on a canal boat and moved slowly night and day, to invade the forests of
Michigan. Sometimes when we came to a lock father got off and walked a
mile or two. On one of these occasions I accompanied him, and when we
came to a favorable place, father signaled to the steersman, and he
turned the boat up. Father jumped on to the side of the boat. I attempted
to follow him, did not jump far enough, missed my hold and went down, by
the side of the boat, into the water. However, father caught my hand and
lifted me out. They said that if he had not caught me, I must have been
crushed to death, as the boat struck the side the same minute. That,
certainly, would have been the end of my journey to Michigan. When it was
pleasant we spent part of the time on deck. One day mother left my little
brother, then four years old, in care of my oldest sister, Rachel. He
concluded to have a rock in an easy chair, rocked over and took a cold
bath in the canal. Mother and I were in the cabin. When we heard the cry
"Overboard!" we rushed on deck, and the first thing we saw was a man
swimming with something ahead of him. It proved to be my brother, held
by one strong arm of an English gentleman. He did not strangle much; some
said the Englishman might have waded out, in that case he would not have
strangled any, as he had on a full-cloth overcoat, which held him up
until the Englishman got to him. Be that as it may, the Englishman was
our ideal hero for many years, for by his bravery and skill, unparalleled
by anything we had seen, he had saved our brother from a watery grave.

That brother is now the John Smith Nowlin, of Dearborn.

Nothing more of importance occurred while we were on the canal. When we
arrived at Buffalo the steamer, "Michigan," then new, just ready for her
second trip, lay at her wharf ready to start the next morning. Thinking
we would get a better night's rest, at a public house, than on the
steamer father sought one, but made a poor choice.