sisted in their arduous labors when
landing is made as no other light has
yet been able to assist them. In fact,
the entire boat is a magazine of pent-
up power, floating arsenal of energy,
| and it is not to be wondered at that
| owners and officers learn to love their
| boat as one does his home.
AS indicating this trait, as well as
the more important one of fertility of
resource possessed by tow-boat men, a
single instance may be cited. One
pleasant day in April; 1879. the tow
ing steamer John a. Wood, of Pitts
burgh, was coming up the Mississippi
twenty-five miles below New Orleans
in fine style. Then came mishap the
first Her ponderous wrought-iron
shaft cracked, and disabled wheels and
engines. Swinging out of her course
she struck the iron works of sunken
war vessel, the De Soto, which tore
great hole in her hull and she sank i'm
mediately. Able engineers pronounced
her case hopeless one, for no boat
ever survived twenty-five feet of Mis-
sissippi water and resultant deposits of
heavy mud. The owner and godfath-
er of the ill-fated steamer, Captain
John A. Wood visited his pet a few
days afterward His 100000 beauty
was in a serious plight. She leaned
toward the great river at far more
desperate angle than the famed Tower
of Pisa, and her upper works and CHM
neys alone were visible above the
whirling water. The man made up
bis mind to save his boat, and he did
it. She had 200 tons of coal on board
weighing four times that much besides,
and mud was settling in every nool
and corner. A thousand yards of cir.
Gus canvas and fifteen thousand feet oi
good plank, fashioned into water
tight box or caisson, were built about
the entire boat, and the most powerful
pumps in New Orleans set agoing. Tor
four weeks the work went on with
varying success. Such was the inter-
est felt in his unwonted wrestle with
the river that ocean-going steamers
slowed their engines in passing the
trials of the divers, and dipped their
colors in token Of their recognition of
pluck and energy. Three times the
river reclaimed its prey and the boat
sank But the fourth effort resulted
in the triumph of mans ingenuity and
perseverance To-day the resurrected
boat is one of the best steamers in the
trade, and her rescuer considers the
$40, 900 devoted to the work as well
spent.
AS the days roll on, and Northern
chill and fogs give way to balmy skies,
the labor of the tow-boat man grows
less irksome His fears of shoals and
bars diminish rs the river rolls mile
wide and .kere is fifty feet of water
under his keel As his deep-laden
craft nears the Crescent City he feels
that his coal, worth SO per ton at the
start, will be eagerly sought for at $6
per ton by ocean steamers and waiting
planters, and the reflection is a sooth-
ing one, an Offset against the grim fact
that every day of his voyage implies
an expenditure of 5000.
AT length cottonwood ana caneDrake
give way to moss-draped cypress and
broad level acres of cotton plantations
The verdure of the distant shores is
that OF full, joyous spring, and finally
there drifts into view the forest of
masts that environ the levee at New
Orleans
At various points boats and barges
have been dropped from the tow to
repenish the wasted stock at different
landings, and when the last day of the
voyage dawns, but n fourth of the
original feet remains. The greater
portion of this remnant goes to coaling
ocean steamers, and some slips by,
and at the rivers mouth evolves steam
for the work going on at the jetties.
And from thousand chin!heys in the
Crescent City ascends the smoke ia
miliar to Pittsburgh eyes, leading to
the reflection that the chill and gloom
in store for all, should the sun be blot
ted out, would in a measure be the lot
of New Orleans, and other cities, were
Pittsburgh's coal to be annihiated, or
the rivers permanently obstructed.
[Galveston News.l
The Madison, (Wis.) Democrat, in
endeavoring TO treat the wounds re-
ceived by the candidates for the Oresi-