BOOKS WHICH HAVE BEEN PUBLISHED RELATING TO MINNESOTA.

The following will be found in "Collections of the Minnesota Historical Society, volume I, St. Paul, 1872:"

1. The French Voyageurs to Minnesota during the Seventeenth Century, by Rev. E. D. Neill.

   2. Description of Minnesota (1850), by Hon. Henry H. Sibley.

3. Our Field of Historical Research, by Hon. Alexander Ramsey.

4. Early Courts of Minnesota, by Hon. Aaron Goodrich.

5. Early Schools of Minnesota, by D. A. J. Baker.

6. Religious Movements in Minnesota, by Rev. C. Hobart.

7. The Dakota Language, by Rev. S. R. Riggs.

8. History and Physical Geography of Minnesota, by H. R. Schoolcraft.

9. Letter of Mesnard, by Rev. E. D. Neill.

10. The Saint Louis River, by T. M. Fullerton.

11. Ancient Mounds and Memorials, by Messrs. Pond, Aiton and Riggs.

12. Schoolcraft's Exploring Tour of 1832, by Rev. W. T. Boutwell.

13. Battle of Lake Pokegama, by Rev. E. D. Neill.

14. Memoir of Jean Nicollet, by Hon. Henry H. Sibley.

15. Sketch of Joseph Renville, by Rev. E. D. Neill.

16. Department of Hudson's Bay, by Rev. G. A. Belcourt.

17. Obituary of James M. Goodhue, by Rev. E. D. Neill.

18. Dakota Land and Dakota Life, by Rev. E. D. Neill.

19. Who were the First Men, by Rev. T. S. Williamson.

20. Louis Hennepin, the Franciscan, and Du Luth, the Explorer.

21. Le Sueur, the Explorer of the Minnesota River.

22. D'Iberville; An Abstract of his Memorial.

  23. The Fox and Ojibway War.

24. Captain Jonathan Carver and his Explorations.

25. Pike's Explorations in Minnesota.

26. Who Discovered Itasca Lake, by William Morrison.

27. Early Days at Fort Snelling.

28. Running the Gauntlet, by William T. Snelling.

29. Reminiscences, Historical and Personal.

Volume 2:

30. Voyage in a Six-oared Skiff to the Falls of St. Anthony in 1817, by Major Stephen H. Long.

31. Early French Forts and Footprints of the Valley of the Upper Mississippi, by Rev. E. D. Neill.

32. Occurrences in and around Fort Snelling from 1819 to 1840, by Rev. E. D. Neill.

33. Religion of the Dakotas (Chapter VI. of James W. Lynd's Manuscripts).

34. Mineral Regions of Lake Superior, from Their First Discovery in 1865, by Hon. Henry M. Rice.

35. Constantine Beltrami, by Alfred J. Hill.

36. Historical Notes on the U. S. Land Office, by Hon. Henry M. Rice.

37. The Geography of Perrot, so far as it relates to Minnesota, by Alfred J. Hill.

38. Dakota Superstitions, by Rev. Gideon H. Pond.

39. The Carver Centenary; an account of the Celebration, May 1, 1867, of the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Council and Treaty of Capt. Jonathan Carver with the Nadowessioux, at Carver's Cave in St. Paul, with an address by the Rev. John Mattocks.

  40. Relation of M. Penticant, translated by Alfred J. Hill, with an introductory note by the Rev. E. D. Neill.

41. Bibliography of Minnesota, by J. Fletcher Williams.

42. A Reminiscence of Fort Snelling, by Mrs. Charlotte O. Van Cleve.

43. Narrative of Paul Ma-za-koo-to-ma-ne. Translated by Rev. S. R. Riggs.

44. Memoir of Ex-Governor Henry A. Swift, by J. Fletcher Williams.

45. Sketch of John Otherday, by Hon. Henry H. Sibley.

46. A Coincidence, by Mrs. Charlotte O. Van Cleve

47. Memoir of Hon. James W. Lynd, by Rev. S. R. Riggs.

48. The Dakota Mission, by Rev. S. R. Riggs.

49. Indian Warfare in Minnesota, by Rev. S. W. Pond.

50. Colonel Leavenworth's Expedition to Establish Fort Snelling in 1819, by Major Thomas Forsyth.

51. Memoir of Jean Baptiste Faribault, by Gen. H. H. Sibley.

52. Memoir of Captain Martin Scott, by J. Fletcher Williams.

53. Na-peh-shnee-doo-ta, a Dakota Christian, by Rev. T. S. Williamson.

54. Memoir of Hercules L. Dousman, by Gen. Henry H. Sibley.

55. Memoir of Joseph R. Brown, by J. F. Williams, E. S. Goodrich, and J. A. Wheelock.

56. Memoir of Hon. Cyrus Aldrich, by J. F. Williams.

  57. Memoir of Rev. Lucian Galtier, by Bishop John Ireland.

58. Memoir of Hon. David Olmsted, by J. F. Williams.

59. Reminiscences of the Early Days of Minnesota, by Hon. H. H. Sibley.

60. The Sioux or Dakotas of the Missouri River, by Rev. T. S. Williamson.

61. Memoir of Rev. S. Y. McMasters, by Earle S. Goodrich.

62. Tributes to the Memory of Rev. John Mattocks, by J. F. Williams, Hon. Henry H. Sibley, John B. Sanborn and Bishop Ireland.

63. Memoir of Ex-Governor Willis A. Gorman, compiled from press notices, and eulogy by Hon. C. K. Davis.

64. Lake Superior, Historical and Descriptive, by Hon. James H. Baker.

65. Memorial Notices of Rev. Gideon H. Pond, by Rev. S. R. Riggs, Hon. H. H. Sibley and Rev. T. S. Williamson.

66. In Memory of Rev. Thomas S. Williamson, by Rev. S. R. Riggs and A. W. Williamson.

67. The Ink-pa-du-ta Massacre of 1857, by Hon. Charles E. Flandrau.

Volume 4:

68. History of the City of St. Paul and County of Ramsey, Minnesota, by J. Fletcher Williams, containing a very full sketch of the first settlement and early days of St. Paul, in 1838, 1839 and 1840, and of the territory from 1849 to 1858; lists of the early settlers and claim owners; amusing events of pioneer days; biographical sketches of over two hundred prominent men of early times; three steel portraits and forty-seven woodcuts (portraits and views); lists of federal, county and city officers since 1849.

Volume 5:

69. History of the Ojibway Nation, by William W. Warren (deceased); a valuable work, containing the legends and traditions of the Ojibways, their origin, history, costumes, religion, daily life and habits, ideas, biographies of leading chieftains and, orators, vivid descriptions of battles, etc. The work was carefully edited by Rev. Edward D. Neill, who added an appendix of 116 pages, giving an account of the Ojibways from official and other records. It also contains a portrait of Warren, a memoir of him by J. Fletcher Williams, and a copious index.

Volume 6:

70. The Sources of the Mississippi; their Discovery, Real and Pretended, by Hon. James H. Baker.

71. The Hennepin Bicentenary; Celebration by the Minnesota Historical Society of the 200th anniversary of the Discovery of the Falls of St. Anthony in 1680, by Louis Hennepin.

72. Early Days at Red River Settlement and Fort Snelling; reminiscences of Mrs. Ann Adams.

73. Protestant Missions in the Northwest, by Rev. Stephen R. Riggs, with a memoir of the author, by J. F. Williams.

  74. Autobiography of Major Lawrence Taliaferro, Indian Agent at Fort Snelling, 1820 to 1840.

75. Memoir of General Henry Hastings Sibley, by J. F. Williams.

76. Mounds in Dakota, Minnesota and Wisconsin, by Alfred J. Hill.

77. Columbian Address, delivered by Hon. H. W. Childs before the Minnesota Historical Society, Oct. 21, 1892.

78. Reminiscences of Fort Snelling, by Col. John Bliss.

79. Sioux Outbreak of 1862; Mrs. J. E. DeCamp's Narrative of her Captivity.

80. A Sioux Story of the War; Chief Big Eagle's Story of the Sioux Outbreak of 1862.

81. Incidents of the Threatened Outbreak of Hole-in-the-day and other Ojibways at the time of the Sioux Massacre in 1862, by George W. Sweet.

82. Dakota Scalp Dances, by Rev. T. S. Williamson.

83. Earliest Schools in Minnesota Valley, by Rev. T. S. Williamson.

84. Traditions of Sioux Indians, by Major William H. Forbes.

85. Death of a Remarkable Man; Gabriel Franchere, by Hon. Benjamin P. Avery.

86. First Settlement on the Red River of the North in 1812, and its Condition in 1847, by Mrs. Elizabeth T. Ayres.

87. Frederick Ayer, Teacher and Missionary to the Ojibway Indians, 1829 to 1850.

88. Captivity among the Sioux; Story of Nancy McClure.

89. Captivity among the Sioux; Story of Mary Schwandt.

  90. Autobiography and Reminiscences of Philander Prescott.

91. Recollections of James M. Goodhue, by Colonel John H. Stevens.

92. History of the Ink-pa-du-ta Massacre, by Abbie Gardner Sharp.

Volume 7:

93. The Mississippi River and Its Source; a narrative and critical history of the river and its headwaters, accompanied by the results of detailed hydrographic and topographic surveys; illustrated with many maps, portraits and views of the scenery; by Hon. J. V. Brower, Commissioner of the Itasca State Park, representing also the State Historical Society. With an appendix: How the Mississippi River and the Lake of the Woods became instrumental in the establishment of the northwestern boundary of the United States, by Alfred J. Hill.

Volume 8:

94. The International Boundary between Lake Superior and the Lake of the Woods, by Ulysses Sherman Grant.

95. The Settlement and Development of the Red River Valley, by Warren Upham.

96. The Discovery and Development of the Iron Ores of Minnesota, by N. H. Winchell, State Geologist.

97. The Origin and Growth of the Minnesota Historical Society, by the President, Hon. Alexander Ramsey.

  98. Opening of the Red River of the North to Commerce and Civilization, with plates, by Capt. Russell Blakeley.

99. Last days of Wisconsin Territory, and Early Days of Minnesota Territory, by Hon. Henry L. Moss.

100. Lawyers and Courts of Minnesota, Prior to and During its Territorial Period, by Judge Charles E. Flandrau.

101. Homes and Habitations of the Minnesota Historical Society, by Charles E. Mayo.

102. The Historical Value of Newspapers, by J. B. Chaney.

103. The United States Government Publications, by D. L. Kingsbury.

104. The First Organized Government of Dakota, by Gov. Samuel J. Albright, with a preface by Judge Charles E. Flandrau.

105. How Minnesota became a State, by Prof. Thomas F. Moran.

106. Minnesota's Northern Boundary, by Alexander N. Winchell.

107. The Question of the Sources of the Mississippi River, by Prof. E. Lavasseur. (Translated by Col. W. P. Clough.)

108. The Source of the Mississippi, by Prof. N. H. Winchell.

109. Prehistoric Man at the Headwaters of the Mississippi River (with plates), and an addendum relating to the early visits of Mr. Julius Chambers and the Rev. J. A. Gilfillan to Itasca Lake, by Hon. J. V. Brower.

110. History of Minnesota, by Edward D. Neill. First Edition, 1858; has gone through four editions.

   111. Concise History of the State of Minnesota, by Edward D. Neill, 1887.

112. Minnesota in the Civil and Indian Wars, 1861-1865, prepared under the supervision of a committee appointed by the legislature, 1890-1893, in two volumes.

113. History of the Sioux War and Massacres of 1862-1863, by Isaac V. D. Heard, 1865.

114. A History of the Great Massacre by the Sioux Indians in Minnesota, by Charles S. Bryant and Abel B. Murch, 1872.

115. Minnesota Historical Society Collections, in eight volumes, 1850 to 1898, containing many of the above named works and papers.

116. History of St. Paul, Minnesota, by Gen. Christopher C. Andrews, 1890.

117. History of the City of Minneapolis, by Isaac Atwater, in two volumes.

118. Pen Pictures of St. Paul, Minnesota, and Biographical Sketches of Old Settlers, by T. M. Newson.

119. Fifty Years in the Northwest, by W. H. C. Folsom, 1888.

120. The United States Biographical Dictionary and Portrait Gallery of Eminent and Self-Made Men, Minnesota Volume by Jeremiah Clemmens, assisted by J. Fletcher Williams, 1879.

121. Progressive Men of Minnesota, Biographical Sketches and Portraits, together with an historical and descriptive sketch of the state, by Marion D. Shutter and J. S. McLain, 1897.

122. Biographical History of the Northwest, by Alonzo Phelps, 1890.

   123. A History of the Republican Party, to which is added a political history of Minnesota from a Republican point of view, and biographical sketches of leading Minnesota Republicans, by Eugene V. Smalley.

124. There are also many quarto histories of counties in Minnesota and of larger districts of the state, mostly published during the years 1880 to 1890, including twenty counties, namely, Dakota, Dodge, Faribault, Fillmore, Freeborn, Goodhue, Hennepin, Houston, McLeod, Meeker, Olmsted, Pope, Ramsey, Rice, Steele, Stevens, Wabasha, Waseca, Washington, and Winona, and five districts, namely, The St. Croix Valley, the Upper Mississippi Valley, the Minnesota Valley, the Red River Valley and Park Region, and Southern Minnesota.

125. Winona and its Environs, by L. H. Bunnell, 1897, with maps and portraits.

Among the Earliest Publications are:

126. Minnesota and its Resources, by J. Wesley Bond, 1853.

127. Minnesota Year Books, 1851, 1852, 1853, by William G. Le Duc.

128. Floral Home, or First Years of Minnesota, 1857, by Harriet E. Bishop.

129. Narratives and Reports of Travels and Explorations, by Hennepin, Carver, Long and Keating, Beltrami, Featherstonhaugh, Schoolcraft, Nicollet, Owen, Oliphant, Andrews, Seymour and others.

   130. For Geographic and Geologic descriptions of Minnesota, the reports of the geological and natural history survey are the most complete sources of information, by Prof. N. H. Winchell, State Geologist, assisted by Warren Upham, Ulysses Sherman Grant, and others. The annual reports comprise twenty-three volumes, 1872 to 1894, with another to be published. Several other volumes have been issued as bulletins of the survey, on iron, mining, birds, mammals, and fishes.

131. Four thousand two hundred and fifty bound volumes of Minnesota newspapers, embracing complete files of nearly all the newspapers ever published in Minnesota from first to last.

132. One thousand seven hundred and two books and about fifteen hundred pamphlets relating in some way to Minnesota history. All these books can be found in the library of the Minnesota Historical Society, which is always open to the public, free.

133. Much historical and other information is contained in the messages of the governors and reports of the various state officers, and especially in the Legislative Manuals prepared for the use of the members of the legislature by the secretary of state, under chapter 122 of the General Laws of 1893, and former laws. These Manuals, and especially that of 1899, are replete with valuable statistics concerning the state, its history and resources.

134. Illustrated History of Minnesota, by T. H. Kirk, M. L., 1887.

   135. Ancestry, Life and Times of Henry Hastings Sibley, by Nathaniel West, D. D., 1889.

136. Minnesota and Dacotah in Letters descriptive of a Tour through the Northwest in the Autumn of 1856, with information relative to public lands and a table of statistics, by General C. C. Andrews.

137. Lights and Shadows of a Long Episcopate by the Rt. Rev. Henry Benjamin Whipple, D. D., L. L. D., Bishop of Minnesota.

138. Reminiscences, Memoirs and Lectures of Monsignor A. Ravoux, V. G. 1890.

139. Encyclopedia of Biography of Minnesota, with a History of Minnesota, by Judge Charles E. Flandrau.

Finis.

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TALES OF THE FRONTIER.

FRONTIER TALES.

HUNTING WOLVES IN BED.

Forty-six years ago, almost immediately after my arrival in St. Paul, I accepted an offer to explore the valley of the Minnesota river and its tributaries, with reference to finding out the character of its soil, timber, steamboat landings and other natural features, bearing upon the founding of a city. My attention was particularly directed to the point where St. Peter now stands, which had then acquired the name of Rock Bend, from a turn in the river in front of the prairie, with a rocky wall which presented a fine landing for steamboats. Of course, the valley was not a terra incognito when I entered it, but settlement was very sparse, and very little was known about it. Town-site speculation was rife, and any place that looked as if it would ever be settled was being pounced upon for a future city. There was not a railroad west of Chicago, and every town location was, of course, governed by the rivers. As strange as it may seem to the residents of the present day, the Minnesota was then a navigable stream, capable of carrying large side wheel steamers several hundred miles above its mouth, and afterwards bore an immense commerce. As soon as the ice broke up in the spring, the river would rise and overflow its banks clear to the bluffs on each side, making a stream of from five to six miles wide, and deep enough to float boats anywhere within its limits.

A man by the name of William B. Dodd, better known as Captain Dodd in those days, had selected a claim at Rock Bend, covering the landing, and had laid out a road from the Mississippi to this point. He wanted to interest capitalists to start a town on his claim, and had succeeded in gaining the attention of Willis A. Gorman, then governor of the territory, and several other gentlemen, but none of them had ever been up the valley, and reliable information was difficult to obtain. It was true that Tom Holmes had laid out Shakopee, and Henry Jackson and P. K. Johnson, with a syndicate behind them, had selected Mankato, and I think there was a settler or two at Le Sueur, but the whole valley may be said to have been at that time in the possession of Indians, Indian traders and missionaries.

The St. Paul gentlemen who had been approached by Captain Dodd engaged me to go up the valley of the Minnesota river, and follow out all its tributaries, with the idea of reporting upon its general characteristics and prospects, with reference to the founding of a city at Rock Bend. I was delighted to do anything, or go anywhere, that promised work or adventure. It was to me what the Klondike has been to thousands recently. They furnished me with a good team, and away I went. It was in the winter, but I succeeded in reaching Traverse des Sioux, where I found a collection of Indian trading houses, where flourished Louis Roberts, Major Forbes, Nathan Myrick, Madison Sweetzer and others, who drove a trade with the Sioux. There was also at this point a missionary station, with a schoolhouse, a church, and a substantial dwelling house, occupied by the Rev. Moses N. Adams, who had been a missionary among the Sioux, having been transferred from the station at Lac qui Parle, where he had lived for many years, to this point. But the best find that I made was a young Scotchman by the name of Stuart B. Garvie, who had a shanty on the prairie about midway between Traverse des Sioux and my objective point, Rock Bend. I think that Garvie went up there from St. Anthony, under some kind of a promise from Judge Chatfield, that if ever the courts were organized in that region he would be made clerk. Garvie was delighted to discover me, and I being in search of information, we soon fraternized, and he agreed to go with me on my tour of exploration. We went up the Blue Earth, the Le Sueur, the Watonwan, and, in fact, visited all the country that was necessary to convince me that it was, by and large, a splendid agricultural region, and I decided so to report to my principals.

