Between St.Louis and Cairo the steamboat wrecks average one to the mile;--two hundred wrecks, altogether.
I could recognize big changes from Commerce down.

Beaver Dam Rock was out in the middle of the river now, and throwing a prodigious 'break;' it used to be close to the shore, and boats went down outside of it.
A big island that used to be away out in mid-river, has retired to the Missouri shore, and boats do not go near it any more.

The island called Jacket Pattern is whittled down to a wedge now, and is booked for early destruction.

Goose Island is all gone but a little dab the size of a steamboat.

The perilous 'Graveyard,' among whose numberless wrecks we used to pick our way so slowly and gingerly, is far away from the channel now, and a terror to nobody.