four hours, and when we could not
use the sail, the current carried us sixty miles.

When we reached the mouth of the Missouri, the prospect seemed to me,
who had never seen a considerable body of water, to be like a great
inland sea. Flora was appalled at our distance from the land, and Sim
shouted, "Hookie!" Our raft, which had seemed so large on the stream
where it had been built, now loomed puny and insignificant. Great
steamboats, three times as large as any I had ever seen, and looming up
far above the water, dashed by us. Huge flat-boats floated lazily down
the river, and the scene became more lively and exciting as we advanced.
A new world had opened to us.

From the broad river we saw the great city of St. Louis, and we gazed
with wonder and astonishment at its dense mass of houses, its busy
levee, and the crowds of steamboats which thronged it. We had never seen
the great world before, and we were overwhelmed with surprise. Flora was
silent, and Sim cried "Hookie" a hundred times within an hour.

The swift current and the steady breeze carried us away from this stormy
scene into the quiet of nature; for the great river has its solitudes,
though many times in the day we saw steamboats going up and down, or
encountered other craft voyaging towards the Gulf.

On the tenth day we approached the mouth of the Ohio. Again the expanse
of waters increased, till it seemed to my narrow vision to be almost an
ocean. It was nearly dark, and the weather was as pleasant as a maiden's
dream. We had advanced about seven degrees of latitude towards the
south, and Nature was clothed in her brightest green. We had stepped
from the cold spring of Wisconsin to the mild summer of the South. Ten
days before we had been among leafless trees; now we were in the midst
of luxuriant foliage. Flora sat in her arm-chair, near the platform,
enjoying the scene with me.

"If you are tired of the raft, Flora, we will go the rest of the way in
a steamboat," I said, after we had spoken of the changing seasons we had
experienced.

"I am not tired of it--far from it," she replied.

"We have over a thousand miles farther to go."

"I think I shall only regret the river was not longer when we get to New
Orleans."

"I wonder what Captain Fishley thinks has become of us," I added,
chuckling, as I thought of the family we had left.

"He and his wife must be puzzled; but I suppose they won't find out
where we are till we write to them."

"Th