A steamboat had just pulled out of its moorings and crossed over to where I was, and began to take on wood.

I went on board, and told the captain, who was a clever and good man, that I would like to take a trip with him to Mobile and back, and that I was a wounded soldier from the hospital.

He told me, "All right, come along, and I will foot expenses." It was about sunset, but along the line of the distant horizon we could see the dark and heavy clouds begin to boil up in thick and ominous columns.

The lightning was darting to and fro like lurid sheets of fire, and the storm seemed to be gathering; we could hear the storm king in his chariot in the clouds, rumbling as he came, but a dead lull was seen and felt in the air and in nature; everything was in a holy hush, except the hoarse belchings of the engines, the sizzing and frying of the boilers, and the work of the machinery on the lower deck.

At last the storm burst upon us in all its fury; it was a tornado and the women and children began to scream and pray--the mate to curse and swear.