for many years until walter percy's death. before he went off to be a rhodes scholar the summer before, he was still on his great writer mission and offered a job as a summer intern by "the washington post" and he turned it down. he turned it down to become a stevedore on a derrick barge on the mississippi and the reason this was part of his great writer quest he felt that in doing so he could encounter so many crews of so many colorful characters that he could write a novel would be a serious contender to huckleberry finn. mark twain was the one he was trying to knock down. well, still, it didn't happen. but in his drawer, he says in his desk drawer their lies a manuscript still unfinished about the happenings on derrick barge on the mississippi. there is a captain coone, his name is, and i think this is as we have walter here this evening we ought to commit to him if he'd just get out that manuscript and polished off we will all come to hear you read from your book. what his -- i feel his new book american sketches is all ab