When I was about to leave for down the river, Garvie insisted that I should return and take up my abode at Traverse des Sioux. The proposition seemed too absurd to me to be seriously entertained, and I said: "I am destitute of funds, and how can a lawyer subsist where there are no people? How can I get a living?" This dilemma, which seemed to me to be insuperable, was easily answered by my new found friend. "Why," he said, "That is the easiest part of it. We can hunt a living, and I have a shack and a bed." The proposition was catching, having a spice of adventure in it, and I promised to consider it.

After making my report, in which I recommended Rock Bend as a promising place for a great city, I told the parties who proposed to purchase Captain Dodd's claim that I would confirm my faith in the success of the enterprise by returning and living at the point. I did so, and found myself farther west than any lawyer in the United States east of the Rocky Mountains, unless he was in the panhandle of Texas. And now comes the singular way in which I made my first fee, if I may call it by that name. It was my first financial raise, no matter what you call it.

Garvie and I had gotten quietly settled in our shanty on the prairie, when one excessively cold night an Indian boy, about thirteen years of age, saw our light, and came to the door, giving us to understand that his people were encamped about four or five miles up the river, and that he was afraid to go any further lest he should freeze to death. He was mounted on a pony, had a pack of furs with him, and asked us to take him in for the night. We of course did so, and made him as comfortable as we could by giving him a buffalo robe on the floor. But we had no shelter for his pony, and all we could do was to hitch him on the lee side of the shanty, and strap a blanket on him. When morning came he was frozen to death. We got the poor little boy safely off on the way to his people's camp, and decided to utilize the carcass of the pony for a wolf bait.

In order to present an intelligent idea of the situation, I will say that the river made an immense detour in front of the future town, having a large extent of bottom land, covered with a dense chaparral, which was the home of thousands of wolves, and as soon as night came they would start out in droves in search of prey.

We hauled the dead pony out to the back of the shanty, and left it about two rods distant from the window. The moment night set in the wolves in packs would attack the carcass. At first we would step outside and fire into them with buck shot from double-barrelled shotguns, but we found they were so wary that the mere movement of opening the door to get out would frighten them, and we had very limited success for the first few nights. Another difficulty we encountered was shooting in the dark. If you have never tried it, and ever do, you will find it exceedingly difficult to get any kind of an aim, and you have to fire promiscuously at the sound rather than the object.

We remedied this trouble, however, by taking out a light of glass from the back window, and building a rest that bore directly on the carcass, so that we could poke our guns through the opening, settle them on the rest, and blaze away into the gloom. We brought our bed up to the window, so that we could shoot without getting out of it, while snugly wrapped up in our blankets. After this our luck improved, and after each discharge we would rush out, armed with a tomahawk, dispatch the wounded wolves, and collect the dead ones, until we had slaughtered forty-two of them. We skinned them, and sold the pelts to the traders for seventy-five cents a piece, which money was the first of our earnings.

It was not long before we ceased to depend on wolf hunting for a living, as immigration soon poured in, and money became plenty. I remember soon after of having seventeen hundred dollars in gold buried in an oyster can under the shanty.

I lived on this prairie for eleven years, and never was happier at any period of my life, and feel assured that I can safely say that no other man ever enjoyed the luxury of hunting wolves in bed.

The pleasure of narrating such adventures for the present generation is, in this instance, marred by the reflection that both Captain Dodd and my old friend Garvie were killed by the Indians in 1862, the former while gallantly fighting at the battle of New Ulm, and the latter at the Yellow Medicine Agency, on the first day of the outbreak.

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THE POISONED WHISKY.

I was told by a gentleman at my club the other day that he had read in some magazine that the British army had blown open the tomb of the Mahdi in upper Africa, and had mutilated the body, cutting off the head and sending it to England in a kerosene can. I could hardly believe the story, but he vouched for having read it in a reputable publication, and being a strong hater of the English, affirmed his unqualified faith in the statement. Notwithstanding his position, it seemed to me incredible that such an act of barbarism could be perpetrated by the disciplined soldiery of a civilized nation in the nineteenth century. The conversation so impressed me that I could not drive it out of my mind, and I kept revolving it and making comparisons with events in my own experience, until I concluded that it is more than probable that it took place as related, and have since learned that it actually occurred.

I have seen a good deal of ferocity and savagism, and it was not at all confined to people acknowledged to be barbarians. I remember an instance where I came very near being a party to a scheme, the brutality of which would have made the mutilation of the dead Mahdi commendable in comparison; but fortunately my better nature and second thought overcame my passions, and I was spared the perpetration of the awful crime, the remembrance of which, had it been committed, would undoubtedly have haunted me through life.

Many of the older settlers of Minnesota will remember the horrors of the Indian massacre and war of 1862, when the Sioux attacked our exposed frontiers, and in a day and a half massacred quite a thousand people. They spared neither age nor sex. It was like all such savage outbreaks,—a war against the race and the blood. These atrocities extended over a large and sparsely inhabited area of country, and were usually perpetrated at the houses of the settlers by the slaughter of the entire family, sometimes varied by the seizure of the women, and carrying them off into captivity, which in most instances was worse than death. Every character of mutilation and outrage that could be suggested by the inflamed passions of a savage were resorted to, and so horrible were they that it would shock and disgust the reader should I attempt to describe them. This condition of things was no surprise to me, because it was to be expected from savages; but the more we saw and heard of it, the more exasperated and angered we became, and the more we vowed vengeance should the opportunity come.

I resided on the frontier at the time the outbreak occurred, and murders were committed within eight miles of my home before I heard of it, which was on the morning of the second day. I, of course, immediately, after disposing of my impedimenta in the shape of women and children, took the field against the enemy, and by nine o'clock in the evening of the same day that I heard of the trouble I found myself at the town of New Ulm, a German settlement on the frontier, the extreme outpost of civilization, in command of over one hundred men, armed and ready for battle. We had raised and equipped the company and travelled thirty-two miles since the morning.

When we entered the town it was being attacked by a squad of Indians, about one hundred strong, who had already burned a number of houses and were firing upon the inhabitants, having already killed several. We soon dislodged the enemy, put out the fires, and settled down to await events. This was on Tuesday, the 19th of August. We strengthened the barricades about the town, and did all we could to prepare for a second attack, which we knew would certainly come, and from the combined forces of the enemy, and which did come on the following Saturday. While waiting, numerous squads of whites from the surrounding country reenforced us, and it soon became apparent that someone must be put in command of the whole force, to prevent disorders on the part of the men, as whisky was abundant and free. The honor of the command fell upon me by election of the officers of the various companies, and in the choice of a rank for myself my modesty restrained me to that of colonel. I have often thought since that I lost the opportunity of my life, as I might just as easily have assumed the title of major general.

Every day we sent out scouting expeditions, and brought in refugees, men, women and children, who were in hiding or wounded, and in the most pitiable condition. From these we learned of many additional atrocities, which kept our passions and desire for revenge at fever heat. On Saturday, the 23d, the Indians who had been all the week besieging Fort Ridgely, abandoned that quest, and came down upon us in full force. The attack commenced about half-past nine o'clock on Saturday morning, and the fight raged hotly and viciously for about thirty hours without cessation. I lost in the first hour and a half ten killed and fifty wounded, out of a command of not more than 250 guns. On the afternoon of the next day the Indians gradually disappeared toward the north, and gave us a breathing spell, and then a relief company arrived and the fighting ceased.

On Monday ammunition and provisions were getting short, and fearing a renewal of the attack, I decided to evacuate the town, and go down the Minnesota river to Mankato, a distance of about thirty miles over an open prairie. We had nearly fifteen hundred women and children to take care of, and about eighty wounded men. The caravan consisted of 153 wagons, drawn by horses and oxen; the troops being on foot, and so disposed as to make a good defense if attacked.

Everything being ready for a start, some one suggested to me to set a trap for the Indians, when they should enter the town after our departure, as we all supposed they would, there being an immense amount of loot left behind,—stores full of goods of all kinds, and many other things of value to the savage.

I had, the day before, put a stop to some of the younger men scalping the eight or ten dead Indians who had been dragged into the town from where they had been killed, regarding it as barbarous. The boys would take off a small piece of scalp, and with its long black hair, tie it into their button-holes, as a souvenir to take home with them.

What do you think was the nature of the trap that was proposed to catch the Indians? It makes my blood run cold to think of it, and so disgraceful and diabolical was it that, in all I have said and written about this war in the last thirty-six years, I have never had courage to mention it. Yet as awful as it was, so incensed was I at all the devilish cruelty that had been perpetrated on our people that I at first consented to it, and we went so far as actually to set the trap.

It was proposed to expose a barrel of whisky in a conspicuous place, and put enough strychnine in it to destroy the whole Sioux nation, and then label it "poison" in all the languages spoken in our polyglot country, so that should the first comers be whites they would avoid it, but if Indians, we might have the satisfaction of exterminating them. We actually went so far as to place the barrel where it would attract anyone who should be looking about the main street, which was all that was left of the town, and labelled it in French, English, German, Italian, Swedish and Norwegian, and then put into it eight or ten bottles of strychnine, prepared for destroying wolves, and were about leaving when the thought flashed through my mind: "Suppose a relief squad should be sent to us, and should think the whole matter a joke to cheat them out of a drink, and should sample it and die, as they certainly would, we never could forgive ourselves, and would be really their murderers." My knowledge of the fact that a soldier who had made a long march on a hot day would take big chances for a drink, heightened my apprehension on this view of the subject, and the more I thought the matter over, the more devilish it appeared to me, even if we caught only Indians. I actually felt as though I would be ashamed to meet the spirit of even a savage enemy whom I had disposed of in such a cowardly manner, should we finally be consigned to the same happy hunting grounds, so I took an axe and knocked the head of the barrel in, and let the contents into the street. While I deeply regretted the loss of so much good whisky, I have never thought of the occurrence since without inwardly rejoicing that my better nature and judgment prevented me from committing such an offense against all the laws of honor, humanity and civilization. It turned out that the first arrival was a squad sent by General Sibley to our relief, and from what I know of some of the men composing it, I am quite certain that the warning would have been disregarded. The circumstance, however, proves how deeply the savage instinct is imbedded in human nature, whatever the color of the skin. "Give us strength to resist temptation," has been my prayer ever since.

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FUN IN A BLIZZARD.

The winter of 1856, in Minnesota, was characterized by the usual amount of cold weather, snow and storms, and people operating on the frontier were compelled to exercise great care and caution to prevent disasters. All old timers who have had occasion to live beyond the settlements and travel long distances in an open prairie country well know that the danger of being overtaken by storms is one of the most terrible that one can be exposed to. Most of the casualties, however, that result from being caught in these storms may be attributed to want of experience, and consequent lack of preparation to meet and contend with them. I have employed many men of all nationalities in teaming long distances on the prairie frontier in the winter season, and while the American is always reliable and dexterous in emergencies, I have found the French Canadian always the best equipped for winter prairie work, in his knowledge in this line that can only be gained by experience. His ancestors served the early fur companies from Montreal to McKenzie's river, from Hudson's bay to the Pacific, and knew how to take care of themselves with the unerring instinct of the cariboo and the moose, and the generation of them that I came in contact with had inherited all these characteristics.

I have known a brigade of teams, manned by Germans, Englishmen and Irishmen (the Scandinavians had then just begun to make their appearance in the Northwest) to be caught in a winter storm, and result in the amputation of fingers, toes, feet and hands from freezing, but I cannot remember ever losing a Canadian Frenchman. I recall one instance, where a train was overtaken by a severe storm just about evening, where no timber was in sight. The men built barricades with their sleds and loads, and took refuge to the leeward of them, where they passed quite a comfortable night for themselves and their teams. With the coming of the morning light they discovered a timber island not very far off, and started for it with their horses, to make fires, feed the teams, and get breakfast. The storm had abated, and the sun shone brilliantly. One young American lad shouldered a sack of oats, and not realizing that it was very cold, did not put on his mittens, but seized the neck of the sack with his bare hand. When he arrived at the timber all his fingers were frozen, and had to be amputated. It was merely one of the cases of serious injury I have known arising from ignorance.

No one who has not encountered a blizzard on the open prairie can form an adequate idea of the almost hopelessness of the situation. The air becomes filled with driving, whirling snow to such an extent that it is with difficulty you can see your horses, and the effect is the same as absolute darkness in destroying all conception of direction. You may think you are going straight forward when in fact you are moving in a small circle; the only safety is to stop and battle it out.

I remember a case which happened in this region before it became Minnesota which fully proves the dangers of a blizzard to a traveler on the open prairie. Martin McLeod and Pierre Bottineau, together with an Englishman and a Pole, started from Fort Garry for the headwaters of the Minnesota river. They were well equipped in all respects, having a good dog train, and, in Bottineau, one of the most experienced guides in the Northwest. While the party was in sight of timber it was suddenly enveloped in a blizzard, and, of course, wanted to reach the timber for safety. Here a controversy arose as to the direction to be taken to find it, the Englishman and the Pole insisting on one line, and McLeod and Bottineau on another. They separated. McLeod took the dogs, and he and they soon fell over a precipice and were covered up in a deep snow drift, where they remained quite comfortably through the night. Bottineau through his instincts reached the timber, and was safe, where he was joined the next morning by McLeod. The Englishman was afterwards discovered so badly frozen that he died, while the Pole was lost. The only trace of him that was ever discovered was his pistols, which were found on the prairie the next spring, the wolves having undoubtedly disposed of his remains.

The remedy for these dangers is to avoid them by a close scrutiny of the weather, and by never venturing on a big prairie if you can by any means avoid it, and always being abundantly supplied with food for yourself and animals, whether horses or dogs, besides fuel, matches, blankets, robes, and all the paraphernalia of a snow camp, should you have to make one. No people are more careful in these particulars than the Indians themselves, from whom the French voyageurs undoubtedly learned their lessons.

To give an idea of how treacherous the weather may be, and of what dangers frontier people are subjected to, I will relate an adventure in which I participated when living in the Indian country, which, however, turned out pleasantly. I had been at my Redwood agency for several days, and it became important that I should visit my upper agency, situated on the Yellow Medicine river, about thirty miles distant, up the Minnesota river. After crossing the Redwood river, the road led over a thirty-mile prairie, without a shrub on it as big as a walking stick. The day was bright and beautiful, and the ride promised to be a pleasant one, so I invited my surgeon, Dr. Daniels, and his wife to accompany me. They gladly accepted, and Mrs. Daniels took her baby along. (By the way, this baby is now the elder sister of the wife of one of our most distinguished attorneys, Mr. John V. I. Dodd.) Mr. Andrew Myrick, a trader at the agency, learning that we were going, decided to accompany us, and got up his team for the purpose, taking some young friends with him, and off we went.

I had early taken the precaution to construct a sleigh especially adapted to winter travel in this exposed region. It had recesses where were stowed away provisions, fuel, tools, and many things to meet possible emergencies. The cushions were made of twelve pairs of four-point Mackinaw blankets, and the side rails were capable of carrying two carcasses of venison or mutton, so I felt quite capable of conquering a blizzard.

I may say here that I had a surgeon at each agency, who were brothers, Dr. Asa W. Daniels at the lower agency and Dr. Jared Daniels at the upper, and this excursion presented a pleasant opportunity for the families to meet. The upper agency was in charge of my chief farmer, a Scotch gentleman by the name of Robertson. He was a mystery which I never unravelled,—a handsome, aristocratic, highly educated man about seventy years of age, with the manners of a Chesterfield. He had been in the Indian country for many years, had married a squaw, and raised a numerous family of children, and had been in the employment of the government ever since the making of the treaties. I always thought he once was a man of fortune, who had dissipated it in some way, after travelling the world over, and had sought oblivion in the wilds of America.

There was a large comfortable log house at the Yellow Medicine agency, occupied by Robertson, which answered for all his purposes, both business and domestic, and furnished a home and office for me when I happened to be there; and on one occasion, during the Ink-pa-du-ta excitement, I found it made a very efficient fort for defense against the Indians.

Our trip was uneventful, and we arrived in the evening. That night a blizzard sprang up that exceeded in severity anything of the kind in my experience, and I have had nearly half a century of Minnesota winters. It raged and rampaged. It piled the snow on the prairie in drifts of ten and twenty feet in height. It filled the river bottoms to the height of about three feet on the level. It lasted about ten days, during which time, we of course, did not dream of getting out, but amused ourselves as best we could. It was what the French called a poudre de riz, where there is more snow in the air than on the ground. Although I have been entertained in many parts of the world, and by many various kinds of people, I can say that I never enjoyed a few weeks more satisfactorily than those we spent under compulsion at the Yellow Medicine river on that occasion.

Personal association with Mr. Robertson was not only a delight, but an education. He had been everywhere, and knew everything. He was charming in conversation and magnificent in hospitality, and the unique nature of his entertainment under his savage environments lent an additional charm to the situation. He soon became aware that we needed something exciting to sustain us in our enforced imprisonment, and he produced fiddlers and half-breed women for dancing. He gave us every day a dinner party composed of viands unknown outside of the frontier of North America. One day we would have the tail of the beaver, always regarded as a great delicacy on the border; the next, the paws of the bear soused, which, when served on a white dish, very much resembled the foot of a negro, but were good; then, again, roasted muskrat, which in the winter is as delicate as a young chicken; then fricasseed skunk, which, in season, is free from all offensive odor, and extremely delicate,—all served with le riz sauvage. In fact, he exhausted the resources of the country to make us happy.

But Robertson's menu was the least part of it. Every evening he would assemble us, and read Shakespeare and the poetry of Burns to us. I never understood or enjoyed Burns until I heard it read and expounded by Robertson.

The time passed in this pleasant fashion until we commenced to think we were "snowed in" for the winter, and I began to devise ways and means for getting out. I had to get out; but how, was the question. To cross the prairie was not to be thought of; we could not get an Indian to venture over it on snowshoes, let alone driving over it. Nothing had been heard of us below, and, as we learned afterwards, the St. Paul papers had published an account of our all being frozen to death, with full details of Andrew Myrick being found dead in his sleigh, with the lines in his hands and his horses standing stiff before him.

