The River and Its History -- The River and Its Explorers -- Frescoes from the Past -- The Boys' Ambition -- I Want to Be a Cub Pilot -- A Cub Pilot's Experience -- A Daring Deed -- Perplexing Lessons -- Continued Perplexities -- Completing My Education -- The River Rises -- Sounding -- A Pilot's Needs -- Rank and Dignity of Piloting -- The Pilots' Monopoly -- Racing Days -- Cutoffs and Stephen -- I Take a Few Extra Lessons -- Brown and I Exchange Compliments -- A Catastrophe -- A Section in My Biography -- I Return to My Muttons -- Traveling Incognito -- My Incognito is Exploded -- From Cairo to Hickman -- Under Fire -- Some Imported Articles -- Uncle Mumford Unloads -- A Few Specimen Bricks -- Sketches by the Way -- A Thumbprint and What Came Of It -- The Disposal of a Bonanza -- Refreshments and Ethics -- Tough Yarns -- Vicksburg During the Trouble -- The Professor's Yarn -- the End of the "Gold Dust" -- The House Beautiful -- Manufactures and Miscreants -- Castles and Culture -- The Metropolis of the South -- Hygiene and Sentiment -- The Art of Inhumation -- City Sights -- Southern Sports -- Enchantments and Enchanters -- "Uncle Remus" and Mr. Cable -- Sugar and Postage -- Episodes in Pilot Life -- The "Original Jacobs" -- Reminiscences -- A Burning Brand -- My Boyhood Home -- Past and Present -- A Vendetta and Other Things -- A Question of Law -- An Archangel -- On the Upper River -- Legends and Scenery -- Speculations and Conclusions