mie pick
her up again, though several times he thought he glimpsed her.

Half an hour later, and the other boat had also passed from their ken,
swallowed up in the little wavelets that covered the surface of the
rapidly growing river; for they were now approaching the spot where the
mighty flood of the Missouri joined forces with the swollen current of
the Mississippi, to boom along toward the sunny land of Dixie.

Then they came to where the great city of St. Louis stood. It required
considerable and careful maneuvering to pass safely among the various
river craft they found moving about on the Mississippi at this
important port; but Jack was a keen-eyed pilot, and knew just how to
handle his boat, so that they managed to get by without any serious
trouble, though whistled at by tugs and ferryboats as they bravely cut
along.

The running time was pretty well up when they saw the last of the
metropolis of the Middle West.

"One hour only, and then we must pull up, Jimmie," remarked the skipper.

"'Tis mesilf that's glad to hear the same," replied the other, with a
wry look on his freckled face, and one hand pressing against his
stomach, as if to call attention to its flat condition; for they had
only eaten sparingly at noon.

"You might be keeping a lookout for a harbor," remarked Jack; but not
with any great amount of animation.

Truth to tell, he was wondering whether after all it paid to leave the
river and hide up one of those gloomy looking creeks, where all sorts
of dangers might be lying in wait.

"I hope as how we don't have the same luck we had before," grumbled
Jimmie, who apparently had not forgotten the experience either.

After that he was constantly on the job of looking ahead for signs of a
creek.

"If we don't find the same, thin what?" he asked, when half an hour had
passed without any favorable result from his critical survey of the
nearby shore; creeks he could see in plenty; but none that seemed
navigable for a boat drawing as much water as their craft; and Jack
meant to take no chances of being held fast in the mud on a falling
river.

"Why, we'll just have to stick it out, and anchor. But there's a point
below us that looks favorable, Jimmie, where the brush is heaped up on
a sandbar. Unless I'm greatly mistaken the signs point to a fair-sized
opening there."

And just as Jack said it proved to be just what they were looking for.

"This looks better to me," remarked the skipper