She'll never raise the reef on this headway!'
For all the effect that was produced upon Mr. Bixby, one would have supposedthat no remark had been made. But five minutes later, when the dangerwas past and the leads laid in, he burst instantly into a consuming fury,and gave the captain the most admirable cursing I ever listened to.
No bloodshed ensued; but that was because the captain's cause was weak;for ordinarily he was not a man to take correction quietly.
Having now set forth in detail the nature of the science of piloting,and likewise described the rank which the pilot held among the fraternityof steamboatmen, this seems a fitting place to say a few words about anorganization which the pilots once formed for the protection of their guild.
It was curious and noteworthy in this, that it was perhaps the compactest,the completest, and the strongest commercial organization everformed among men.
For a long time wages had been two hundred and fifty dollars a month;but curiously enough, as steamboats multiplied and business increased,the wages began to fall little by little. It was easy to discoverthe reason of this. Too many pilots were being 'made.' It was niceto have a 'cub,' a steersman, to do all the hard work for a coupleof years, gratis, while his master sat on a high bench and smoked;all pilots and captains had sons or nephews who wanted to be pilots. By andby it came to pass that nearly every pilot on the river had a steersman.
When a steersman had made an amount of progress that was satisfactoryto any two pilots in the trade, they could get a pilot's license for himby signing an application directed to the United States Inspector.
Nothing further was needed; usually no questions were asked, no proofsof capacity required.
Very well, this growing swarm of new pilots presentlybegan to undermine the wages, in order to get berths.
Too late--apparently--the knights of the tiller perceivedtheir mistake. Plainly, something had to be done, and quickly;but what was to be the needful thing. A close organization.
Nothing else would answer. To compass this seemed an impossibility;so it was talked, and talked, and then dropped.
It was too likely to ruin whoever ventured to movein the matter. But at last about a dozen of the boldest--and some of them the best--pilots on the river launchedthemselves into the enterprise and took all the chances.
They got a special charter from the legislature, with large powers,under the name of the Pilots' Benevolent Association;elected their officers, completed their organization,contributed capital, put 'association' wages up to two hundredand fifty dollars at once--and then retired to their homes,for they were promptly discharged from employment.
But there were two or three unnoticed trifles in their by-lawswhich had the seeds of propagation in them. For instance,all idle members of the association, in good standing,were entitled to a pension of twenty-five dollars per month.
This began to bring in one straggler after another from the ranksof the new-fledged pilots, in the dull (summer) season.
Better have twenty-five dollars than starve; the initiationfee was only twelve dollars, and no dues requiredfrom the unemployed.
Also, the widows of deceased members in good standing coulddraw twenty-five dollars per month, and a certain sum for eachof their children. Also, the said deceased would be buriedat the association's expense. These things resurrected allthe superannuated and forgotten pilots in the Mississippi Valley.
They came from farms, they came from interior villages, they camefrom everywhere. They came on crutches, on drays, in ambulances,--any way, so they got there. They paid in their twelve dollars,and straightway began to draw out twenty-five dollars a month,and calculate their burial bills.
By and by, all the useless, helpless pilots, and a dozen first-class ones,were in the association, and nine-tenths of the best pilots out of itand laughing at it. It was the laughing-stock of the whole river.
Everybody joked about the by-law requiring members to pay ten per cent.
of their wages, every month, into the treasury for the supportof the association, whereas all the members were outcast and tabooed,and no one would employ them. Everybody was derisively gratefulto the association for taking all the worthless pilots out of the wayand leaving the whole field to the excellent and the deserving;and everybody was not only jocularly grateful for that, but for aresult which naturally followed, namely, the gradual advance of wagesas the busy season approached. Wages had gone up from the low figureof one hundred dollars a month to one hundred and twenty-five, and insome cases to one hundred and fifty; and it was great fun to enlargeupon the fact that this charming thing had been accomplished by a bodyof men not one of whom received a particle of benefit from it.
Some of the jokers used to call at the association rooms and havea good time chaffing the members and offering them the charityof taking them as steersmen for a trip, so that they could see whatthe forgotten river looked like. However, the association was content;or at least it gave no sign to the contrary. Now and then itcaptured a pilot who was 'out of luck,' and added him to its list;and these later additions were very valuable, for they were good pilots;the incompetent ones had all been absorbed before. As business freshened,wages climbed gradually up to two hundred and fifty dollars--the association figure--and became firmly fixed there; and stillwithout benefiting a member of that body, for no member was hired.
