About this time Mr. Bixby appeared on the scene. Something like a minute later I was climbing the pilot-house steps with some of my clothes on and the rest in my arms. Mr. Bixby was close behind, commenting. Here was something fresh—this thing of getting up in the middle of the night to go to work. It was a detail in piloting that had never occurred to me at all. I knew that boats ran all night, but somehow I had never happened to reflect that somebody had to get up out of a warm bed to run them. I began to fear that piloting was not quite so romantic as I had imagined it was; there was something very real and work-like about this new phase of it. How does the excerpt reflect the fact that this novel is a realist text?
It employs a matter-of-fact tone commonly used within realist texts.
It depicts the loss of a romantic vision of working on a steamboat.
It suggests that what follows will be grim and possibly depressing.
It uses humor to describe a situation that is difficult for the narrator.