Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-05-26

\ Wv Nho uLa RAlANo HUH Tie cuOIt, Willie
| sat facing him in the stern.
"The boatman was evil in looks and sim
lister in MANNER; nor was he to be despised,
muscularly considered. The man must
have been over 40 years of age, shorter
than !, but heavier. The fellows counte-
nance was singularly magnetic and vet re-
p~ellant. 1t was fixed as a harrow and as
cold and grim. One could read in every
lineament cowardice and will, GOODNESS and
passion, patience and cunning, wariness
and cruelty. His face was feshless, broad
across the cheek bones, of a dirty, clay
brown color, and half hid in an ili-grown
mass of mud-clored hair and beard, while
two small, grey-blue, close-set, uneasy
eyes glittered from beneath a pair of crag-
like brows. The eyes, above all else, riy-
tied my attention, they seemed at once
searching for all things and avoiding
everything.
"rhe longer | remained in the boat the
more restless l grew, and as my grim Wis
avis pulled with a steady and untlagging
stoke his snaky eyes would ever and anon
dart their cold glitter upon me with what
L now know to have been a gloating CLEAN
of qualification. Night closed down upon
us while still upon the water, and day was
wholly dead when the skiff's keel grated
upon the gravel of the welcome shore
Maryland, My Maryland.
SILENTLY | bounded from the boat and
stood upon the ground, and silently the
ill-favored ferryman pulled to the right
| about and was soon lost in the gathered
gloom. When l could no longer hear the
dip and splash of the receding oars |
turned with a sigh of relief and entered
the wood behind me. Feeling my way
through the underbrush 1 found a clear
| spot, where | knelt and prayed in fervent
sincerity, and where l slept soundly, not
withstanding the cold of an early autumn
night, against which | could only inter-
pose good Planter Callahan's little old
linen coat and straw hat.
"Up by daybreak and peering about |
saw that | was on a wooded knoll, and
that below me was a marsh in which here
and there limpid pools of water cleaned
| and sparkled. While descending for the
purpose of bathing my face, | caught sight
of a couple of men skulking in the bushes
to the right of the marsh. | called to
| them, and after some show of hesitation
they came forward.
"From those men | learned the astound-
ing fact that | was not in Maryland-that
l was still In Virginia, between Indian
Head and Dumfries, and on a little island
that blocks the mouth of Occoquan creek.
at was plain that when | met the man
with the skitf | had reached the inland
extremity of Occoquan creek, and not the
| rivers margin as [ had supposed, and as
the boatman had permitted me to believe.
| GtTu av- found oan--1- IL
reached the island in the same manner as
myself and through the instrumentality of
the same person, to whom they had been
directed as one who would set them across
to the Maryland shore, and whose name
they assured me was Lewis.
"The men-or, rather, boys, for they were
both very young-had already spent two
nights and a day on the island and were
famished with hunger. They proved to
be members of the Eleventh Regulars,
| Saxe's brigade, natives of the State OF
| Massachusetts,, and were named respect
lively Knapp and Ross. Knapp might
have been 20 years of age, but Rosa
singularly delicate and gentle youth
must have been three or four years
younger. As for me, l was, as l had in
formed the boatman, 20 years of age.
at was difficult for me to realize the
situation. Hurrying to the river side of
the island, l surveyed the rough bosom Of
the Potomac lover four miles in width at
that point, and saw at a glance the utter
impossibility of reaching the MARYLAND
shore. None of US could swim, and, if we
could, the temperature and distance, as
well as the rivers roughness and current,
L wn1lH hava 4ar1nfaH tha Sc a.
tain Webb or the science of Paul Bow
ton. The same difficulties stared us in
the face on the Virginia side. 1t was evil
dent that We had been placed on the island
to remain, and the horrible suspicion crept
into my mind that we had been placed
there for the purpose of being starred to
deathf
In company with my unfortunate COM
p~anions, | spent day after day roaming
around in the vain hope of finding some
thing edible. Thinking to find insects,
toads or frogs in the marsh, we conned it
over and over, but to no purpose. We
searched for berries, banks, roots, with a
like result. We dug up the ground in
search of worms; we sought for bugs,
moths and grubs in the c~revices of rocks
and beneath them, and for the same pur-
pose we peeled the bark from the pitch
pine trees, but all to no purpose. The
island contained nothing that lived, save
the pitch-pine trees, with here and there a
dry, thorny underbrush, and we three
mortals doomed TO q slow and tortuous
death-the death of starvation. Thus
occupied, four days crept slowly by, and
four days for mi were five days for my
companions.
"On the morning of my fifth day,
Knapp found the chamber or pit of a
sunken battery. 1t had originally been
walled up with logs, and the logs Law
~topsy-turvy in the half-flled pit. In that
pit | saw a CLEAN of hope and a promise
of %deliverance.
q told Knapp that we must build a
raft, and sent him after Ross, while l
applied myself to getting out logs. Knapp
remained away so long hat / became
uneasy, and looking him up, found him
seated on the ground beside Ross, who
was stretched out flat upon his back.
They were both dazed and nerveless, and
it was with the greatest difficulty that |
succeeded in moving them to the work
in hand. The work would have been
mere amusement for three men in good,
or fair condition, but to us, weak and
famished as We were, it was slow and
toilsome-more especially as the growing
helplessness and stupor of Ross increased
the burden for Knapp and l. The pit be-
ing more than half-filled we had but a
few feet to raise the logs, and as each
was raised we would roll it over the
brow of the bluff and let it fall to the
strand below. We unearthed the rem
nants Of a cracker-box and some twenty
feet of strong cotton rope, such as is used
for lashing gun-carriages-things which
we found eminently useful-one in lash
ing the logs together and the other to
serve as paddles.
"On the seventh night-my seventh
night, the raft was completed. 1t was a
daisy-that raft. Simply a lot of pitch
pine logs laid side by side and dashed to
each other in the center. The logs could
not roll, thanks to our cotton rope, but
the opposing ends of each log were as
free and frolicsome as it is possible for
log ends to be. A fact that made our
footing a matter of ~never-ending watch
fulness and effort, and that compelled us
to huddle in the center of our unman-
ageable craft.
"Some two hours after dark we were
ready to embark. The excitement of the
occasion cave me- strauoth and ener0y apd