The hilarity at the association's expense burst all bounds, now.
There was no end to the fun which that poor martyr had toput up with.
However, it is a long lane that has no turning. Winter approached,business doubled and trebled, and an avalanche of Missouri,Illinois and Upper Mississippi River boats came pouring downto take a chance in the New Orleans trade. All of a suddenpilots were in great demand, and were correspondingly scarce.
The time for revenge was come. It was a bitter pill to have toaccept association pilots at last, yet captains and owners agreedthat there was no other way. But none of these outcasts offered!
So there was a still bitterer pill to be swallowed:
they must be sought out and asked for their services.
Captain ---- was the first man who found it necessary to takethe dose, and he had been the loudest derider of the organization.
He hunted up one of the best of the association pilots and said--'Well, you boys have rather got the best of us for alittle while, so I'll give in with as good a grace as I can.
I've come to hire you; get your trunk aboard right away.
I want to leave at twelve o'clock.'
'I don't know about that. Who is your other pilot?'
'I've got I. S----. Why?'
'I can't go with him. He don't belong to the association.'
'What!'
'It's so.'
'Do you mean to tell me that you won't turn a wheel with one of the very bestand oldest pilots on the river because he don't belong to your association?'
'Yes, I do.'
'Well, if this isn't putting on airs! I supposed I was doing youa benevolence; but I begin to think that I am the party that wantsa favor done. Are you acting under a law of the concern?'
'Yes.'
'Show it to me.'
So they stepped into the association rooms, and the secretarysoon satisfied the captain, who said--'Well, what am I to do? I have hired Mr. S---- for the entire season.'
'I will provide for you,' said the secretary. 'I will detail a pilotto go with you, and he shall be on board at twelve o'clock.'
'But if I discharge S----, he will come on me for the whole season's wages.'
'Of course that is a matter between you and Mr. S----, captain.
We cannot meddle in your private affairs.'
The captain stormed, but to no purpose. In the end he had to dischargeS----, pay him about a thousand dollars, and take an association pilotin his place. The laugh was beginning to turn the other way now.
Every day, thenceforward, a new victim fell; every day some outragedcaptain discharged a non-association pet, with tears and profanity,and installed a hated association man in his berth. In a verylittle while, idle non-associationists began to be pretty plenty,brisk as business was, and much as their services were desired.
The laugh was shifting to the other side of their mouths most palpably.
These victims, together with the captains and owners, presently ceasedto laugh altogether, and began to rage about the revenge they would takewhen the passing business 'spurt' was over.
Soon all the laughers that were left were the ownersand crews of boats that had two non-association pilots.
But their triumph was not very long-lived. For this reason:
It was a rigid rule of the association that its members should never,under any circumstances whatever, give information about the channelto any 'outsider.' By this time about half the boats had nonebut association pilots, and the other half had none but outsiders.
At the first glance one would suppose that when it cameto forbidding information about the river these two partiescould play equally at that game; but this was not so.
At every good-sized town from one end of the river to the other,there was a 'wharf-boat' to land at, instead of a wharf or a pier.
Freight was stored in it for transportation; waiting passengers sleptin its cabins. Upon each of these wharf-boats the association'sofficers placed a strong box fastened with a peculiar lock which wasused in no other service but one--the United States mail service.
It was the letter-bag lock, a sacred governmental thing.
By dint of much beseeching the government had beenpersuaded to allow the association to use this lock.
Every association man carried a key which would open these boxes.
That key, or rather a peculiar way of holding it in the handwhen its owner was asked for river information by a stranger--for the success of the St. Louis and New Orleans associationhad now bred tolerably thriving branches in a dozen neighboringsteamboat trades--was the association man's sign and diplomaof membership; and if the stranger did not respond by producinga similar key and holding it in a certain manner duly prescribed,his question was politely ignored. From the association's secretaryeach member received a package of more or less gorgeous blanks,printed like a billhead, on handsome paper, properly ruled in columns;a bill-head worded something like this--STEAMER GREAT REPUBLIC.
JOHN SMITH MASTERPILOTS, JOHN JONES AND THOMAS BROWN.
+-------------------------------------------------------------+| CROSSINGS. | SOUNDINGS. | MARKS. | REMARKS. |+-------------------------------------------------------------+These blanks were filled up, day by day, as the voyageprogressed, and deposited in the several wharf-boat boxes.
