Read it through once

Speaking of manufactures reminds me of a talk upon that topic which I heard--which I overheard--on board the Cincinnati boat. I awoke out of a fretted sleep, with a dull confusion of voices in my ears. I listened--two men were talking; subject, apparently, the great inundation. I looked out through the open transom. The two men were eating a late breakfast; sitting opposite each other; nobody else around. They closed up the inundation with a few words--having used it, evidently, as a mere ice-breaker and acquaintanceship-breeder--then they dropped into business. It soon transpired that they were drummers--one belonging in Cincinnati, the other in New Orleans. Brisk men, energetic of movement and speech; the dollar their god, how to get it their religion.