Chapter 31—On the Hudson River
The St. John, and its sister ship, the Dean Richmond, are two of the finest steamships on the river. They are buildings rather than boats; terraces rise one above another, with galleries and verandas. One would almost have thought it was a gardener’s floating plantation. There are twenty flag-staffs, fastened with iron tressings, which consolidate the whole building. The two enormous paddle-boxes are painted al fresco, like the tympans in the Church of St. Mark, at Venice. Behind each wheel rises the chimney of the two boilers, the latter placed outside, instead of in the hull of the steamship, a good precaution in case of explosion. In the center, between the paddles, is the machinery, which is very simple, consisting only of a single cylinder, a piston wor