I decided that an expedition might work its way through on the river bottoms, and we could follow in its trail. So I sent out a party with several heavy sleds, loaded with hay, and each drawn by four or five yoke of oxen to beat a track. They returned after several days' absence, and reported that the thing was impossible, and they could not get through. I then called for volunteers, and the French Canadians came to the front. I allowed them to organize their own expedition. They took their fiddles with them, and the agreement was, that if we didn't hear from them in five days, we were to consider that they were through, and we could follow. The days passed one after the other, and at the expiration of the time, we all started, and laboriously followed the trail they had beaten. We noticed their camps from day to day, and saw that they had not been distressed, and found them, at the end of the journey, as jolly as such people always are, whether in sunshine or storm.

It is much more agreeable to write about blizzards than to encounter them.

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LAW AND LATIN.

In the beginning of the settlement of the Minnesota valley, in the early fifties, a man named Tom Cowan located at Traverse des Sioux. His name will be at once recognized by all the old settlers. He was a Scotchman, and had been in business in Baltimore. Financial difficulties had driven him to the West, to begin life anew and grow up with the country. He was a very well read and companionable man, and exceedingly bright by nature, and at once became very popular with the people. His first venture was in the fur trade, but not knowing anything about it, his success was not brilliant. I remember that he once paid an immense price for a very large black bearskin, thinking he had struck a bonanza. He kept it on exhibition, until one day John S. Prince, who was an experienced fur buyer, dropped in, and after listening to Cowan's eulogy on his bear skin, quietly remarked: "He bear; not worth a d—n," which decision induced Tom to abandon the fur trade.

There being no lawyer but one at Traverse des Sioux, and I having been elected to the supreme bench, Mr. Cowan decided to study law, and open an office for the practice of that profession. He accordingly proposed that he should study with me, which idea I strongly encouraged, and after about six weeks of diligent reading, principally devoted to the statutes, I admitted him to the bar, and he fearlessly announced himself as an attorney and counselor at law. In this venture he was phenomenally successful. He was a fine speaker, made an excellent argument on facts, and soon stood high in the profession. He took a leading part in politics, was made register of deeds of his county, went to the legislature, and was nominated for lieutenant governor of the state after its admission into the Union; but, of course, in all his practice he was never quite certain about the law of his cases. This deficiency was made up by dash and brilliancy, and he got along swimmingly.

One day he came to my office and said: "Judgey, I am going to try a suit at Le Sueur to-morrow that involves $2,500. It is the biggest suit we have ever had in the valley, and I think it ought to have some Latin in it, and I want you to furnish me with that ingredient." I said: "Tom, what is it all about? I must know what kind of a suit it is before I can supply the Latin appropriately, and especially as I am not very much up in Latin myself."

He said the suit was on an insurance policy; that he was defending on the ground of misrepresentations made by the insured on the making of the policy, and he must have some Latin to illustrate and strengthen his point.

I mulled over the proposition, looked up some books on maxims, and finally gave him this, "Non haec in federe veni," which I translated to mean, "I did not enter into this contract." He was delighted, and said there ought to be no doubt of success with the aid of this formidable weapon, and made me promise to ride down with him to hear him get it off. So the next day we started, and in crossing the Le Sueur prairie, Cowan was hailed by a man who said he was under arrest for having kicked a man out of his house for insulting his family, and he wanted Tom to defend him. The justice's court was about a mile from the road, in a carpenter shop, the proprietor of which was the justice. Tom told him to demand a jury, and he would stop on his way back and help him out.

When we arrived at Le Sueur we found that the case could not be heard that day, and, starting homeward, about four o'clock we reached the carpenter shop. There we found the jury awaiting us. We hitched the team, and I spread myself comfortably on a pile of shavings to witness the legal encounter. The complaining party proved his case. Cowan put his client on the witness stand, and showed the provocation. Then he addressed the jury. His defense was, want of criminal intent. He dwelt eloquently on the point that the gist of the offense was the intent with which the act was committed, and when it appeared that the act was justified, there could be no crime. Then, casting a quizzical glance at me, he struck a tragic attitude, and thundered out: "Gentlemen of the jury, it is indelibly recorded in all the works of Roman jurisprudence, 'Non haec in federe veni,' which means there can be no crime without criminal intent." The effect was electrical; the jury acquitted the prisoner, and we drove home fully convinced that the law was not an exact science. With what effect Tom utilized his Latin in the insurance suit I have forgotten, or was never advised.

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INDIAN STRATEGY.

In the summer of 1856 I had the celebrated battery commanded by Major T. W. Sherman of the United States Army (better known as the Buena Vista Battery, from the good work it did in the Mexican war) on duty in the Indian country, on account of a great excitement which prevailed among the Indians. The officers of the battery were Major Sherman, First Lieutenant Ayer, and Second Lieutenant Du Barry. Its force of men was about sixty, including noncommissioned officers. I think it had four guns, but of this I am not certain.

One day, after skirmishing about over considerable country, we made a camp on the Yellow Medicine river, near a fine spring, and everything seemed comfortable. The formation of the camp was a square, with the guns and tents inside, and a sort of a picket line on all sides about a hundred yards from the center, on which the sentinels marched day and night. I tented with the major, and seeing that the Indians were allowed to come inside of the picket lines with their guns in their hands, I took the liberty of saying to him that I did not consider such a policy safe, because the Indians could, at a concerted signal, each pick out his man and shoot him down, and then where would the battery be? But the major's answer was, "Oh, we must not show any timidity." So I said no more, but it was just such misplaced confidence that afterwards cost General Canby his life among the Modocs, when he was shot down by Captain Jack. Things went on quietly, until one day a young soldier went down to the spring with his bucket and dipper for water, and an Indian who desired to make a name for himself among his fellows followed him stealthily, and when he was in a stooping posture, filling his bucket, came up behind him, and plunged a long knife into his neck, intending, of course, to kill him; but as luck would have it, the knife struck his collarbone and doubled up, so the Indian could not withdraw it. The shock nearly prostrated the soldier, but he succeeded in reaching camp. The major immediately demanded the surrender of the guilty party, and he was given up by the Indians. I noticed one thing, however; no more Indians were allowed inside the lines with their guns in their hands.

When the prisoner was brought into camp a guard tent was established, and he was confined in it, with ten men to stand guard over him. These men were each armed with the minie rifle which was first introduced into the army, and which was quite an effective weapon.

While all this was going on, we were holding pow-pows every day with the Indians, endeavoring to straighten out and clear up all the vexed questions between us. The manner of holding a council was to select a place on the prairie, plant an American flag in the center, and all hands squat down in a circle around it. Then the speechifying would commence, and last for hours without any satisfactory results. Anyone who has had much experience in Indian councils is aware of the hopelessness of arriving at a termination of the discussion. It very much resembles Turkish diplomacy. But the weather was pleasant, and everybody was patient.

The Indians, however, were concocting plans all this time to effect the escape of the prisoner in the guardhouse. So one day they suggested a certain place for the holding of the council, giving some plausible reason for the change of location, and when the time arrived, everybody assembled, and the ring was formed. Those present consisted of all the traders, Superintendent Cullen, Major Sherman, Lieutenant Ayer,—in fact, all the white men at the agency,—and about one hundred Indians, everyone of whom had a gun in his hands. I had warned the major frequently not to allow an Indian to come into council with a gun, but he deemed it better not to show any timidity, and they were not prohibited. The council on this occasion was held about four hundred yards from the battery camp, and on lower ground, but with no obstruction between them. The scheme of the savages was to spring to their feet on a concerted signal and begin firing their guns all around the council circle, so as to create a great excitement and bring everyone to his feet, and just at this moment the prisoner in the guardhouse was to make a run in the direction of the council, keeping exactly between the guard and the whites in the council ring, believing that the soldiers would not fire for fear of killing their own people. When the time arrived every Indian in the ring jumped to his feet and fired in the air, creating a tremendous fusilade, and as had been expected, the most frightful panic followed, and everyone thinking that a general massacre of the whites had begun, they scattered in all directions. Instantly the prisoner ran for the crowd, and an Indian can sprint like a deer. Contrary to expectations, every one of the ten guards opened fire on him, and seven of them hit him, but curiously not one of the wounds stopped his progress, and he got away; but the bullets went over and among the whites, one ricocheting through the coat of Major Cullen. The prisoner never was caught, but I heard a great deal about him afterwards. His exploit of stabbing the soldier and his almost miraculous escape made him one of the most celebrated medicine men of his band, and he continued to work wonders thenceforth.

After the return of the battery I was informed by my close friends among the Indians that they had sat on the hills overlooking the camp and concocted all kinds of schemes to take it, the principal one of which was to fill bladders with water, and pour them over the touch-holes of the guns, and, as they supposed, render them useless, and then open fire on the men. Fortunately nothing of the kind was tried, but I was convinced that no one can be too cautious when in the country of a savage enemy. A good lesson can be learned from this narrative by the people now occupying the country of the Filipinos.

One pleasing circumstance resulted from the presence of this battery in the Indian country. About thirty years after the occurrences I have been narrating I had occasion to transact some business with the adjutant general of our state at his office in the capitol, and after completing it I was about to retire, when the general said to me: "Judge, you don't seem to remember me." I replied: "General, did I ever have the pleasure of your acquaintance?" "Not exactly," he said, "but don't you remember the time when you had the old Sherman Battery in the field, with its tall first sergeant?" I said: "I recall the event quite clearly, but not the sergeant." He said: "One day, after a long, hot march, I was laying out the camp, and you were sitting on your horse observing the operation, when you noticed me and called me to you, and pulling a flask from your pocket or holster, you asked me to take a drink. That is a long time ago, but I remember it as the best drink I ever had, and I always associate you pleasantly with it." The tall sergeant had matured into a most dignified and charming gentleman, with whom I have ever since enjoyed the most agreeable relations.

The moral of this story is, that when you are in the country of hostile savages, never accept any confidences or take any chances, and when you have more drinks than you can conveniently absorb, divide with your neighbor.

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THE FIRST STATE ELECTION RETURNS FROM PEMBINA.

The State of Wisconsin was admitted into the Union in the year 1848, with the St. Croix river as its western boundary. This arrangement left St. Paul, St. Anthony, Stillwater, Marine, Taylor's Falls and other settlements, which had sprung up in Wisconsin west of the St. Croix, without any government. The inhabitants of these communities immediately sought ways and means to extricate themselves from the dilemma in which they were placed. There were a great many men among them of marked ability and influence—Henry M. Rice, Henry H. Sibley, Morton S. Wilkinson, Henry L. Moss, John McKusick, Joseph R. Brown, Martin McLeod, Wm. R. Marshall and others. Differences of opinion existed as to whether the remnant of Wisconsin on the west side of the St. Croix still remained the Territory of Wisconsin or whether it was a kind of "no man's land," without a government of any kind. Governor Dodge of the territory had been elected to the senate of the United States for the new state. The delegate to congress had resigned, and the government of the territory had been cast upon the secretary, Mr. John Catlin, who became governor ex-officio on the vacancy happening in the office of governor. He lived in Madison, in the new state, and would have to move over the line into the deserted section if he proposed to exercise the functions of his office. A correspondence was opened with him, and he was invited to come to Stillwater, and proclaim the existence of the territory by calling an election for a delegate to congress from Wisconsin Territory. He accepted the call, moved to Stillwater, and in the month of September, 1848, issued his proclamation. An election was held in November following, and Henry H. Sibley was chosen delegate from Wisconsin Territory to the congress of the United States.

Sibley procured the passage of an act, on March 3, 1849, organizing the Territory of Minnesota, and we have had regular elections ever since.

There is a little unwritten history connected with the transaction above related. The principal citizens west of the St. Croix fixed things up among the settlements in a manner entirely satisfactory to themselves. They divided the prospective spoils about as follows: Sibley lived at Mendota, and that place was to have the delegate to congress, St. Paul was to have the capital, Stillwater the penitentiary, and St. Anthony the university, which comprised all there was to divide. The program was faithfully carried out, and has been maintained ever since, although various attempts have been made to violate the treaty by the removal of the capital from St. Paul; but I am glad to be able to say, in behalf of honesty and fair dealing, none of them have been successful.

The existence of this unwritten treaty has been denied, but there are men yet living in the state who took part in it, and have publicly affirmed its authenticity. Judge Douglas of Illinois, when chairman of the senate committee on territories, insisted on placing the capital at Mendota, with the building on the top of Pilot Knob, and had it not been for the stern integrity of Sibley, he would have succeeded, to the everlasting inconvenience and discomfort of our people.

There were really no politics worthy of the name during the years of the territory. All the principal offices were filled by appointment by the general government, and the rest of them determined by personal rivalries. The main business of the territory was the fur trade, carried on by warring companies, whose chief factors sought office more for the sake of its influence on their business than for the principles they represented.

I remember one year the legislature, in a spasm of virtue, passed a prohibitory liquor law, which the supreme court, under the influence of a counter spasm, immediately set aside as unconstitutional. Outside of the cities, where the missionaries exerted a strong influence, the contention was usually whisky or no whisky; in fact, there was very little else to fight about.

The first government was appointed by the Whigs (the Republican party being yet unborn), and as Governor Ramsey was from Pennsylvania, we had a great influx of immigration from that state. The second governor (Gorman) was appointed by the Democrats, and came from Indiana, and the people of that state being much more migratory than the Pennsylvanians, we were flooded with Hoosiers. These various influences caused differences of opinion and interests sufficient to keep the political pot boiling quite lively, but on lines that were necessarily personal and temporary in their bearing. We soon, however, approached the more important subject of statehood, and, strange as it may seem to the present generation, the question of slavery was a strong factor. The Republican party was born about 1854, and as its principal creed was opposition to the extension of slavery, its followers naturally forced the subject into the politics of the day. I can, however, positively affirm that no one of any political faith had the slightest idea of introducing slavery into Minnesota. A constitution for the proposed state was framed in 1857, and in the fall of that year the election for the officers of the first state government was held, and, of course, great interest was manifested as to the result. The general election was fixed by law for November in all of the counties of the territory except one. The county of Pembina was so distant from the capital that it was found to be difficult to get the returns in so as to be counted with those of the rest of the state. The only transportation between the two places was by Red River carts, drawn by oxen in the summer, and by dog trains in the winter; the distance to be travelled was about four hundred miles, and the time necessary to compass it nearly or quite a month. The legislature had, in 1853, in order to remedy this difficulty, and because the population was on its annual buffalo hunt in November, passed an act fixing the time for holding elections in the county of Pembina on the second Tuesday in September in each year, thus giving ample opportunity to get the returns to the authorities in St. Paul in time to be counted with those from the other districts. The result of this was that no one outside of Pembina ever knew how many votes had been polled in that district until long after the rest of the territory had been heard from, and it became a common saying among the Whigs that the Pembina returns were held back until it became known how many votes were necessary to carry the election for the Democrats, and that they were fixed accordingly, which the Democrats denounced as a Whig lie.

About all that was known of Pembina was that it was inhabited by a savage looking race of Chippewa half-breeds, and that Joe Rolette lived there, and Norman W. Kittson went there occasionally. It carried on an immense trade in furs with St. Paul, by means of brigades of Red River carts each summer and by dog trains in the winter, and the more you saw of these people the more you were impressed with their savage appearance and bearing.

The first state election, curious as it may appear, was held in 1857, before the state was admitted into the Union, which latter event was postponed until May 11, 1858, and when the votes from all the counties except Pembina had been returned to the proper officer the result, as far as could be ascertained before the official count was made, was somewhat in doubt, which circumstance naturally excited great interest in the Pembina election, as it was well known that all the votes from that district would be Democratic, so the great question was, "How many?"

While the country was holding its breath in suspense and expectancy, a man in the Indian trade, named Madison Sweetzer, came to me about two o'clock one night, or rather morning, and told me that Nat. Tyson, who was a merchant in St. Paul and an enthusiastic Republican, had just started for the north with a fast team and an outfit that looked as if he contemplated a long journey, and his belief was that he intended to capture Joe Rolette and the Pembina returns. I thought such might be the case, and we immediately began to devise ways and means to circumvent him. We hastened to the house of Henry M. Rice, who knew every trader and half-breed between here and Pembina, and laid our suspicions before him. He diagnosed the case in an instant, and sent us to Norman W. Kittson, who lived in a stone house well up on Jackson street, with instructions to him to send a mounted courier after Tyson, who was to pass him on the road, and either find Rolette or Major Clitheral, who was an Alabama man and one of the United States land officers in the neighborhood of Crow Wing (and, of course, a reliable Democrat), and to deliver a letter to the one first found, putting him on guard against the supposed enemy. I prepared the letter, and Kittson in a few moments had summoned a reliable Chippewa half-breed, mounted him on a fine horse, fully explained his mission, and impressed upon him that he was to reach Clitheral or Rolette ahead of Tyson, if he had to kill a dozen horses in so doing. There is nothing a fine, active young half-breed enjoys so much as an adventure of this kind; a ride of four hundred miles had no terrors for him, and to serve his employer, no matter what the duty or the danger, was his delight. When he was ready to start, Kittson gave him a send-off in about the following words: "Va, va, vite, et ne t'arrette pas, même pour sauver la vie" ("Go; go quick; and don't stop even to save your life"), and giving his horse a vigorous slap, he was off like the wind.

The result was that he passed Tyson before he had gone twenty miles, found Clitheral a day and a half before Tyson reached Crow Wing, if he ever did get there, delivered his letter, and the major immediately started to find Rolette, which he succeeded in doing, took the returns and put them in a belt around his person, and having relieved Joe of all his responsibility, left him to his own devices, which meant painting all the towns red that he visited on his way. We well knew that Joe could no more resist the temptations of civilization than an old sailor returning from a long voyage, and what we apprehended was that he might, while in a too-convivial mood, either lose the returns, or have them stolen from him.

The tone of the letter was so urgent that the major did not know but that half the Republicans in St. Paul might be lying in wait to capture him, so he did not enter the town directly, but went to Fort Snelling, and left the returns with an officer of the army, and then proceeded to St. Paul. When we explained to him that no one but Rice, Kittson, Sweetzer and myself knew anything about the matter, he was relieved, but still cautious. He waited for a few days, and then proposed to a lady to take a ride with him to Fort Snelling. When they started home, he gave her a bundle and asked her to care for it while he drove, which she unsuspectingly did, and that is the way the Pembina returns of Minnesota's first state election reached the capital. It is needless to say how many votes they represented, but only to announce that the election went Democratic.