For instance, as soon as the first crossing, out from St. Louis,was completed, the items would be entered upon the blank,under the appropriate headings, thus--'St. Louis. Nine and a half (feet). Stern on court-house, headon dead cottonwood above wood-yard, until you raise the first reef,then pull up square.' Then under head of Remarks: 'Go just outsidethe wrecks; this is important. New snag just where you straighten down;go above it.'
The pilot who deposited that blank in the Cairo box (after addingto it the details of every crossing all the way down from St. Louis)took out and read half a dozen fresh reports (from upward-bound steamers)concerning the river between Cairo and Memphis, posted himself thoroughly,returned them to the box, and went back aboard his boat again so armedagainst accident that he could not possibly get his boat into troublewithout bringing the most ingenious carelessness to his aid.
Imagine the benefits of so admirable a system in a piece of river twelveor thirteen hundred miles long, whose channel was shifting every day!
The pilot who had formerly been obliged to put up with seeing a shoalplace once or possibly twice a month, had a hundred sharp eyes to watch itfor him, now, and bushels of intelligent brains to tell him how to run it.
His information about it was seldom twenty-four hours old. If the reportsin the last box chanced to leave any misgivings on his mind concerninga treacherous crossing, he had his remedy; he blew his steam-whistlein a peculiar way as soon as he saw a boat approaching; the signal wasanswered in a peculiar way if that boat's pilots were association men;and then the two steamers ranged alongside and all uncertainties were sweptaway by fresh information furnished to the inquirer by word of mouth andin minute detail.
The first thing a pilot did when he reached New Orleans or St. Louiswas to take his final and elaborate report to the association parlorsand hang it up there,--after which he was free to visit his family.
In these parlors a crowd was always gathered together, discussingchanges in the channel, and the moment there was a fresh arrival,everybody stopped talking till this witness had told the newest newsand settled the latest uncertainty. Other craftsmen can 'sink the shop,'
sometimes, and interest themselves in other matters. Not so with a pilot;he must devote himself wholly to his profession and talk of nothing else;for it would be small gain to be perfect one day and imperfect the next.
He has no time or words to waste if he would keep 'posted.'
But the outsiders had a hard time of it. No particular placeto meet and exchange information, no wharf-boat reports,none but chance and unsatisfactory ways of getting news.
The consequence was that a man sometimes had to run five hundredmiles of river on information that was a week or ten days old.
At a fair stage of the river that might have answered; but when thedead low water came it was destructive.
Now came another perfectly logical result. The outsiders beganto ground steamboats, sink them, and get into all sorts of trouble,whereas accidents seemed to keep entirely away from the association men.
Wherefore even the owners and captains of boats furnishedexclusively with outsiders, and previously considered to be whollyindependent of the association and free to comfort themselveswith brag and laughter, began to feel pretty uncomfortable.
Still, they made a show of keeping up the brag, until one black daywhen every captain of the lot was formally ordered to immediatelydischarge his outsiders and take association pilots in their stead.
And who was it that had the dashing presumption to do that? Alas, it camefrom a power behind the throne that was greater than the throne itself.
It was the underwriters!
It was no time to 'swap knives.' Every outsider had to take his trunkashore at once. Of course it was supposed that there was collusionbetween the association and the underwriters, but this was not so.
The latter had come to comprehend the excellence of the 'report' systemof the association and the safety it secured, and so they had made theirdecision among themselves and upon plain business principles.
There was weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth inthe camp of the outsiders now. But no matter, there wasbut one course for them to pursue, and they pursued it.
They came forward in couples and groups, and proffered theirtwelve dollars and asked for membership. They were surprisedto learn that several new by-laws had been long ago added.
For instance, the initiation fee had been raised to fifty dollars;that sum must be tendered, and also ten per cent.
of the wages which the applicant had received each and everymonth since the founding of the association. In many cases thisamounted to three or four hundred dollars. Still, the associationwould not entertain the application until the money was present.
Even then a single adverse vote killed the application.
Every member had to vote 'Yes' or 'No' in person and before witnesses;so it took weeks to decide a candidacy, because many pilotswere so long absent on voyages. However, the repentantsinners scraped their savings together, and one by one,by our tedious voting process, they were added to the fold.
A time came, at last, when only about ten remained outside.
They said they would starve before they would apply.
They remained idle a long while, because of course nobody could ventureto employ them.
By and by the association published the fact that upon a certaindate the wages would be raised to five hundred dollars per month.
All the branch associations had grown strong, now, and the RedRiver one had advanced wages to seven hundred dollars a month.
