ah and the ark, and this time, when he started down
Barren River, it was cloudy and threatenin' rain, and the next day it
begun showerin' and then clearin' off and then showerin' again, more
like April than December. But when they struck the Ohio they found jest
the right sort o' weather for flatboat journeyin', clear and frosty at
night and sunshiny all day; and they'd been floatin' along all day and a
good part of every night, as they was in a hurry to git to New Orleens
and sell their tobacco before prices fell.

"Well, the night o' the earthquake, father said it was his time to sit
up and watch the fire and guide the boat, and he was glad of it; for he
said there wasn't anything as peaceful and happy as the nights he'd
spend on the river. With the moon and the stars over him and the big
river under him it was like bein' in the hollow of God's hand. That
night he was pretty busy up to twelve o'clock, lookin' out for snags and
dangerous places; but about one o'clock they'd got to a place where he
knew the channel was safe, and he was sittin' down leanin' against a
pile o' tobacco and half dozin', when all at once he heard a rumblin'
like thunder, and not a sign o' rain in the sky, and then a noise like
the noise o' many waters, and the big waves begun lappin' around the
boat, and the first thing father knew the boat was goin' up-stream
faster than it ever had gone down. Uncle Tandy was wide awake by this
time, and he called out to father to know what had happened, and father
says: 'God only knows what's happened! The Mississippi River's flowin'
north instead o' south.' And jest then they heard the rumblin' sound
like thunder again, and Uncle Tandy says: 'The end o' the world's come,
and we're travelin' up-stream to the New Jerusalem.' And while father
and Uncle Tandy went floatin' up-stream half scared out o' their wits,
the Goshen folks and the town folks was down on their knees prayin', and
the church bells was ringin', and everybody thought the Judgment Day had
come. Two or three people was so scared they professed religion.

"Mother said she was awake when the earthquake happened. She never slept
well when father was off on his river trips, and she was lyin' in bed
wonderin' if he was safe, when the house begun to shake, and the dishes
and pans rattled on the shelves, and there was father and Uncle Tandy
travelin' back wards twelve miles; and when the earthquake was over and
the river got to flowin' south again, t