Whether Tyson had any idea of doing what we suspected him of, I never discovered, but if that was his purpose, he had a long ride for nothing, and as our scheme terminated so successfully, I am willing to acquit him of the charge.

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A FRONTIER STORY WHICH CONTAINS A ROBBERY, TWO DESERTIONS, A CAPTURE AND A SUICIDE.

In 1856 I was United States Indian agent for the Sioux. My agencies were at Redwood, about thirteen miles above Fort Ridgely, and at Yellow Medicine, on a river of that name, emptying into the Minnesota about fifty miles above the fort. Under the treaties with these Indians the government paid them large sums of money and great quantities of goods, semi-annually, at the agencies. Up to a short time before the event which I am about to relate these payments were made by the agent, but, for some reason best known to the government, the making of the payment was turned over to the superintendent of Indian affairs having charge of the tribes. The manner of making these payments before the change was this: I would receive from the superintendent, at St. Paul, the money, in silver and gold (this being long before the days of greenbacks), amounting to a full wagon load, and take it up to the agencies, while the goods would be delivered by the contractors in steamboats, a census of the Indians would be taken, and the money and goods equally divided among them.

After this duty was withdrawn from the agents and imposed upon the superintendents, of course all responsibility for the money and goods was shifted from the former and laid upon the latter, which was to me a great relief, as I had transported many wagon loads of specie from St. Paul to the agencies without guard, and at great personal and financial risk. A payment was due early in July, 1857, and the superintendent had brought the money as far as Fort Ridgely. Arriving at that point, news came of much excitement among the Indians at the agencies, which was not at all unusual, as thousands of savage fellows used to come in from the Missouri river country, and make trouble for our tribes about payment time, and the superintendent decided it was prudent to leave the money at Fort Ridgely until matters quieted down. There was no vault or other safe place in which to deposit the money at the fort, so it was placed in a room occupied by the quartermaster's clerk, a Frenchman, an enlisted man, and he, with another soldier, a German, who was the post baker, were put in charge of it. This Frenchman had been selected from the ranks of Captain Sully's company and made quartermaster's clerk on account of his superior education, his excellent penmanship and his good character. I always have thought he was some unfortunate young gentleman, serving under an assumed name. The money was all in stout wooden mint boxes, holding each $1,000 in silver, and in gold about $25,000 or more, there being usually one or two boxes of gold. The boxes were spread on the floor of the room, and the men slept on them.

The constitutional convention to frame the organic law for the proposed State of Minnesota had been called to convene in St. Paul, on the thirteenth day of July, 1857, and the people of the Minnesota valley had done me the honor to elect me a member of it. I had delayed starting for St. Paul until a day or two before the meeting of the convention, and having heard rumors that there would be trouble in organizing it, I felt very anxious to be there on the opening day. The only mode of transportation, except the river, in those days, was the little canvas-covered stages of Messrs. M. O. Walker & Co., which would hold four inside comfortably, and six on a pinch. When the down stage reached Traverse des Sioux, on the morning of the 11th of July, it was full; that is, there were five inside, three on the back seat, and two on the front, and one man on the seat with the driver. I insisted strenuously on going, and said I would ride in the boot rather than not go at all, my insistence, of course, having reference to my desire to be at the opening of the convention. I was admitted, and took my place on the front seat, with my back to the driver, and my knees interlocked with those of the passenger on the back seat who faced me. At this time I had heard nothing of what had happened at the fort. The fact was that the two men who had been placed in charge of the money had opened one of the boxes of gold, taken out a bag containing $5,000 in quarter eagles, and sealed it up again. When the superintendent sent down for his money, and it was loaded into the wagon, the two soldiers immediately deserted, which, of course, excited the suspicions of the officers. A courier was at once dispatched to the agency to see if the money was all right, and the theft was soon discovered. The superintendent, who was then Major Cullen, had handbills struck off, giving the description of the deserters, and offering $600 for their capture and the return of the money. Couriers were dispatched in all directions to effect their arrest, and one of the handbills reached Henderson, which was the county seat of Sibley county, some twenty miles down the river from the point at which I took the stage. A deputy sheriff of that county had started out to hunt the thieves and secure the reward, carrying one of the handbills with him, and had proceeded up the river as far as Le Sueur, about half way between Traverse des Sioux and Henderson.

It is well to state here that the stages carried the mails, and always stopped at the post towns long enough to deliver the incoming and receive the outgoing mails, which afforded time for a bit of gossip, a drink, and a stretch of the legs. There were two postoffices in Le Sueur, in upper town and lower town, about a mile and a half apart. As soon as the stage stopped at upper town, the deputy sheriff handed me the handbill through the window, announcing the theft and describing the thieves. I read it right in the face of my vis-a-vis, and after congratulating myself that I had no responsibility for the lost money, I remarked to the sheriff: "Of course, you don't expect to find these fellows on the main thoroughfare. They are probably now going down the Missouri in a canoe." Nothing more occurred until we arrived at the lower town postoffice, where we again stopped to change the mails.

Let me here state that the man in front of me was the Frenchman, and the man on the front seat with the driver was the German, the deserting thieves. The Frenchman was slight of build, but the German was a powerful fellow, and had in his hand a double-barrelled shotgun. I, of course, had no idea of their identity at this time; but they, and especially the Frenchman, knew me perfectly well, having frequently seen me about the garrison. They had construed my anxiety to go on the stage into the belief that I knew them, and was after them, and had made my remark to the sheriff as a mere blind connected with some other scheme for their capture. It must have been a trying ordeal for the man in front of me, who was evidently watching my every move, and feeling the weight of his guilt, supposed I knew all about it.

While we were waiting the change of mail at Lower Le Sueur, the deputy sheriff asked me to get out of the stage, and said to me: "Major [I was called major in those days], had we not better take another look at those fellows in the stage? They are going out of the country when everybody is coming in. It looks to me suspicious." I agreed with him, and took another look. I at once discovered that they were both dressed from head to foot in new slop-shop clothes, indicating the necessity for an entire change of costume, and I concluded from this clue there were sufficient grounds to suspect them. So the deputy sheriff said: "You hold the stage ten or fifteen minutes, and I'll go to Henderson, and take out a warrant, and arrest them on the arrival of the stage; so that, if we are mistaken, no particular harm will be done." He started on. I got my hand-bag out of the boot, and buckled on my six-shooter, all of which was seen by the thieves, who must have fully understood the program; at least, such must have been the case with the Frenchman, as subsequent events led me to doubt whether the German was a participant in the theft, or more than a mere deserter. I had a sense of uneasiness about the double-barrelled shotgun carried by the German, but I thought I could handle the other man. We started, and, much to my relief, when we reached the ferry over the river, the German fired one barrel of his gun at a pigeon, and snapped several caps on the other, which refused to go off. As we approached Henderson, quite a crowd had gathered at the hotel to see the arrest, and just as the stage swung up to the sidewalk, the Frenchman took out of his pocket a small penknife, the largest blade of which could not have been over four inches long. He opened it so quietly that it did not excite my apprehensions in the least, although I had my right hand on my six-shooter, intending to draw and cover him the moment the stage stopped. He made a desperate lunge at his breast with the knife, and handing me a carpetbag which lay on his lap, he said, "The money is all in this bag, sir," just as if we had been talking the whole matter over. I, fearing that he might strike at me with the knife, drew my revolver and struck him sharply over the knuckles, making the knife fly out of the window, and seizing him by the throat with my left hand, I covered him with my pistol. The stage stopped. Retaining my hold on him, and still covering him with my pistol, we got out of the stage, on the sidewalk. He wavered for a second, and fell dead. He had put the knife an inch into his heart. I found in a belt on his body, and in the bag $5,320 in gold, which I deposited in the United States land office, at Henderson, subject to the order of Major Cullen, who got it all in good time. The Frenchman had in his pocket some letters from a lady in Strasburg, written in French, conveying some very tender sentiments. I never thought he was a bad man, but had yielded, as many do, to a strong temptation, and had decided to die rather than be captured. It was not more than twenty minutes before we were on our way to St. Paul. As no evidence connected the German with the theft, he was sent back simply as a deserter.

A curious question arose as to the reward. Major Cullen insisted on giving it to me. I knew very well that, had it not been for the superior detective sagacity of the deputy, the thieves would never have been caught, so I refused it, as I would have done under any circumstances. Then the sheriff claimed it, and finally the major left its disposition to me, and I divided it between the sheriff and the deputy, partly because I thought it just, and partly to keep the peace in the sheriff's official family. Where the extra $320 came from, or where it went, I never knew nor cared.

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THE PONY EXPRESS.

As western settlement progressed after the purchase of the Louisiana territory from France in 1803, it gradually extended up the west side of the Mississippi, until the State of Missouri was admitted into the Union, in 1820, which was followed by the States of Iowa and Minnesota, along the line of the Mississippi, and Kansas and Nebraska, on the Missouri. The Mexican War occurred in 1846, and as one of its fruits California was ceded to the United States, and was admitted to the Union in 1850. The territory which now composes the States of Washington, Oregon and Idaho was finally determined to belong to our country by the treaty with Great Britain, which was signed July 17, 1846, fixing the boundary line between us and the British possessions at the forty-ninth parallel of north latitude. These extreme western acquisitions gave us an immense coast line on the Pacific Ocean, leaving a stretch of country between our Pacific and central possessions, on the Missouri, of considerably over two thousand miles in extent, which was uninhabited by whites, and composed the hunting grounds of many savage tribes of Indians and the pasture ranges of countless herds of buffalo. This vast area of country was practically unknown and unexplored, although it had been crossed by the expeditions of Lewis and Clark, in 1805-1806, John Jacob Astor in 1811, Captain Bonneville in 1832, Marcus Whitman in 1836, and John C. Fremont in 1843, to which sources of information may be added the prejudiced reports of the Hudson Bay Company.

When California was ceded to us by Mexico, very little was thought of it as an acquisition to our possessions. It was looked upon as a country out of which a small trade in hides and tallow might grow, but nothing more. I have heard it denounced on the floor of the house of representatives, in Washington, by some of the wisest statesmen of the day, as a bear garden, unfit for the use of civilized man; but prophets usually make bad work of matters about which they know absolutely nothing, which was the case with California in 1848. However, adventurous spirits soon found their way there, as they have always done in Western America, and in 1848 or 1849 gold was found accidentally by Captain Sutter, in digging a mill-race on his ranch, which discovery at once settled the status and fortunes of California. The news soon reached the States, and spread like a prairie fire on a windy day. All the subsequent gold excitements of Frazier river, down to and including the Klondike, have been insignificant in comparison. I was in New York at the time, and used to sit on the East river wharves, and see the ships sailing away for distant California with an insatiable boyish longing to join in the procession.

There was no way of reaching the promised land except by a voyage around Cape Horn or an overland trip from western Missouri across the great American desert, the Rocky and Sierra Nevada ranges of mountains, either of which routes necessitated a weary and dangerous trip of nine months' duration. The usual plan adopted in the East was to form a company of about one hundred or more men, calculate the probable expense to each, and divide it, purchase an old whaling ship, fit her up with bunks and cooking appliances, and get an outfit and sail. Of course, there was nothing involved in the enterprise but the departure, the voyage and the arrival at San Francisco. No steamer had ever crossed the ocean at this time, and all navigation was done in sailing ships. So great was the rush that a scarcity of ships was soon felt. I remember distinctly on one occasion, when an old played-out vessel, purchased by a party which proposed to take out a printing press and start the first newspaper, was seized by the maritime authorities and condemned as unseaworthy just as she was leaving port. The next morning she was gone, and made one of the quickest and most successful voyages of the emigration. It is a curious fact that, out of all the ships that enlisted in this hazardous enterprise, not one was lost or seriously damaged.

The overland route involved more dangers and hardships than the one by sea. Many people died on the way from exhaustion and disease, and many were killed by the Indians, but the emigration never ceased, or even lessened, from these reasons. I have followed the trails made by these emigrants in the Sierra Nevadas, and it seemed almost impossible that animals could have climbed the precipitous mountain slopes they encountered. These hardships, however, did not go unrewarded, because to enjoy the distinction of being a "Forty-niner" was ever afterwards a badge of nobility on the Pacific Coast.

It was not long, under this vast influx of immigration, before California became a well settled state, and its business relations with the rest of the country, or as it was then called, "The States," became very extensive and important, and the difficulty of intercommunication was seriously felt. There were no telegraphs and no railroads, and no way for business men to correspond with each other except across a continent on wheels or around a continent by sea. What was to be done? It did not take the genius of American enterprise long to solve the problem. The overland immigration and its incidents had developed a class of men skilled in horsemanship, Indian fighting, and all the accomplishments that attend the latter, such as courage, wary intelligence, and a peculiar sagacity in trailing and scouting, only learned by intercourse with wild animals and wild men. Such men, for instance, as Col. Wm. Cody, now celebrated as "Buffalo Bill," and Robert Haslam, distinguished as "Pony Bob," are its best representatives. This class of men much resembled the rough riders of to-day, and could be relied upon for any enterprise that involved adventure, courage and endurance. At the same time, the country was not lacking in a higher degree of intellect which could conceive a project that would call into play the utmost ability of this class of men.

California had been, and I think was, in 1860, represented in the senate of the United States by Senator Guin, who was associated with Alexander Majors and Daniel E. Phelps in transportation matters. They conceived the project of reducing the time between the Pacific Coast and the States by the establishment of an express, from St. Joseph, on the Missouri river, to Sacramento in California, a distance of about two thousand miles, which was to carry special business mails, together with light and valuable express matter, by means of ponies, ridden by young men rapidly for short distances, between the two points. Of course, this scheme involved an immense expenditure for stations all along the route, horses and men to ride them, and all other elements that would necessarily enter into the scheme. The matter was discussed fully at both ends of the route, and found many advocates and much opposition. The most experienced plainsmen and mountaineers pronounced it impracticable, on account of the dangers to be met with, and the opinion was expressed that no package risked on this line would ever reach its destination, and that all the riders would be murdered before a test could be made. Sense and experience seemed to uphold these views. It must be remembered that the whole distance was a wilderness of desert and mountain ranges, little known, and infested with the most savage Indian tribes on the continent, the relations of which with the whites were either unsettled or hostile. But, nothing daunted, the projectors decided to carry out their design, win or lose. They purchased six hundred Texas bronchos, built all the necessary stations, employed all the men required to operate and defend them, and secured seventy-five riders from the adventurous men found on the borders. The wages paid the riders were from $125 to $150 a month, with rations, and singular as it may seem to people of to-day, these positions were much sought for. Danger among this class of men has an irresistible fascination, and writing about it recalls an incident which verifies the assertion fully. When I lived in Carson City, Nev., the office of sheriff of Ormsby county, in which Carson was situated, was the most coveted position in the gift of the people, and it was well known that there never was an incumbent of it who had not died in his boots.

The whole arrangement was perfected with western rapidity, and the first pony started from St. Joseph in Missouri on the third day of April, 1860. On the same day and hour the western pony started from Sacramento in California. The distance between the stations was about forty miles, and was ridden in the shortest time possible. Two minutes were allowed for refreshments and change of horses. Each rider carried about ten pounds, and the freight charged for the full distance was five dollars an ounce. The line was maintained successfully for about two years, without any interruption more serious than the occasional killing of a rider by the Indians, when, in June, 1862, the first transcontinental telegraph went into operation, and the pony express, being no longer profitable, yielded, as many other things have since, to the all-conquering invader, electricity.

The first pony carried from the president of the United States a congratulatory message to the governor of California. The best time ever made between the two extreme points was when the last message of President Buchanan reached Sacramento in eight and one-half days from Washington. It seems almost incredible that such time could have been made with animals, when we reflect that the first expedition sent out by Mr. Astor, was eleven months in crossing the continent.

The pony express was a success financially to its projectors, and satisfied the hungering of the people for news from points so distant from each other, and immensely facilitated the transaction of business; but, in my opinion, it was most important in demonstrating that the western American never shrinks from encountering and overcoming obstacles that to most people would seem insurmountable.

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KISSING DAY.

The Sioux Indian is an exceptionally fine specimen of physical manhood. His whole method of life tends to this result. He lives in the open air. He may be said to be born with arms in his hands. From the moment he is old enough to draw a bowstring, he commences warfare on birds and small animals. As he advances to manhood, he becomes familiar with the use of firearms, and extends his warfare to the buffalo and the larger animals. He rides on horseback from infancy, and excels as a daring horseman. He goes on the warpath when half-grown, and learns strategy from the wolf and the panther. He is a meat eater, which diet conduces to the growth of a lean, muscular, athletic frame, and a bold and highly spirited temperament. He is taught to spurn labor of any kind as unmanly, and only fit for women. His life occupation is, in the language of the old school histories and geographies, "hunting, fishing and war," in each and all of which accomplishments he becomes surpassingly expert.

I attribute the superiority of the Sioux over many other tribes to their meat diet and their method of transportation—the horse. This peculiarity has been noticed by travellers and historians for many years. There is an old and true adage which says, "We are what we eat." Washington Irving, in his story of "Astoria," says in regard to this subject:

"The effect of different modes of life upon the human frame and human character is strikingly instanced in the contrast between the hunting Indians of the prairies and the piscatory Indians of the sea coast. The former, continually on horseback, scouring the plains, gaining their food by hardy exercise, and subsisting chiefly on flesh, are generally sinewy, tall, meagre, but well formed and of bold and fierce deportment. The latter, lounging about the river banks, or squatting or curved up in their canoes, are generally low in stature, ill-shaped, with crooked legs, thick ankles, and broad flat feet. They are inferior also in muscular power and activity, and in game qualities and appearance, to their hard-riding brethren of the prairies."

The general habits of the Sioux warrior tend to make him lordly, proud, and somewhat taciturn and morose, although he is not without a strong sense of humor. He is a good husband and indulgent father, but not at all demonstrative in his affections. Very little billing and cooing is noticeable among the nearest relations, and none between lovers. A kiss is regarded more as a ceremony than an endearment.

In the natural and savage state of these people, they counted time by moons and seasons, having no division of years, and, of course, knew nothing of our red letter days of Christmas or New Year's,—but after the advent of the Christian missionaries among them, they were taught to understand the meaning of New Year's day, and to recognize its arrival, and to distinguish it they called it "Kissing Day," everybody being expected to bestow a kiss upon his or her friends in honor of the day.

