and rarely broken series of
forests, cane brakes and sand bars, covered with masses of willows and
poplars which, in the spring, when the floods come down, are overflowed
for many miles back. It was found necessary to run embankments
practically parallel with the current, in order to confine the waters of
the river in its channel. Memphis was and is the most important city of
Tennessee, indeed, the most important between St. Louis and New Orleans,
particularly from the commercial point of view. Cotton was the principal
product of the territory tributary to it. The street running along the
bluff was called Front Row, and was filled with stores and business
houses. This street was the principal cotton market, and here the
article which, in those days, was personified as the commercial "king,"
was bought and sold, and whence it was shipped, or stored, awaiting an
advancing price. The completion of the Memphis and Charleston railroad
was a great event in the history of the city. It was termed the marriage
of the Mississippi and the Atlantic, and was celebrated with a great
popular demonstration, people coming from the surrounding country for
many miles. Water was brought from the Atlantic ocean and poured into
the river; and water taken from the river and poured into the Atlantic
at Charleston. It was anticipated that this railroad connection between
the two cities would make of Charleston the great shipping port, and of
Memphis the principal cotton market of the southwest. The expectation in
neither of these cases has been fully realized. Boss, in common with
planters and business men throughout that whole region, was greatly
excited. I attended him and thus had the opportunity of witnessing this
notable celebration.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER III.

SLAVERY AND THE WAR OF THE REBELLION.

* * * * *

BEGINNING OF THE WAR.

I remember well when Abraham Lincoln was elected. Boss and the madam had
been reading the papers, when he broke out with the exclamation: "The
very idea of electing an old rail splitter to the presidency of the
United States! Well he'll never take his seat." When Lincoln was
inaugurated, Boss, old Master Jack and a great company of men met at our
house to discuss the matter, and they were wild with excitement. Was not
this excitement an admission that their confidence in their ability to
whip the Yankees, five or six to one, was not so strong as they
pretended?