A ferry-boat paused midway of the long tow rope and its commuters, crowded on the forward deck, watched this slow-moving procession with some show of annoyance. Not a few impatient remarks rose loud and clear above the hum of the restless crowd, directed at the head of a man seated in the stern of the boat, calmly puffing on a pipe. Aft on the barge, a young boy was wrestling heroically with the tiller, trying to keep the lumbering hulk head on.