In 1857 I lived among the Sioux, having them in charge as their agent, appointed by the United States government, and when New Year's day came around, I found myself at the Yellow Medicine Agency, but was ignorant of their peculiar ceremonies for the occasion. I proposed to make the best of my isolation from my kind, and spend the day as pleasantly as circumstances would permit. While debating the subject of what to do, I was informed of the way the Indians celebrated the event, and told that I would probably be called upon by a numerous delegation of squaws, and that it would be expected that I should receive them by the bestowal of some sort of present. Not wishing to be ungallant, and desiring to gain information of the customs and manners of my savage wards, I ordered my baker to prepare several barrels of ginger bread, and purchased many yards of gaily colored calico, which I had cut into proper pieces for women's dresses, and with this outfit, prepared to meet the enemy.

At this point I will say a word about the Sioux girl and woman. As a general thing, the very young girl is by nature pretty and attractive. I have seen many at the age of thirteen and fourteen who had graceful figures, good carriage, and very beautiful faces; but they marry very young, and as soon as married become pack-horses for their husbands, carrying loads on their backs, by means of a head strap across the forehead, that it takes two men to lift from the ground, and very often when thus loaded babies, puppies, and many other things, will be put on top of the pack. They will trudge fifteen or twenty miles a day with this burden, bending forward, and staggering under its weight. The result is to spoil the figure and gait, and deprive them of every semblance of beauty. The awkward walk produced by this hard labor we used to call "The Dakota shamble." Under this treatment they soon look old, and become wrinkled, and are called "Wakonkas," which might be translated to mean old witches.

With this visitation in prospect, I awaited quietly their coming. About ten in the morning they began to assemble about the agency in groups of all sizes and ages. I could hear a great deal of giggling among the girls, and scolding by the elder women. They were apparently selecting someone to break the ice by making the first assault. Presently a venerable dame opened the door, and sidled in like a crab. She approached me and kissed me on both cheeks, and received her presents. Then they followed in a line, old and young, pretty and ugly, each giving me a hearty kiss, which, in some cases, I returned with interest. The ceremony continued with great hilarity and much frolicksome tittering and fun, until forty-eight squaws had kissed and been kissed by me. They all carried off their presents and seemed very happy. Whether it was all caused by the presents or not, I am unable to say, but I was not the grizzled old fellow then that I have since become. I have celebrated a good many New Year's days, both before and since, but none have left a more agreeable impression than the one I have described. I have never known the exact figures of Hobson's Kansas experience, nor can I make a just comparison between the Sioux and the Kansas article, but from the general reputation of that state, I would recommend the caress of the untutored aborigines.

If Hobson ever reads this story he will have to admit that there were others.

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A POLITICAL RUSE.

All people who keep the run of politics will remember that the Republican party, now called the "Grand Old Party" (I suppose on account of its extreme youth), had its birth in the year 1854, after the death of the Whig party, and succeeded to the position in American politics formerly occupied by the Whigs, with a strong tinge of abolition added. It was, of course, largely recruited from the Whigs, but had quite formidable acquisitions from the Free-soil Democrats. It sprang into prominence and power with phenomenal rapidity, coming very near to electing a president in 1856, and succeeding in 1860. Minnesota resisted the attractions of the new party, and remained Democratic until 1857, when the first state election occurred, and the whole Democratic state ticket was elected. Since then the Democrats have never succeeded in our state, unless the election of Governor Lind in 1898 may be called a Democratic victory.

It was very natural that the politicians who had joined the new party should be exceedingly zealous and enthusiastic for its success. Such is usually the case, and verifies the old proverb, that "A converted Turk makes the best Christian." This phase of political tendencies was fully illustrated by the conduct of my old friend, Mr. James W. Lynd of Henderson, more familiarly known by us as "Jim Lynd," which occurred at the election of 1856, and forms the text for the present story.

In the early days of the territory much had been said, and generally believed, about frauds being perpetrated by the Democrats in the elections on the frontier. For instance, it was asserted that, at Pembina and the Indian agencies, one pair of pantaloons would suffice to civilize several hundred Indians, as, by putting them on, and thus adopting the customs and habits of civilization, they would be entitled to vote. There never was much truth about these rumors, and being on the border, and having charge of an Indian agency, where hundreds of men were employed, I knew a good deal about how these matters were conducted, and I can conscientiously say that there never was much truth in them. The nearest approach to a violation of the election laws that I ever discovered was at Pembina, and that was free from any intention of fraud. It would come about in this way: Election day would arrive, the polls would open, and everybody who was at home would vote. It would then occur to some one that Baptiste La Cour or Alexis La Tour had not voted, and the question would be asked, why? It would be discovered that they were out on a buffalo hunt, and the judges would say, "We all know how they would vote if they were here," and they would be put down as voting the Democratic ticket. Of course, this would be a violation of the election laws, but who can say that it was not the expression of an honest intention by a simple people. While I cannot approve such methods in an election where the law and the necessities of civilization require the voter to be present, I cannot avoid the wish that we were all honest enough to make such a course possible as the one adopted by these simple border people.

The Republicans being the "outs" and the Democrats being the "ins," of course all the frauds were charged to the latter, and every movement of either party was watched with zealous scrutiny. The law governing the qualification of voters provided that soldiers enlisted in other states or territories, coming into Minnesota under military orders, did not gain a residence, and citizens of Minnesota enlisting in the army did not lose their residence or right to vote as long as they remained in the territory. It so happened, in 1856 or 1857, that there were at Fort Ridgely a number of recruits who had enlisted in the territory, and had not lost their right to vote; but there was no precinct or place to vote where they could exercise their privilege. Knowing that they were Democrats, we had a polling place established at the "Lone Cottonwood Tree," a point about three miles above Fort Ridgely, for the purpose of saving these votes.

Of course, it soon became known throughout the valley, and my friend Jim Lynd, who resided at Henderson, about fifty miles down the river, conceived the idea that it was the intention to vote the whole garrison for the Democrats, and he determined to checkmate it by challenging every soldier who cast his vote, laboring, as he did, under the erroneous impression that an enlistment in the army disqualified the soldiers as voters. So when the election day arrived, Jim, who had walked all the way from Henderson, was on the ground early, fully determined to exclude all soldiers from voting.

It so happened that I was at my Indian agency, at Redwood, and on the morning of the election was to start for St. Paul. The agency was about ten miles up the river from the "Lone Tree," and, starting early in the morning, brought me to the voting place about the time the polls were opened. I knew everybody in the valley and everybody knew me, and we never passed each other on the road without a stop and a chat. When I arrived at the polls all hands came out to greet me, and after the usual inquiries as to how the election was progressing, the judges told me that Lynd had challenged the first soldier who offered his vote, and they, being in doubt as to the law, had agreed to leave it to me. I gave my version of it, but Lynd still disputed it, and insisted that an enlistment in the army disqualified the man as a voter. Being unable to convince him, I, with a significant wink to the judges, suggested that he should get into my wagon and go down to the post (where I knew the sutler had a copy of the statutes), and we could readily settle the controversy. He consented willingly to this proposition, and we started for the post. When we arrived, I gave my team to the quartermaster's sergeant, and we looked up the law in the sutler's store. I then began a game of billiards with some of the officers, and accepted an invitation to lunch. As noon approached, Lynd began to show signs of impatience, and he asked me when I proposed to take him back to the polls. I quietly informed him that my route lay in the opposite direction, and that I would not go back at all. Instantly it flashed upon him that I had taken him away from the polls for a purpose, and he fled like a scared deer over the road we had just travelled, leaving me to pursue my journey alone in the other direction. I afterwards learned that in the interval between Lynd's departure and return, all the soldiers had voted the Democratic ticket without challenge or obstruction. Whether my friend Lynd walked back to Henderson or not, I never certainly ascertained. I was sufficiently satisfied with the success of my ruse not to desire to inflict any discomfort on my dear enemy.

This was the only political trick I remember of having perpetrated on the enemy during my long participation in active politics, and I don't believe any of my readers will regard it as transgressing the proverb that "all is fair in love or war."

My friend Lynd was, like most of the characters in my frontier experience, killed by the Indians in the outbreak of 1862.

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THE HARDSHIPS OF EARLY LAW PRACTICE.

Prior to 1855 the public lands of Minnesota were unsurveyed, and no title could be acquired to them. About that time, however, four United States land districts were established, with a land office in each of them. The districts were straight tracts of country extending from the Mississippi due west to the Missouri, the exterior lines of which were parallel to each other. The offices were at Brownsville, Winona, Red Wing and Minneapolis. I was then living in Traverse des Sioux, which place, together with Mankato, fell within the Winona district, so that any land business we had in our region of the country compelled a trip to Winona, a distance of nearly three hundred miles by water, or one hundred and fifty by land. After the closing of the rivers by winter there was no other way of getting there except to journey across the country.

At the time I refer to there was little or no settlement between Traverse des Sioux and Winona, and no roads. I remember that there were one or two settlers on the Straight river, where now stands Owatonna, and about the same number on the Zumbro, where now is Rochester, and one house at a point called Utica, about fifty miles west of Winona, and a small settlement at Stockton, on a trout stream which flows through the bluffs a few miles west of Winona. The latter place, being on the Mississippi and easy of access, was quite a flourishing town.

That fall I had been elected to the upper house of the territorial legislature, called the council, and the news reached us that there would be a contested seat in the council from some district in the southern part of the territory, but we had no particulars as to the locality or the person, and gave the matter very little attention.

A controversy had arisen between parties at Mankato as to the right to enter a quarter section of land which was part of the town site, and ultimately became a very valuable part of the city. I represented one side of the fight, but cannot recall the name of my adversary. It was customary in those days to lump matters by making up a party of those who had claims to prove up before the land office, and act as witnesses for each other. On the occasion of this Mankato contest we formed two parties, one from Mankato and one from Traverse, and started with two teams, on wheels, there being no snow, and the first day we reached a point in the woods, somewhere near the present town of Elysian, and there camped. When morning opened on us we found the ground covered with from twelve to fifteen inches of snow, which made it impossible to proceed further with our wagons. We did not hesitate, but accepted the only alternative that presented itself, and decided to foot it to Winona. We travelled light in those days, carrying only some blankets and a change of clothes. We cached our wagons in the timber, packed our animals with our impedimenta, and started. Such a tramp would seem appalling at the present time, but we were all accustomed to hardships, and were equipped with good Red River winter moccasins, two or three stout flannel shirts, and thought very little of the undertaking. We drove the horses ahead of us to aid in making a trail, and made pretty good progress. I think it took us about five days to accomplish the journey, which we did without suffering, or even being seriously incommoded, as we found shelter at the Straight river, the Zumbro, Utica, and Stockton.

An amusing and interesting incident happened the night we arrived at Utica which, as I have said, consisted of one small log house. Our march that day had been a long and tiresome one, and I felt as if a good drink of whisky would be very supporting and acceptable, our supplies in that line having become exhausted by reason of the unexpected length of time consumed in our journey; but the prospect of getting one was anything but promising. While revolving the subject in my mind, and having all my faculties concentrated on the much desired end, I, by some accident, learned that the proprietor of the shanty was a doctor. At this discovery my hopes went up several degrees, and I determined to test his medicine chest. Putting on a look of utter exhaustion, with both my hands on my abdomen, and assuming the most plaintive voice I could muster, I said: "Doctor, I have made a long march to-day, and feel utterly broken up; have you not some spirits in your medicine chest that you could prescribe for me? I am sure it would be a great relief." He looked me over with suspicion, and said: "No, I am an herb doctor." I felt that my fate was sealed for the night, and prepared to seek my couch on the softest plank I could find, between the two men who looked the warmest of the party. While thus preparing my toilette de nuit, in a state of mind bordering on desperation, I heard the jingling of sleigh-bells, and a team dash up to the door, from which debarked two men, each comfortably full, followed by hand-bags, blankets and a two-gallon demijohn. They said they had driven from Winona that day, and would stay all night. They ordered supper, and while it was in course of preparation, indulged in a good deal of banter back and forth. Of course, I had formed the determination of becoming acquainted with the contents of that demijohn in some way, by fair means or foul, and became deeply interested in their conversation, looking for a favorable chance to carry my point. I noticed that one of them was very boastful about what he was going to do when the legislature met, and the other saying to him that "he would not be there three days before they would kick him out and send him home." At these words, it flashed across my mind that this must be the man whose seat was contested, and, waiting for a proper opportunity, when his friend was loudest in his assertions that he would not remain long in the legislature, I put in my oar, and said: "Maybe I will have something to say about that." In an instant the legislator gave me a most scrutinizing look, and said: "Are you in the legislature?" I said "Yes." "In which house?" he inquired. "In the council," I answered. I saw the man was bright and intelligent, and it was a study to watch the workings of his mind while debating to himself how I would be affected by his condition, whether favorably or otherwise. Having weighed the matter carefully, he showed his experience and good judgment of character by saying: "My friend, won't you take a drink?" From what I have said, it is unnecessary to record my answer. We spent the greater part of the night in pleasant social intercourse, drawing inspiration from the depths of the demijohn, which had seemed so far removed from my grasp but a short time before.

The man was the famous Bill Lowry, from the Rochester district. This incident made us sworn friends for life, and singular as it may seem, when the legislature convened, I found myself chairman of the committee on contested elections in the council. It is unnecessary to go into the details of the contest. Suffice it to say that the contestant had a very weak case, and Lowry performed all he had boasted that he would do on that eventful night in Utica.

We were engaged in trying our suit at Winona for several days. Captain Upman was the register of the land office, and presided at the trial. The captain was a jolly old German from Milwaukee, and a fairly good drinker. There was a building in the town which had been a church, but by the intervention of the evil one, had been turned into a saloon, and was popularly known as "The Church." This was the captain's favorite resort when thirsty, which physical condition occurred quite frequently, and he would always say on such occasions: "The bells are ringing; come, boys, we must go to church. It is unlawful to try cases on Sunday."

What influences dominated, I don't pretend to say, but I won for my client three forties of the quarter section in dispute. We returned home the way we went down,—on foot,—with the exception that at Stockton we constructed a small sleigh, sufficient to carry our baggage, which much relieved the animals. My client offered me one of the forty-acre tracts for my fee, but I declined, and accepted a twenty dollar gold piece for my services. The land which I refused became worth a quarter of a million of dollars a few years afterwards, but I had a good deal of fun out of the adventure, and never regretted the outcome.

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TEMPERANCE AT TRAVERSE.

The first members of the judiciary of the Territory of Minnesota were Aaron Goodrich, chief justice; Bradley B. Meeker and David Cooper, associates, who were appointed in 1849. They were Whigs, and held their positions until a change of administration gave the Democrats the power, when William H. Welch became chief justice, with Andrew G. Chatfield and Moses Sherburne as associates. The last named judges were in office when I arrived in the territory, in 1853. Judge Chatfield presided mostly over the courts held on the west side of the Mississippi. I made my residence at Traverse des Sioux, in Nicollet county, which was within the territory purchased from the Sioux Indians by the treaty of 1851, proclaimed in 1853. The fifth article of this treaty kept in force, within the territory ceded, all the laws of the United States prohibiting the introduction and sale of spirituous liquors in the Indian country, commonly known as the trade and intercourse laws. Of course, this inhibition was intended to prevent liquor getting to the Indians, but as the country began to be inhabited by whites, many of the new comers regarded it as infringing upon their rights and privileges, and serious questions arose as to whether the treaty-making power had any jurisdiction of such questions after the country was opened to white settlement. The courts, however, held the exclusion valid, and indictments were occasionally found against the violators of these laws. Traverse des Sioux was a missionary center, and the feeling against the liquor traffic was very strong, but, as it always has been, and probably always will be, men were found ready to invade the sacred precincts for the expected profits, and a saloon or two were established in defiance of law and public sentiment.

The judges were empowered to appoint the terms of court where and when there was any probable necessity for them, and the sheriff would summon a grand or petit jury as the business seemed to require. The United States marshal was Colonel Irwin, and the United States district attorney was Colonel Dustin, both of whom lived in St. Paul, and, as a general thing, there were no county attorneys in the different counties. When a term of court was to be held in my county, or any of the adjacent ones, the marshal would send me a deputation to represent him, and a bag of gold to pay the jurors and witnesses; the United States attorney would empower me to appear for him, and on the opening of the court, the judge would enter an order appointing me prosecuting attorney for the county so the judge and I would constitute the entire force, federal and territorial, judicial and administrative. If I procured an indictment against a party at one term, in my capacity of prosecutor, and the regular attorney should appear at the next term, it was more than likely that I would be retained to defend; which would look a little irregular at the present time, but as there was no other attorney but me, as a usual thing, no questions were asked.

At a very early day, a party not having the fear of the law or public opinion before him opened a saloon at Traverse des Sioux, much to the dismay and indignation of the religious element of the community, and went to selling whisky to the other element. The next grand jury indicted him, but, before a court convened that could try him, a squad composed of the temperance people headed by the sheriff, attacked his place, and demolished his contraband stores. Being determined to test the question of his rights, he sued the attacking party, and I was retained to defend them. I devised the plea that the country was full of savage Indians, whose passions became inflamed by whisky, which made them dangerous to the lives of the whites, and that saloons were consequently a nuisance which anyone had a right to abate. The case was tried before Judge Chatfield, and my clients were vindicated. Of course, the suit created a great sensation, not only on account of the feeling engendered, but because of the novel questions involved, and in due course of time the temperance ladies of the county sent to New York and purchased a handsome combination gold pen and pencil, with a jewelled head, and had it inscribed, "Charles E. Flandrau: Defender of the Right." They also procured a handsome family Bible for the sheriff. When all was ready, they held a public meeting, and made the presentations, which were accompanied by the usual speeches. These ceremonies occurred in the latter part of the year 1854, or early in 1855, and in the meantime a small newspaper, called the St. Peter Courier, had been established to boom the city, which contained an elaborate account of the proceedings, together with all the speeches, and diligently circulated them throughout the East, where they were caught up by Horace Greely, in his Tribune, and many other papers, and repeated under the head of "Moral Suasion in Minnesota," and came back to us enlarged and improved.

Should I end the story here, it would leave me in the possession and enjoyment of virtues which I cannot conscientiously claim as my own, and would deprive the tale of its best and only amusing point; so as a faithful narrator, I feel in duty bound to tell the other side of it.

In due course of events the trial of the indictment against the saloonkeeper came on to be heard, and I was acting as prosecuting attorney. Of course, I had to prove that the prisoner had introduced liquor into the Indian country, and, to do so, I called a French half-breed who I knew frequented the place, and after the preliminary questions, this examination followed:

"Q. Joe, were you ever in this saloon?