Reluctantly the ten outsiders yielded, in view of these things,and made application. There was another new by-law, by this time,which required them to pay dues not only on all the wages theyhad received since the association was born, but also on what theywould have received if they had continued at work up to the timeof their application, instead of going off to pout in idleness.
It turned out to be a difficult matter to elect them, but itwas accomplished at last. The most virulent sinner of thisbatch had stayed out and allowed 'dues' to accumulate againsthim so long that he had to send in six hundred and twenty-fivedollars with his application.
The association had a good bank account now, and was very strong.
There was no longer an outsider. A by-law was added forbiddingthe reception of any more cubs or apprentices for five years;after which time a limited number would be taken, not by individuals,but by the association, upon these terms: the applicant mustnot be less than eighteen years old, and of respectable familyand good character; he must pass an examination as to education,pay a thousand dollars in advance for the privilege of becomingan apprentice, and must remain under the commands of the associationuntil a great part of the membership (more than half, I think)should be willing to sign his application for a pilot's license.
All previously-articled apprentices were now taken away from theirmasters and adopted by the association. The president and secretarydetailed them for service on one boat or another, as they chose,and changed them from boat to boat according to certain rules.
If a pilot could show that he was in infirm health and needed assistance,one of the cubs would be ordered to go with him.
The widow and orphan list grew, but so did the association'sfinancial resources. The association attended its ownfunerals in state, and paid for them. When occasion demanded,it sent members down the river upon searches for the bodiesof brethren lost by steamboat accidents; a search of this kindsometimes cost a thousand dollars.
The association procured a charter and went into the insurancebusiness, also. It not only insured the lives of its members,but took risks on steamboats.
The organization seemed indestructible. It was the tightest monopolyin the world. By the United States law, no man could becomea pilot unless two duly licensed pilots signed his application;and now there was nobody outside of the association competentto sign. Consequently the making of pilots was at an end.
Every year some would die and others become incapacitated by ageand infirmity; there would be no new ones to take their places.
In time, the association could put wages up to any figure it chose;and as long as it should be wise enough not to carry the thingtoo far and provoke the national government into amendingthe licensing system, steamboat owners would have to submit,since there would be no help for it.
The owners and captains were the only obstruction that lay betweenthe association and absolute power; and at last this one was removed.
Incredible as it may seem, the owners and captains deliberatelydid it themselves. When the pilots' association announced,months beforehand, that on the first day of September, 1861,wages would be advanced to five hundred dollars per month, the ownersand captains instantly put freights up a few cents, and explainedto the farmers along the river the necessity of it, by calling theirattention to the burdensome rate of wages about to be established.
It was a rather slender argument, but the farmers did not seem to detect it.
It looked reasonable to them that to add five cents freight on a bushelof corn was justifiable under the circumstances, overlooking the factthat this advance on a cargo of forty thousand sacks was a good dealmore than necessary to cover the new wages.
So, straightway the captains and owners got up an associationof their own, and proposed to put captains' wages up to fivehundred dollars, too, and move for another advance in freights.
It was a novel idea, but of course an effect which had beenproduced once could be produced again. The new association decreed(for this was before all the outsiders had been takeninto the pilots' association) that if any captain employeda non-association pilot, he should be forced to discharge him,and also pay a fine of five hundred dollars. Several of theseheavy fines were paid before the captains' organization grewstrong enough to exercise full authority over its membership;but that all ceased, presently. The captains tried to get the pilotsto decree that no member of their corporation should serve undera non-association captain; but this proposition was declined.
The pilots saw that they would be backed up by the captains andthe underwriters anyhow, and so they wisely refrained from enteringinto entangling alliances.
As I have remarked, the pilots' association was now the compactestmonopoly in the world, perhaps, and seemed simply indestructible.
And yet the days of its glory were numbered. First, the newrailroad stretching up through Mississippi, Tennessee, and Kentucky,to Northern railway centers, began to divert the passenger travelfrom the steamers; next the war came and almost entirely annihilatedthe steamboating industry during several years, leaving most ofthe pilots idle, and the cost of living advancing all the time;then the treasurer of the St. Louis association put his handinto the till and walked off with every dollar of the ample fund;and finally, the railroads intruding everywhere, there was littlefor steamers to do, when the war was over, but carry freights;so straightway some genius from the Atlantic coast introduced the planof towing a dozen steamer cargoes down to New Orleans at the tailof a vulgar little tug-boat; and behold, in the twinkling of an eye,as it were, the association and the noble science of piloting werethings of the dead and pathetic past!
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