A Lieutenant at Eighteen by Oliver Optic

The tender in which Deck Lyon and his companion had embarked was a keel-boat such as is usually suspended by two ropes from either end to the upper extremity of a pole, like an ensign staff. It was about twelve feet long, and was not likely to upset, even in the turbulent water at the middle of the river which drained the Cumberland Mountains in the south-eastern part of the State.

Very heavy rains had been falling for several days, overflowing brooks and creeks so as to make many of them impassable; and the great river was swollen, though not to an unusual height in the rainy season. Deck made no effort at first to direct the craft, for he was well-nigh exhausted by the fatigues of the day and his efforts to escape from the fortification.