So we would put in the day, lazying around, listening to the stillness.

Once there was a thick fog, and the rafts and things that went by was beating tin pans so the steamboats wouldn't run over them.

A scow or a raft went by so close we could hear them talking and cussing and laughing--heard them plain; but we couldn't see no sign of them; it made you feel crawly; it was like spirits carrying on that way in the air.

Jim said he believed it was spirits; but I says: "No; spirits wouldn't say, 'Dern the dern fog.'" Soon as it was night out we shoved; when we got her out to about the middle we let her alone, and let her float wherever the current wanted her to; then we lit the pipes, and dangled our legs in the water, and talked about all kinds of things--we was always naked, day and night, whenever the mosquitoes would let us--the new clothes Buck's folks made for me was too good to be comfortable, and besides I didn't go much on clothes, nohow.
Sometimes we'd have that whole river all to ourselves for the longest time.

Yonder was the banks and the islands, across the water; and maybe a spark--which was a candle in a cabin window; and sometimes on the water you could see a spark or two--on a raft or a scow, you know; and maybe you could hear a fiddle or a song coming over from one of them crafts.
It's lovely to live on a raft.