"A. Yes, many a time.

"Q. Did you ever buy and drink any liquor in there?

"A. Yes, many a time.

"Q. Did you see anyone else buy and drink liquor in there?

"A. Yes, many a time.

"Q. Who was it?

"A. I have seen you do it lots of times."

Of course, the laugh was heavily against me, but I sat, as stoical as an Indian, and quietly asked him: "Anyone else, Joe?"

I have forgotten whether the suit terminated in conviction or acquittal, but I never think of it without a good laugh at the way the witness turned the tables on me, and am also reminded of what my old friend, Van Lowry, from the Winnebago country, once said of me: "That Flandrau is one of the most singular men I ever knew. He invariably makes a temperance speech over his whisky."

The gold pen with the jewelled head reposes among my frontier treasures, carefully wrapped up in several editorials cut from eastern papers, extolling my virtues as an apostle of temperance.

Moral: Don't believe everything you read in the papers.

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WIN-NE-MUC-CA'S GOLD MINE.

Every one who has lived in a mining country in its early periods, before its resources had been prospected and pretty well defined, will recall the fact that stories and rumors of a mysterious mine of great richness, which exists somewhere, are always in circulation. The discoverer of this mine is either dead, without having revealed its exact location, or it is known only to the Indians, who are compelled to secrecy by awful oaths, or fear of death from their chief or members of their band. At any rate, there is always a profound mystery connected with the hidden treasure, that envelops it with a tinge of romance and a spice of danger to those who seek to break the spell and lift the veil. There is also just enough known about it, which has leaked out through some obscure channel, to lend some slight probability to the story, and many have been the attempts to discover the bonanza by credulous and adventurous miners, but ever without success.

When I was living in Nevada, in 1864, I became closely associated with an old Mormon by the name of Rose. He had been a settler in the Washoe valley long before the discovery of the rich silver mines at Virginia City, known as the Comstock lode, and necessarily at a time when no one inhabited the country but Mormons and Indians. The principal tribe of Indians were the Piutes, whose head chief was Win-ne-muc-ca. These Indians inhabited the country around Pyramid lake, about a hundred miles to the northeast of Carson City, where I resided. Rose was known to have been an intimate friend of Win-ne-muc-ca in times past, and to have performed some important service for him, which had placed the chief under lasting obligations to him, and rumor said that in compensation he had disclosed to Rose the whereabouts of the most valuable gold mine on all the Pacific Coast, and that Rose was the only white man who knew anything about it. The truth of these rumors was fortified by the existence of three old and abandoned arrastras and a twenty-five foot overshot waterwheel, which had evidently been erected to drive the arrastras, that stood on one of the back streets of Carson City, and were known to have been constructed by Rose, and as there was no stream in the neighborhood to propel the arrastras, it was generally believed that, when Rose built these works, he had a mine, the ore of which was so rich that he could bring it on pack animals, crush it with these machines, and divert a stream to propel them. As quite a large sum had been expended on these works, it was evident that they were intended to carry out some such purpose, which had been interrupted for sufficient reasons. At any rate, I caught the mine fever, and after many conferences with Rose, I and my associates, William S. Chapman and Judge Atwater, got far enough into his confidence to obtain an admission from him that he knew the exact location of the mysterious mine, the secret of which he had learned from Win-ne-muc-ca, and dare not disclose without the consent of that chieftain, but he assured us that it was fabulously rich. It was then learned that the mine was within the limits of the Piute reservation, and even if we had the consent of the Indians to work it, we would not be allowed to do so by the United States government. Here were presented two formidable obstacles, but we were so well satisfied that we had a fortune within call that we determined to remove them both.

Our first operations were upon Win-ne-muc-ca, whom we proposed to conquer by presents and flattery, and succeeded to the extent of eliciting from him a promise that, if we could obtain permission from the United States government to enter upon the reservation and work the mine, he would disclose its whereabouts. All I can say about this branch of the case is, that with a great deal of delicate and masterly diplomacy, in which the interests of the Indians formed the principal argument used, we secured the desired permission, and prepared for an expedition to the mine.

It is as well here to say, for the benefit of the uninitiated, that all such operations are conducted with the greatest secrecy and mystery, because should it be discovered that any such enterprise was on foot its projectors would be watched day and night, and followed to their destination by half the community.

The government sent out a representative to see that the interests of the Indians were properly protected, and we got ready to start. The agent of the government was also charged to look up and report upon the progress of a mill for the Piutes, for which large appropriations had been made, and which was supposed to be situated on the rapids of the Truckey river, which is the outlet of Lake Tahoe, and runs about northeast in the direction of the Piute reservation, along the course to be followed by us. I mention this fact only in order to bring into the story the terse and witty report of the agent, said to have been made about his discoveries regarding the mill. He said: "He found a dam by a mill site, but he didn't find any mill by a damn sight."

Our outfit consisted of a light farm wagon with a four mule team, which we procured from two Mormon brothers, who lived in the Washoe valley, and were skilled guides all over Nevada, both of whom we took along as guides, cooks, and to drive and care for the team. Rose took along a pony, which we led, and the government agent, old Rose and myself formed the passenger list. We were supplied with eatables and drinkables for a long campaign, but as it rains but once a year in that country, we never encumbered ourselves on a march with tents, except in the rainy season. In fact, the ground between the sage bushes and grease-wood trees is so dry and clean that you don't need even blankets or robes to sleep on, but they are usually carried.

Our course lay down the valley of the Truckey river to its big bend, where Rose was to leave us and go to Pyramid lake for Win-ne-muc-ca. We accomplished this part of the journey, a distance of about one hundred miles, in three days, without any special incident, except on one occasion, when we were rounding a projecting point in the river, on a ledge of rocks, some driftwood got entangled with the legs of our leading mules, and came very near dumping us all into the boiling and rushing current, which would inevitably have drowned the whole party; but we reached our destination safely. At the big bend, which is now one of the principal stations on the Central Pacific Railroad, we found a spacious piece of bottom land, well supplied with grass for our animals, and a clump of six tall stately cottonwood trees, presenting an inviting place to camp, which we accepted as our resting place.

The next morning Rose mounted his pony and started for the lake, saying he would return in a couple of days with the chief, who would guide us to the mine—and fortune. The government agent was an old friend of mine, a California forty-niner, and a most companionable fellow. The Mormons were excellent cooks, and most efficient camp men. We had abundant camp supplies, supplemented with fine fish brought to us by the Indians, so we settled down for a delightful rest. Every night the men would make a cheerful crackling fire of dry driftwood from the river, hobble the mules, and fall asleep for the night, leaving us to enjoy the soft summer air and brilliant moonlight, while discussing our future plans when possessed of the boundless wealth that only awaited the coming of Rose and the chief. Before retiring for the night, which only meant lying down on a blanket, we usually reclined each against a tree, with a demijohn between us, and by the time sleep overcame us the fortunes of Cr[oe]sus, Astor and Vanderbilt combined were mere trifles compared with our anticipated wealth, for were we not to be soon endowed with the magic touch of Midas!

We revelled in our repose, seasoned with the exaltation of hope and the demijohn, until about four days had glided away, when even such delights began to pall, and became a little monotonous, and still no Rose and no Win-ne-muc-ca. The fifth, and even the sixth day passed, and yet they came not, and we were driven to the conclusion that either Rose had been victimized by the Piutes, or we had been victimized by Rose. So nothing was left for us but to pull up stakes and wend our weary way back to Carson. Here we found Rose, with the excuse that Win-ne-muc-ca had told him that he dared not give up the secret of the mine for fear his band would kill both Rose and himself, and that he had not dared to return to the camp for fear the Indians would follow him and destroy us all. And so ended our venture.

We came out of the enterprise wiser and poorer men, to the amount of about one thousand dollars. As we had left town at midnight, and returned at the same quiet hour, we were able to keep our adventure to ourselves, and escape the ridicule of more experienced miners, many of whom, however, had passed through similar experiences under varying circumstances.

I have never been able fully to satisfy myself whether Rose acted in good faith or not, but as he had no hope of gain outside of the mine I am inclined to believe his story.

My next mining experience resulted much the same way. Rich finds were reported in the Walker river country, and a small syndicate of us outfitted a party of old and experienced miners to visit the locality and see what they could pick up. They started in the usual mysterious manner, at the dead of night, and in about two weeks returned, and brought to my office a gunny bag full of ore, which they left, and we appointed a meeting the next night at one o'clock, when the town was supposed to be asleep, to examine the bag and pass upon the contents. One of the prospectors tapped the sack affectionately, and, winking at me in the most significant manner, said: "Judge, we've got the world by the tail. It's all pure silver, and there are a million tons of it lying on the top of the ground." Of course, my curiosity and expectations were aroused to the highest pitch, and I awaited the appointed hour with impatience. Before the party arrived, all the windows were darkened with sheets and blankets, refreshments were prepared, and they dropped in one at a time to avoid notice. The bag was opened and its contents displayed upon the table. It was a pure white and brilliant metal, about the weight of silver, and with the assistance of the refreshments we had convinced ourselves before daylight that it was all pure silver.

I took a chunk of it about the size of an orange, and, with one of the miners, went down to the Mexican mill, to have it assayed. The assayer took it, looked it over, and asked if we wanted it assayed for iron. My companion immediately answered, "I'll bet you a thousand dollars there's no iron in it." The assayer replied: "We don't bet on such things, but I will soon tell you all about it," and, after putting it to the test, he reported: "Magnetic iron, ninety-five per cent; no trace of gold or silver."

We let the world's tail go, put our own between our legs, and went home, two of the worst disappointed men in all Nevada, and that was the last of my mining efforts.

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A UNIQUE POLITICAL CAREER.

Gen. James Shields had a most extraordinary career. I remember no man in the history of our country who equals him in the diversity and extent of his public services and office-holding. He was a general in the Mexican War, and for a long time enjoyed the unique reputation of being the only man who was ever shot through the lungs and survived. This, however, was not true. Many others, no doubt, underwent the same experience, and I remember a young Chippewa Indian who, while on a war party into the Sioux country, was wounded in exactly the same manner, and lived to a good old age as a very robust savage.

When the general returned from the Mexican War to Illinois, he was exceedingly popular. He was made commissioner of the general land office of the United States and judge of the supreme court of the State of Illinois, and was subsequently elected to the senate of the United States; but when he was about to take his seat he ran up against the snag that is found in section 3 of article I of the constitution of the United States, which provides that a senator must have been a citizen of the United States for nine years before election, and it appeared that the general fell short of the requisite period. The consequence was that he was rejected, and he had to return to his state. But the citizens of Illinois wanted him to represent them in the senate, and as soon as he attained the proper citizenship they returned him, and he was admitted and served his full term. The general found out that his chances for reelection were not flattering, and as Minnesota was about applying for admission as a state in the Union, he decided to emigrate to that territory. What his motives were I, of course, cannot say, but as I was watching closely political events, I concluded that he had in view an election to the senate from the new State of Minnesota, and I kept my eye on his movements.

It was soon announced that the general had located the land warrant awarded to him for his services in the Mexican War, on a quarter section of land in the neighborhood of Faribault, in Rice county, in this territory, and that he intended to settle upon it. There was a little buncombe added to this announcement, to the effect that this was the first case in the history of America where a general officer had settled in person upon the land donated to him as a reward for the services he had rendered and the blood he had shed for his adopted country. We always called the general's home "The blood-bought farm."

There was an election in our territory in 1856 or 1857, I forget which, for delegate to Congress. Henry M. Rice had received the nomination of the regular Democratic convention for the position, and General Gorman (then territorial governor), Henry H. Sibley and many other leading Democrats had deliberately bolted the judgment of the convention, and nominated David Olmsted for delegate. The fight was on hot. I, of course, was for Rice, the regular nominee. I then lived well up in the Minnesota valley, at Traverse des Sioux, and we were becoming a power in the territory in a political sense, and I looked forward to the arrival of such a prominent Democrat as General Shields in our midst as an event of major political importance. He soon landed at Hastings, on the Mississippi, with a complete outfit for a permanent settlement. A good story is told of his advent at Hastings. In those days of steamboating, all the belongings of an immigrant would be landed on the levee and his freight bill would be presented to him by what we called the mud clerk, and he would take an account of his stock and pay the freight. Legend reports that the general had five barrels of whisky among his paraphernalia, and when the first one was rolled ashore he seated himself upon it to watch the debarkation, and when the bill was presented he refused to pay it because he could see only four barrels, and demanded the fifth. The clerks got on to the joke, and pretended to search for the missing barrel until the last whistle blew, when they suggested to the general that he was occupying the disturbing element. Whether the contents of the barrel ever caused any other misunderstandings history fails to record.

As soon as the general was comfortably settled on the blood-bought farm I dispatched a courier across the country to him, informing him of the political situation, and imploring him to come out for the regular Democratic ticket; but he replied in a very diplomatic way that he was too new a comer to take any active part in the election, and declined. Tom Cowan, George Magruder and I, a trio which composed the leadership of the Democracy of the Minnesota valley, decided that the general should never go to the senate if we could prevent it, and it so happened that when the first legislature of the state assembled Tom Cowan was in the senate, but all our efforts to beat him failed, and Henry M. Rice and the general were elected to the United States Senate. It was hard to beat a man in those days who was a Democrat, an Irishman and a wounded soldier.

The only unlucky thing that the general ever encountered was the fact that he drew the short term when the lots were cast for the positions the new senators were to assume.

The general served out his term in the senate just about the time the Civil War broke out, and he tendered his services to the country, and became a general of volunteers. He was wounded in some battle, and I remember reading a general order announcing that he had sufficiently recovered to ride at the head of his brigade in a buggy. I took advantage of this singular position for a military commander, and impressed into the service of the state a splendid $2,000 team of trotters belonging to Harry Lamberton, with his buggy, and himself as driver, and rode comfortably in it until the end of the Indian war, at the head of my brigade.

The general was not long in discovering that the political wind had taken a Republican direction in Minnesota, which boded him no good. So he pulled up stakes and emigrated to Texas. There he felt the public pulse, and not finding any immediate indications that he would be chosen senator, and not having any pressing business in any other line, he emigrated to California. There he found a more favorable outlook, and almost as soon as he gained a residence in the state he was nominated for the United States Senate by the Democrats, and came within one or two votes of an election.

The general had always been a bachelor before going to California, but he surrendered to the charms of a lady of that state, and married. Not being willing to remain until the next senatorial election, he migrated to the State of Missouri, where he was very soon elected to congress by a substantial majority of about 3,000; but, it being in the reconstruction period, and he being a Democrat, the state board found no difficulty in counting him out, after which event very little was heard of the general for some years, when he appeared on the lecture platform, discoursing on Mexico. This venture was not much of a success, and the general was reputed to be quite broken up financially.

His next appearance was at Washington as a candidate for doorkeeper of the senate, which office, I believe, is one of both dignity and profit; but he did not succeed in getting it, and returned to Missouri, broken in fortune and spirit. It was just at this critical period in his career that his luck returned, and he became famous in a direction that no other man in the United States has ever reached. A vacancy occurred in the office of United States senator from Missouri, either by death or some other reason, and the governor bestowed the position upon the general, thus making him a member of the body of which he had so recently sought to become the doorkeeper, and conferring upon him the peculiar and conspicuous distinction of being the only man in the republic who ever represented three states in the senate of the United States.

The general died some years ago, and the state of his original adoption, Illinois, conferred the additional immortal honor upon his memory by placing his full-length statue in bronze in the old house of representatives at the capitol in Washington, which has become the American Pantheon, in which each state is permitted to commemorate in this way two of its most honored sons.

Truly a most extraordinary and enviable career.

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LA CROSSE.

There is nothing remarkable in the fact that places should be named for something that has happened in or about their locality, and nothing is more natural than that places on the upper Mississippi river should be named after Indians and Indian occurrences. For instance, we have Prairie du Chien, which is the French for the Dog prairie. In early days an Indian chief, who sailed under the dignified name of "The Dog," had his headquarters at this prairie, and thus the name. It will be observed that it has maintained its name in full, "Prairie du Chien," and was, in days past, a military post, called Fort Crawford, and is now quite an important town in Wisconsin.

A little way up the river, and we have "Prairie La Crosse," but the first part of the name is generally dropped now, and it is known as La Crosse simply. No old settler, however, who dates back of the fifties, ever calls it anything but "Prairie La Crosse." This place got its name from the fact that the Indians selected it as a favorite point at which to play their game, known to them as "Ta-kap-si-ka-pi," but called by the French, "La Crosse." Anyone who has been there, and is familiar with the prairie on which the city of La Crosse is built, will recognize at once its superior advantages for a game of ball of any kind. It is long, wide and level. This game has always been a great favorite with the Sioux Indians. It originated with them, and became what might be called their national game. From its spirited character, it was very much liked by the Canadian-French, and they adopted it to such an extent that it is called their national game, but under an entirely different name. They called it "La Crosse," and are still devoted to it. In fact, it is played very generally throughout the northern half of North America. In playing the game, the Indians used a stick made of ash about the length of a walking cane with a circular bend at the end most distant from the hand, in which curve was a network of buckskin strings, forming a pocket, about four inches in diameter and two inches deep. With this stick, which is called a "Ta-ki-cap-si-cha," the ball is manipulated. The ball is of wood, round, and about the size of a hen's egg, and in the game must never be touched by the hand. The Canadians have changed the form of stick used by them, by making it longer, and forming the end that takes the ball something like half of a tennis racquette.

The site of La Crosse was in early years the favorite ball ground of the Indians, and from this circumstance acquired its present name. The game is too well known to need a description. Suffice it to say that the main object is to get the ball to certain goals by two contending parties struggling in different directions. In its main features it resembles hockey, polo, football, and similar games; but with the Indians differs in point of the numbers who play, the whites being limited to eleven or twelve on a side, while with the Indians a whole band may play on each side.

