Next to this station (for as you will perceive, the whole Levée is divided into _stations_ appropriated to peculiar classes of shipping,) commences the range of steamboats, or steamers, as they are usually termed here, rivaling in magnitude the extensive line of ships below. The appearance of so large a collection of steamboats is truly novel, and must always strike a stranger with peculiar interest.
The next station, though it presents a more humble appearance than the others, is not the least interesting. Here are congregated the primitive navies of Indiana, Ohio, and the adjoining states, manned (I have not understood whether they are _officered_ or not) by "real Kentucks"--"Buck eyes"--"Hooshers"--and "Snorters." There were about two hundred of these craft without masts, consisting of "flat-boats," (which resemble, only being much shorter, the "Down East" gundalow, (gondola) so common on the rivers of Maine,) and "keel-boats," which are one remove from the flat-boat, having some pretensions to a keel; they somewhat resemble freighting canal-boats. Besides these are "arks," most appropriately named, their _contents_ having probably some influence with their god-fathers in selecting an appellation, and other non-descript-craft. These are filled with produce of all kinds, brought from the "Upper country," (as the north western states are termed here) by the very farmers themselves who have raised it;--also, horses, cattle, hogs, poultry, mules, and every other thing raiseable and saleable are piled into these huge flats, which an old farmer and half a dozen Goliaths of sons can begin and complete in less than a week, from the felling of the first tree to the driving of the last pin.
When one of these arks is completed, and "every beast that is good for food" by sevens and scores, male and female, and every fowl of the air by sevens and fifties, are entered into the ark,--then entereth in the old man with his family by "males" only, and the boat is committed to the current, and after the space of many days arriveth and resteth at this Ararat of all "Up country" Noahs.
These boats, on arriving here, are taken to pieces and sold as lumber, while their former owners with well-lined purses return home as deck passengers on board steamboats. An immense quantity of whiskey from Pittsburg and Cincinnati, besides, is brought down in these boats, and not unfrequently, they are crowded with slaves for the southern market.