When the Sioux were moved west of the Mississippi they selected the beautiful prairie on which now stands St. Peter, in this state, as one of their most favored ball grounds, and many a time I have enjoyed witnessing the game at that locality, and a most brilliant and exciting scene it presented. The Sioux, like most savages, are great gamblers, and the first thing in the game is to put up the stakes, which is done in this way: A committee is appointed by each contesting party as stakeholders. They assemble at a designated point on the prairie, and await results. Presently up will come an Indian, and put up a pony. He will soon be followed by a competitor, who will cover his pony with another, decided to be of the same value. Then up will come another, and put up a rifle, or a feather head-dress or a knife, all which will be matched from the other side, until all the bets are made. If the players are numerous, the stakes will accumulate until almost everything known as property in Indian life will be ventured. It sometimes takes several days to arrange these preliminaries. A pleasant afternoon is selected, and the contestants appear. They are usually very nearly naked, having on only moccasins, a breech-clout and a head-dress; the two latter articles, being susceptible of ornamentation, are usually adorned with eagle feathers, foxtails, or a string of sleigh-bells about the player's waist. The men are painted in the most grotesque and fantastic manner. It is not unusual to see some of them painted blue or yellow all over their persons, and before the paint has dried it is streaked with their fingers in zig-zag fashion from head to foot, sometimes up and down and sometimes zebra fashion. A yellow face with the imprint of a black or blue open hand diagonally upon it is much affected; in fact, the greater the ingenuity displayed in savage design and glaring colors, the more satisfied the subject seems to be with himself and the more admired by others.

When the players are all lined up they present a striking appearance. About six on each side take the center from which the ball is to be started, and the rest scatter themselves over the prairie for half a mile in each direction, to speed the ball, should it come their way.

All ready: one, two, three, and up goes the ball into the air, and as it falls, up goes each Ta-ki-cap-si-cha in an endeavor to catch it, and so skillful are the men that it is very often caught in the little pocket while in the air, which is a great advantage, as the party catching it has the right if he can to throw it in the direction of his friends, and, with a free chance, it is like throwing a ball out of a sling. I have seen one sent nearly a quarter of a mile. If the game opens in this way, there is, of course, a great rush by the partisans to capture the ball and keep it moving one way or the other; but if at the first toss up it falls to the ground, there is a tussle of all the middle men to see which one shall get it with his stick that puts civilized football in the shade. Shins are whacked, men are tripped and piled onto each other in the utmost confusion, until some lucky fellow extricates the ball from the mass, and sends it flying towards a group of his friends. The Sioux are splendid runners, and sometimes when twenty or thirty of them will be in full chase of the ball, a leading man will tumble, and the whole line will pile over him; but no matter how rough or boisterous the sport may be, I have never known a quarrel to grow out of it. There must be rules to this effect governing the game, such as they have in a Japanese wrestling match, where the parties, before tackling each other, sprinkle salt between them, which is a pledge that even a broken neck will not interrupt friendship. I think I have seen more feats of wonderful skill in running, jumping and catching in a game of this kind than in any play of a similar nature I have ever witnessed.

No one who has seen the Indians play a good game of Ta-kap-si-ka-pi has ever forgotten it. Major Eastman of the old army, who was quite an artist, attempted to depict the scene on canvas, and while he made an excellent picture which would please the eye of anyone who had not seen the real thing, he found it impossible to convey an adequate idea of its best points. The picture, I think, is now either in the rooms of the Wisconsin Historical Society, or in the Cochran gallery of Washington.

One of the noticeable results of a game of this kind, played on a virgin prairie, was the great number of huge snakes the players would kill. I have seen as many as would load a wagon piled up after a game, some of them ten or twelve feet long. They were called in those days bull snakes, and were considered of the constrictor species, but not venomous.

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MAKING A POSTOFFICE.

I had settled on the frontier, where Traverse des Sioux and Mankato were the extreme border towns in southwestern Minnesota. About the year 1854 or 1855 a German settlement was commenced at New Ulm. It originated in Cincinnati, with an association which sent out parties to find a site for a town, and they selected the present site of New Ulm. The lands had not been surveyed by the general government, but our delegate in congress, Henry M. Rice, had anticipated that by obtaining the passage of the law allowing settlement and preëmption on unsurveyed lands. Under the law a town site could only embrace 320 acres, but the projectors of New Ulm laid out an immense tract, comprising thousands of acres. Many of the settlers had not taken any steps toward becoming American citizens, which was a necessary preliminary to preëmption, and everything among them was held in a kind of common interest, the Cincinnati society furnishing the funds.

It was not long before they discovered that they needed legal advice in their venture, and called on me to regulate their matters for them. I was deputy clerk of the court, and always carried the seal and naturalization papers with me, so that I could take the declaration of intention of anyone who desired to become an American citizen anywhere I happened to find him, on the prairie or elsewhere. In this way I qualified many of the Germans for preëmption, and took them by the steamboat load down to Winona to enter their lands. I would be furnished with a large bag of gold to pay for the lands, and sometimes, with the special conveniences furnished by the land office, I would work off forty or fifty preëmptions in a day. I became such a necessary factor in the building of the town that, if any difficulty occurred, even in the running of a mill which they erected and ran by the accumulated water of many large springs, I was immediately sent for to remedy the evil.

The nearest postoffice was at Fort Ridgely, about sixteen miles away, and it soon became apparent that one ought to be established in the town. I was, of course, sent for to see if it could be accomplished. It was a very easy thing to do with the very efficient and influential delegate we had in congress, Hon. Henry M. Rice. Having agreed upon a Mr. Anton Kouse as postmaster, I at once wrote to Mr. Rice to give the new settlement a postoffice. It was not long before I received an answer, which contained the postmaster's commission, his bond for execution, a key for the mail bags, and all the requisites for a going postoffice.

The New Ulm people were a very social lot, and my visits to the town always included a good deal of fun, so I concluded to make a special event of the establishment of the new postoffice, and, as the weather was fine, I invited half a dozen friends to accompany me in a drive to New Ulm, to participate in the opening ceremonies.

One of the earliest settlers in the town was Francis Baasen, who became Minnesota's first secretary of state, and was a gallant officer in the First Minnesota Regiment, so celebrated in the War of the Rebellion, and has recently been appointed by Governor Lind as assistant adjutant general of the state. He had a claim about two miles below the town, just where the ferry crossed the Minnesota river, at Red Stone, and had erected a log shanty there, in which he lived. Of course, we always called on Baasen on our way up, and also on our way back, when we visited New Ulm. Baasen was a charming gentleman, and while his shack was destitute of any of the luxuries or elegancies of life, there was a door, or hatchway, in the middle of the floor, which led to a kind of cellar, the contents of which supplied all the deficiencies of the house, and, flavored with the generous hospitality of the proprietor, made everybody happy.

On this occasion we stopped to take Baasen into the party, and while discussing the great event which brought us up, I decided to add some new features to the inauguration of the new postmaster. Baasen had been appointed a notary public, and was provided with large business-like envelopes and formidable red seals, so I wrote a letter to Mr. Kouse in about the following language:

Executive Mansion, Washington, D. C.
"July 20, 1855.
"Hon. Anton Kouse, Postmaster at New Ulm, Territory of
Minnesota,

"Sir: We have been informed that a flourishing settlement has been founded on the waters of the upper Minnesota river, in Minnesota Territory, which has been named New Ulm, and that the inhabitants are sufficiently numerous and intelligent to need a postoffice. It has also been represented to us that you are a good and true Democrat, and the choice of the people for the office of postmaster. It is therefore our duty and pleasure to appoint you to that office. It is our desire that you locate the office in a part of the town which will accommodate its inhabitants, and see to it that they always vote the Democratic ticket at all elections. I am,

"Yours very truly,
(Seal) "FRANKLIN PIERCE,
"President of the United States of America."

I inclosed this letter in one of Baasen's large envelopes, and we all drove up to the house of Mr. Kouse, and called him out. I stood up in the wagon, and made him a speech, informing him of the creation of the office, and that I had his bond and commission and a letter to him from the president of the United States, which I was instructed to deliver to him in person, and I added that it was customary on such important occasions for the newly appointed postmaster to propose the health of the postmaster general.

Kouse rushed into his house, and appeared with a brown jug and a tin cup, from which we all drank a bumper to the health and prosperity of the postmaster general, the town of New Ulm, and its postmaster. I then handed him his credentials, including the letter from the president, and the postoffice at New Ulm was a reality.

I have never learned whether my friend Kouse caught on to the joke, or whether he has cherished the executive letter as an heirloom for his posterity.

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THE COURAGE OF CONVICTION.

In 1864-65 I was living in Carson City, in the State of Nevada, where, from the abnormal condition of the inhabitants, it was nothing remarkable that some event should happen almost daily that otherwise would have been startling. Many such events did take place, but, from their frequency, were soon forgotten. There was one, however, that impressed itself upon my memory because of the cool daring that characterized it, and it must be understood that bravery was not an uncommon trait in the inhabitants of Carson. Men carried their lives in their hands, and quite frequently lost them.

In order to appreciate the situation fully, you must know that the population of Carson City was composed of about the roughest and most disorderly agglomeration of the refuse of California that was ever assembled at any one time or place,—gamblers, murderers, road agents, and all sorts of unclassified toughs. They were about evenly divided between the North and the South,—the only politics being pronounced Unionism on one side and outspoken rebellion on the other; but, as any discussion between representatives of such views during the hottest period of the war was generally concluded with six-shooters, all parties kept pretty quiet on the subject, and politics was about the least exciting cause of murder, there being others sufficiently numerous to give us a "man for breakfast" nearly every morning.

Like all Pacific Coast mining towns, Carson had an immense saloon, with all the sporting attachments, such as billiards, roulette, faro, poker, etc., and at all times of the day and night it was frequented by hundreds of men, who amused themselves talking, drinking, gambling and reading their letters, as most of them received their correspondence at these headquarters. It was called the "Magnolia," and was kept by Pete Hopkins, who, I believe, still flourishes in San Francisco.

The telegraph had reached us in 1862, and we kept pretty well posted on what was going on in the States. On the 14th of April, 1865, it was flashed over the wires that President Lincoln had been assassinated, and the excitement was intense. Men studiously avoided the subject, for fear of being misunderstood and being drawn into deadly conflict. The news was not credited at first, but soon became confirmed, and generally accepted as true. The Union men determined that some public demonstration should be made to recognize the event. A meeting was held, and a committee appointed to formulate a program. It was decided to put the town in mourning, have a procession and mock funeral, an oration and appropriate resolutions,—all of which was the correct thing. An evening or two before the ceremony was to take place the committee came down to the Magnolia, to announce publicly what it had decided upon. The chairman mounted the bar and made his proclamation, adding that anyone who failed to hang out some emblem of mourning on his house or place of business might expect to be roughly handled.

The room was crowded, and with the most inflammable material. Had a bomb been exploded on one of the billiard tables the effect would not have stirred the rebels to greater depths. Among them was an old Virginian, whom we will call Captain Jones. He almost immediately accepted the challenge, and speaking up loudly, he said: "I am damned glad Lincoln was killed, and if any man attempts to put mourning on my house, or interfere with me for not doing so, there will be a good many more killed."

Everybody knew that the old man meant just what he said, and was always equipped to make good his promises. The effect was remarkable. Instead of precipitating a fight, it seemed to paralyze the crowd, and nothing came of it that night; the captain was wise enough quietly to disappear.

Captain Jones had a small brick building on the main street of the town, a block or two from the Magnolia, where he had his office, and lived in a back room.

At the proper time the procession formed on the plaza. Bands of music were interspersed through the line. The orator and distinguished citizens were in carriages, every vehicle in town being brought into requisition. There was a large cavalcade of horsemen. I rode in a handsome buggy, with the principal gambler of the town, and many hundred footmen followed, the Chinamen bringing up the rear. It was a beautiful day, the sun shining brightly. The procession moved off majestically down a back street, off the main thoroughfare, and then turned into the principal street. Every house on the line of march displayed signs of mourning on both sides of the street. Soon appeared in the distance Captain Jones, sitting just outside the line of the sidewalk, in the street, exactly in front of his house. His head was bare, and his long white hair glistened in the sunshine. He sat in an arm-chair, with an immense double-barrelled shotgun poised quietly across his knees. He was carelessly reading a newspaper, and not a semblance of mourning was to be seen anywhere on his premises. As the head of the procession reached him hundreds of hands involuntarily sought their revolvers, and every man held his breath; even the music ceased, and the expectation was intense. There were many in the line who would have shot him if they had dared, but they knew he had hosts of friends in the line who would have resented it instantly, and to the death, and they also knew the captain's eye was coursing down the line and the first shot would be answered by the contents of both barrels of his big gun. So no one fired; no one spoke; hardly anyone looked. The captain never moved a muscle, and the column passed.

I remember once of reading an incident in connection with the French army. While marching in Africa it encountered a splendid African lion, lying in the road, who did not seem disposed to give the right of way. The army halted. The circumstance was reported to the commanding officer and instructions asked whether they should kill the royal beast or march round him. The orders were to march round him. I have never thought of the incident here related without recalling the cool bravery of the king of beasts; but I always award the superiority to my friend, Captain Jones.

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HOW THE CAPITAL WAS SAVED.

The ancestors of Joe Rolette, the leading character in the story which I am about to relate, emigrated at a very early day from Normandy, in France, to Canada. It is believed that the celebrated Montcalm was one of this party. Many of these emigrants became disheartened by the hardships they encountered, and returned to France; but not so the Rolettes. Jean Joseph Rolette, the father of our Joseph, was born in Quebec, on Sept. 24, 1781. He was originally designed for the priesthood, but fortunately for that holy order his inclinations led him in another direction, and he became an Indian trader. His first venture in business was at Montreal, next at Windsor opposite Detroit, finally winding up at Prairie du Chien, about the year 1801 or 1802.

In the war of 1812, with Great Britain, the Americans captured Prairie du Chien in 1814, and built a stockade there, which was called Fort Shelby. The British, under Colonel McKay, besieged it, Rolette having some rank in the attacking party. He was offered a captaincy in the British army for his good behavior in this affair, but declined it. He continued his Indian trade successfully up to 1820, when John Jacob Astor offered him a leading position in the American Fur Company, which he accepted, and held until 1836, when he was succeeded by Hercules L. Dousman. He died at Prairie du Chien, Dec. 1, 1842, leaving a widow and two children, a son and daughter. His daughter married Captain Hood of the United States army, and was a very superior woman. His son was the hero of this story. Rolette senior was called by the Indians, "Sheyo" ("The Prairie Chicken"), from the rapidity with which he travelled. Joe was called "Sheyo chehint Ku" ("The Prairie Chicken's Son").

Joe Rolette was born on Oct. 23, 1820, at Prairie du Chien. He received a commercial education in New York, but having inherited the free and easy, half-savage characteristics of his father, he soon gravitated to the border, and settled at Pembina, on the Red River of the North, near the dividing line between the United States and Canada. At this point an extensive trade in furs had sprung up, in opposition to the Hudson Bay people, who had monopolized the trade for British interests for many long years. The catch of furs was brought down to the Mississippi every year by brigades of carts, constructed entirely of wood and rawhide, which were drawn by a single horse or ox, and carried a load of from 800 to 1,000 pounds. These vehicles were admirably adapted to the country, which was in a perfectly natural state, without roads of any kind, except the trail worn by the carts. They could easily pass over a slough that would obstruct any other forms of wheeled carriage, and one man could drive four or five of them, each being hitched behind the other. They were readily constructed on the border, by the unskilled half-breeds, where iron was unobtainable. This trade, with an occasional arrival of dog trains in the winter, was the only connecting link between far away Pembina and St. Paul.

When the Territory of Minnesota was organized, in 1849, St. Paul was designated as the capital, and a plain but suitable building was erected by the United States for the purpose of the local government, and when finished the territorial legislature convened there annually.

Joe Rolette, being the leading citizen of Pembina, and naturally desirous of spending his winters at the capital, had himself elected to the legislature, first to the house of representatives in 1853, and again in 1854 and 1855. In 1856 and 1857 he was returned to the council, which was the upper house, corresponding to the senate as the legislature is now composed. This body consisted of fifteen members. The sessions were limited by the organic act to sixty days.

That the capital should be located and remain at St. Paul had been determined by the leading citizens of this region, as far as they could decide this question, before the organization of the territory, but there were from the beginning manifestations of a desire to remove it exhibited in several localities. Wm. R. Marshall resided at St. Anthony, and at the first session in 1849 worked hard to have it removed to that point, but failed, and no serious attempt was again made until 1857, when, on February 6th, a bill was introduced by a councillor from St. Cloud, to remove it to St. Peter, a town on the Minnesota river, which had grown into considerable importance. General Gorman was the governor, and largely interested in St. Peter. He gave the scheme the weight of his influence. Winona, through its councillor, St. A. D. Balcombe, was a warm advocate of the change, and enough influence was secured to carry the bill in both houses. It, however, only passed the council by one majority, eight voting in its favor, and seven against it.

It was at this point in the fight that Rolette proved himself a bold and successful strategist. He was a friend of St. Paul, and was determined that the plan should not succeed if it was possible for him to prevent it. He never calculated chances or hesitated at responsibilities, but would undertake any desperate measure to carry a point with the same unreflecting dash and heedlessness of danger that he would plunge his horse into a herd of buffalo, shooting right and left, trusting to luck to extricate him. It happened that Joe was chairman of the committee on enrolled bills of the council, and all bills had to pass through his hands for enrollment and comparison. On the 27th of February the removal bill reached him, and he instantly decided that the legislature should never see it again, so he put it in his pocket and disappeared. He had, however, foresight enough carefully to deposit the bill in the vault of Truman M. Smith's bank, in the Fuller House, on the corner of Seventh and Jackson streets, before his vanishment.

On the 28th Joe did not appear in his seat, and no one seemed to know anything of his whereabouts. As his absence was prolonged, some of the advocates of the removal became uneasy, and sent to the enrollment committee for the bill, but none of them knew anything about it. At this point Mr. Balcombe offered a resolution, calling on Rolette to report the bill forthwith, and on his failure to do so, that the next member of the committee, Mr. Wales, procure another enrolled copy and report it. He then moved the previous question on his resolution. At this point, Mr. Setzer, a friend of St. Paul, moved a call of the council, and Mr. Rolette, being reported absent, the sergeant-at-arms was sent out to find him, and bring him in.

To comprehend the full bearings of the situation, it should be known that, under the rules, no business could be transacted while the council was under a call, and that it required a two-thirds vote to dispense with the call. As I have said before, the bill was passed in the council by a vote of eight for and seven against, which was the full vote of the body; but in the absence of Rolette there were only fourteen present. Luckily for St. Paul, it takes as many to make two-thirds of fourteen as it does to make two-thirds of fifteen, and the friends of the bill could only muster nine on the motion to dispense with the call. Mr. John B. Brisbin was president of the council, and a strong friend of St. Paul, so no relaxation of the rules could be hoped for from him. In this dilemma, the friends of removal were forced to desperate extremes, and Mr. Balcombe actually made an extended argument to prove to the chair that nine was two-thirds of fourteen. Both gentlemen were graduates of Yale, and, on the completion of his argument, Mr. Brisbin said, "Balcombe, we never figured that way at Yale; the motion is lost," and the council found itself at a deadlock, with the call pending, and no hope of transacting any business, unless some member of the five yielded. They were all steadfast, however, and there was nothing to do but to receive the daily report of the sergeant-at-arms that Mr. Rolette could not be found. Sometimes he would report a rumor that Rolette had been seen at some town up the river, making for Pembina with a dog train, at the rate of fifteen miles an hour; again, that he had been assassinated,—in fact, everything but the truth, which was that he was luxuriously quartered in the upper story of the Fuller House, having the jolliest time of his life, surrounded by friends, male and female, and supplied with the best the town afforded, including buckets of champagne.

The 5th of March was the last day of the session, and the council camped in its chamber, theoretically handcuffed and hobbled, until midnight of that day, when President Brisbin took the chair, and pronounced the council adjourned sine die.

The sergeant-at-arms was John Lamb, well known to all old settlers. He was a resident of St. Paul, and true to her interests, as his conduct proved. I don't suppose any man ever spent five days and nights trying harder how not to find his man than he did on this occasion. Whether his fidelity was ever rewarded I am unable to say.

During the deadlock the friends of removal got a copy of the bill through, but neither the speaker of the house nor the president of the council would sign it. The governor, however, did approve it, but the first time it was tested in court it was pronounced invalid, and set aside. Other attempts at capital removal were made, but none of them proved successful.

Rolette and I were close friends. We had served together in the council at its preceding session, and afterwards in the constitutional convention, and always roomed together when in St. Paul. I lived at Traverse des Sioux, which is next door to St. Peter, at the time of this attempt to remove the capital there, but vigorously opposed the measure. Rolette's life was threatened by the friends of removal, and many is the night I have played the part of bodyguard to him, armed to the teeth; but fortunately he was not assailed.

As I rather admired the plucky manner in which my friend had stood by St. Paul in this, the hour of her danger, I conceived the idea of preserving the event to history by presenting his portrait to the Historical Society of the state, which I did, in April, 1890, and also hung one in the Minnesota Club. It is a capital likeness, representing him, full life size, in the wild and picturesque costume of the border. A brass tablet on the frame is inscribed with the following legend: "The Hon. Joe Rolette, who saved the capital to St. Paul, by running away with the bill removing it to St. Peter, in 1857."

Joe died at Pembina, and is buried in the graveyard of the old Catholic church of Belencourt, under a cross of oak, which once bore the words:

"Here reposes Joseph Rolette.
"Born Oct. 23, 1820.
"Died May 16, 1871."

The simple chronicle is long since effaced.

"Requiescat in pace!" is the wish and hope of his historian and friend.

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AN EDITOR INCOG.

In the years 1864 and 1865 I lived in Carson City, the capital of Nevada, which recently became famous as the place where the great prize fight between Bob Fitzsimmons and Gentleman Jim Corbett occurred. The racecourse which became the arena on that occasion was during all the time of my residence there used by me daily as a gymnasium for exercise. I had very little to do with the actual politics of the country, because I was, and had always been, a Democrat of the most uncompromising character, and the party divisions out in that country were between the Republicans and men from the Southern States, who were generally outspoken rebels; and as it was in the midst of the Civil War, the feeling was intense between them. I was a warm supporter of the war for the Union, and found myself in the position of a man without a party. The situation did not incommode me, however, as I was fully occupied outside the realm of politics.

There were two daily newspapers published in the town,—one Republican, which was called the Carson Daily Appeal, and the other Democratic, called the Evening Post. There were no associated press dispatches, although the telegraph had reached the Pacific Coast and the San Francisco papers had the benefit of that great purveyor of news.

The proprietor of the plant of the Republican paper was an old Minnesota man, and a friend of mine, with whom I frequently came in contact, both in a business and social way. Under this condition of things, you may imagine my surprise and consternation when I tell you that one day he rushed into my office in a great state of excitement, and told me that his editor had left him and gone to San Francisco, and that he could not keep his paper going unless I would run it until he could arrange for another editor, adding that a failure to publish it for a single day would ruin him. At first I looked upon the proposition as utterly out of the question, and said: "How can I edit a Republican newspaper, when I am at swords' points with everything they believe and advocate?" It was with him, however, "a groundhog case," as we used to call such imperative occasions. He had to get him, as he was out of meat. He was persistent in his demands, and as the negotiations progressed, I began to look upon the matter as a good joke, and finally promised that I would undertake to keep the paper going if he would swear that he would never disclose my identity, which condition he promised faithfully to observe.

It was a matter that admitted of no delay. I had to prepare a column and a half of editorial that night for the next morning's issue. What I wrote about, I don't pretend to remember, but it was well received, and its Republican orthodoxy was never questioned, and I repeated the dose daily for some time with the same success, growing more and more violent in my attacks on the Democracy in each successive issue. Carson was a small town, and, as the old editor was missed by his friends, public curiosity increased as to who had succeeded him, and I enrolled myself among the guessers, and improved every occasion to criticise publicly the editorials. It soon became very tiresome and difficult to maintain my ground, with politics as the sole text for my editorials, and as news was very scarce, I sought relief in any channel that opened a way. A great race took place in San Francisco between Charley Brian's ever victorious horse, Lodi, and a colt of the celebrated stallion Lexington, named Norfolk, for which Joe Winters of Carson had paid fifteen thousand and one dollars to the owner of Lexington,—Lord Bob Alexander of Kentucky,—especially to make the race with Lodi. The $15,001 was exacted by the owner of Lexington, because he had been laughed at for paying $15,000 for Lexington when he was old and blind, and had said he would sell his colts for more than he had paid for their sire. This race, of course, created an immense excitement. At least twenty thousand people went to see it, and everybody on the Pacific Coast from the forty-ninth parallel to the Mexican line had a bet on the result. Lodi was beaten, and as Nevada was the victor, and I knew all about Lexington, I wrote several essays on race horses in general and Norfolk in particular.

The office of sheriff of our county was a very hazardous one, every incumbent of it prior to the then holder having "died with his boots on." Tim Smith, who filled the office when I was there, and had shown desperate courage on several occasions in the performance of his duties, had gained my admiration and friendship, and afforded me a good text, and I wrote him up.

There was an ex-governor of California residing in Carson with whom I became intimate, and on one occasion I wrote him up; and last, but not least, I made the acquaintance of a beautiful and accomplished lady living in the town, and as such a person was a phenomenon in that rude land, I was inspired to write her up, and did so in the following poem:

"This descriptive epigram is dedicated to the most beautiful woman in Carson City, by the editor:

My political attacks did not seem to make much impression on my Democratic contemporary, and he paid very little attention to what I said, feeling, no doubt, indifferent in the overwhelming majority of the Republican party, but when I branched out in the line I have indicated, he opened on me savagely in several editorials. He said the Appeal had discovered a soft-soap mine, and had used it lavishly to lather governors, sheriffs, ladies, and a great many other people, for the purpose of gaining their support and patronage, all of which afforded me a fine opportunity of getting back at him in a humorous, and at the same time effective manner, so I shot at him in verse, which I will repeat; but to a full understanding of it, I will explain that all mining claims are measured by the number of feet the claimant owns on the ledge, and the word "feet" became synonymous with the mine itself. This was my answer:

"SOAP."
"Great renovator of the human race!
Great cleanser of the human face!
Thy potent art removes each stain
From dirtiest mortal on this sphere mundane.
'Tis sad to think thy mystic spell
Can't penetrate within the shell,
And to a soiled, perverted heart
Cleanliness and purity impart.
Thy subtle essence, heretofore confined
In bars of Windsor toilet cakes refined;
In Colgate's honey for the barber's brush,
And shapeless masses much resembling slush,
Has now, according to our evening sheet,
Been found in ledges, known as "feet."
To use the language of the Post, in fine,
The great Appeal has found a mine;
And having now much soap to spare,
Soaps governors—sheriffs—ladies fair.
How sad it is, with all this soap,
To know there's not the slightest hope
If all the Chinamen in town
Should wash it up and wash it down,
And scrub 'till it gave up the ghost,
Of making clean the Evening Post."

The effect of my shot was equal to a thirteen-inch shell in the camp of the enemy. The whole community laughed, and the Post left me studiously alone until the new editor came and relieved me. I had lots of fun out of the experiment, besides getting the magnificent compensation of twenty dollars a week for my services. I also had the gratification of knowing that the exciting question of "Who edits the Appeal?" remained unanswered until I answered it myself.

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THE INK-PA-DU-TA WAR.

All old settlers will remember what in the history of Minnesota is known as "The Ink-pa-du-ta War." It occurred in 1857, and, briefly described, was something like the following: Near the northwest corner of the State of Iowa, in the county of Dickinson, and near the southwest corner of the State of Minnesota, in the county of Jackson, there are two large and very beautiful lakes, called Spirit lake and Lake Okoboji. The country about these lakes is surpassingly beautiful and fruitful, and naturally attracted settlers in a very early day. In 1855 and 1857 a few families settled on a small river which heads in Minnesota and flows southward into Iowa, called in English Rock river, and in Sioux In-yan-yan-ke. In 1856 Hon. William Freeborn of Red Wing, Minn., started a settlement at Spirit lake, and near the same time another location was made about ten or fifteen miles north of Spirit lake, and called Springfield.

There was a small band of Indians, numbering ten or fifteen lodges, under the chieftainship of Ink-pa-du-ta, or the "Scarlet Point," which had for long years frequented the region of the Vermillion river, and although Sioux, they had become separated from the bands that made treaties with the United States in 1851, and were regarded as outlaws and vagabonds. This band had planted in the neighborhood of Spirit lake prior to 1857, and ranged the country from there to the Missouri.

Early in March, 1857, these Indians were hunting in the neighborhood of Rock river settlement, and got into a row with the white people from some trivial cause, and the treatment they received greatly angered them. They proceeded north and massacred all the people at the Spirit lake and Okoboji settlements, except four women, whom they captured and carried off with them. They then attacked the settlers at Springfield, and killed most of them. The result of the massacre was forty-two white people killed and four white women taken as captives.

I was then United States agent for the Sioux, and the news of the trouble reached me at my agency, on the Minnesota river, early in March, 1857, by two young men, who had escaped, and had travelled all the way on foot through the deep snow, a distance of nearly one hundred miles. Although the air was always full of rumors of Indian troubles in those days, I was convinced that the news brought by these boys was true, so I made a requisition on Colonel Alexander of the Tenth United States Infantry, stationed at Fort Ridgely, for troops, and he sent me Company "A," commanded by Captain Barnard E. Bee and Lieutenant Murray. I supplied guides and interpreters from my Indians, and after a most laborious and painful roundabout march of many days, we reached the scene of the troubles, only to find, as I fully expected, the Indians gone. The dead were buried, and the troops, after remaining for some time, returned to the fort.

Now comes the most interesting part of the incident. The captured women were Mrs. Noble, Mrs. Thatcher, Mrs. Marble and Miss Gardner. The legislature of the territory was in session, and the news of the event soon reached St. Paul, and, as might be expected, created great excitement, and, of course, the principal interest centered in the rescue of the prisoners. All the legislature could do was to appropriate money to defray the expenses of the undertaking, and as nobody knew what to do or how to do it, they appropriated $10,000 and wisely left the whole matter to Governor Medary, who was then the governor of the territory, with full power to do what he thought best about it. He, being a practical man, and having no idea at all of how to proceed in the matter, very sensibly turned the whole business over to me, with carte blanche to do whatever I thought best.

An accident controlled the situation, and shaped future events. Two of my Indians, who had been hunting on the Big Sioux river, heard that Ink-pa-du-ta was encamped at Skunk lake, about seventy-five miles west of Spirit lake, and had some white captives in his camp; so they went to see him, and succeeded in purchasing Mrs. Marble, for whom they paid horses and rifles, and whatever they had, and brought her into the Yellow Medicine agency and delivered her to me. I paid them $500 each for their services, and immediately sent out another expedition to try to rescue the other captives. I say I paid these two Indians $500 each. The fact is, I could raise but $500 in money on the reservation, which I gave them, and resorted to a financial scheme to get the rest, which has since become quite the fashion when people or communities are short. I issued a territorial bond, and as it is the first government bond that ever was issued in all the country that lies between the Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains, I give it in full.

"I, Stephen R. Riggs, missionary among the Sioux Indians, and I, Charles E. Flandrau, United States Indian agent for the Sioux, being satisfied that Mak-pi-ya-ka-ho-ton and Si-ha-ho-ta, two Sioux Indians, have performed a valuable service to the Territory of Minnesota and humanity, by rescuing from captivity Mrs. Margaret Ann Marble, and delivering her to the Sioux agent, and being further satisfied that the rescue of the two remaining white women who are now in captivity among Ink-pa-du-ta's band of Indians depends much upon the liberality shown towards the said Indians who have recovered Mrs. Marble, and having full confidence in the humanity and liberality of the Territory of Minnesota, through its government and citizens, have this day paid to the two said above named Indians, the sum of five hundred dollars in money, and do hereby pledge to said two Indians that the further sum of five hundred dollars will be paid to them by the Territory of Minnesota or its citizens within three months from the date hereof.

"Dated May 22nd, 1857, at Pa-Ku-ta Zi-zi, M. T.
"STEPHEN R. RIGGS,
Missionary A. B. C. F. M.
"CHAS. E. FLANDRAU,
"U. S. Indian Agent for Sioux."

This bond differed materially from some that were issued by Minnesota afterwards, in being paid promptly at maturity.

My expedition brought in Miss Gardner, but Mrs. Noble and Mrs. Thatcher were killed before relief reached them.

All this occurred before I heard of the action of the legislature, and was done wholly on my individual responsibility. I, however, reimbursed myself for the outlay from the state funds, and covered the balance of the appropriation into the treasury.

Very shortly after the rescue of Miss Gardner, while at the Redwood agency, I received a note from Sam Brown, a trader at Yellow Medicine, by an Indian courier, which informed me that Ink-pa-du-ta and several of his band were at the Yellow Medicine river. I at once determined to kill or capture them, and sent word back that I would be on hand with a proper force on the morning of the second day, and that he must send an Indian who knew where to find them, who would meet me at midnight on the top of a butte half way between the Redwood and Yellow Medicine rivers, and guide me in.

I then made a requisition for troops on the commander of the post at Ridgely, who sent me a lieutenant and fifteen men. It chanced to be Lieutenant Murray, who had accompanied the expedition to Spirit lake. While waiting for the soldiers, I raised a volunteer force of about twenty men, among whom was a son of the celebrated electrician, Professor Morse, and some other young gentlemen who were visiting the agency, all of whom insisted on going for the fun of the thing. The balance consisted of employes, most of whom were half-breeds. The soldiers arrived about five o'clock in the afternoon, and I put them in wagons. I mounted my squad on good horses, and every man was furnished with a double-barrelled shotgun and a revolver. We started about dark, and at midnight arrived at the butte. I galloped to the top of it, and found sitting there in the most composed manner possible smoking his pipe, An-pe-tu-toka-sha, or John Otherday, who had been deputed by Brown to guide us in. He said he knew where we could find the enemy, and indicated six lodges standing together about four miles above the Yellow Medicine Agency, on the open prairie. He left the road, and guided us through the open country to a point on the river about a mile below the lodges, they being on the other side of the river. We arrived at about four o'clock in the morning, just as the light of day was breaking. It was an engrossing study to observe how skillfully he kept us concealed from view of the enemy, by keeping rolls of the prairie between us. All his movements were like those of a wary animal, stealthy and noiseless. The fact is, the education of a savage is learned from the wild animals on which he lives, and that is what makes him such a good hunter and fighter.

The river, with a narrow stretch of bottom land and a bluff of about thirty feet in height, lay between us and the plateau on which was the camp where Ink-pa-du-ta was supposed to be. Here we formed our plan of attack. As soon as we crossed and attained the high prairie, and located the enemy, we were to divide our force into two squads, one of which was to be the soldiers and the other the mounted men. The soldiers were to double-quick up the edge of the bluff, to intercept a retreat into the river bottom, while the mounted men took the open prairie to cut off escape in the other direction. Lieutenant Murray was to lead the soldiers and I the horsemen. I said to Otherday and my interpreter: "How are we to know the guilty parties?" The answer was: "Whoever runs from the camp you may be sure of."

The scene presented when we reached the high land was beautiful, inspiring, and frightfully alarming. As far as the eye could reach there was an unbroken camp of savages, not less than eight or ten thousand of them, representing all the Indians of my upper bands, and those from the Missouri who always visited us at payment time. I knew many of them were relatives of Ink-pa-du-ta and his people, and most of them his friends, but there was no time for balancing chances, and, at the word, away we went for the enemy's camp, which was the farthest up the river of them all. The night had been very hot, and, as is the custom, the tepees had been rolled up at the bottom, to allow a free circulation of air, which, of course, allowed the inmates an open view of the prairie. When my squad got within about two or three hundred yards of the lodges a young Indian, holding the hand of a squaw and carrying a double-barrelled shotgun, sprang out, and made for the river bluff as fast as his legs would carry him. All the soldiers fired at him, but he did not seem to be hit, and disappeared among the chaparral in the bottom. We surrounded him. He fired four shots, and each time I looked to see a man fall, but only one shot was effective, and that struck the cartridge box of a young soldier, turning it completely inside out, but without injuring the wearer. Whenever he shot, we poured a volley into the place indicated by the smoke, and succeeded in killing him. We took his squaw and put her into one of the wagons, more for the purpose of identifying the man than anything else, and started down the river towards the agency. We had to pass through the heart of all these camps, and the squaw yelled as only a scared squaw can. The savages swarmed about our party by the hundreds and thousands, threatening vengeance, and flourishing their guns in a blood-curdling manner. A shot from one of them, or from one of us, would have sent us all into heaven in less than a moment. The shot was not fired, and we succeeded in reaching the agency in safety. I have always attributed our escape to the moral force of the government that was behind us.

At the agency there were great log buildings, in which we fortified ourselves. I sent a courier to Fort Ridgely for reenforcements. The commanding-officer sent us the old Sherman Buena Vista Battery, which assisted us in letting go and getting out.

The Indian we killed turned out to be the eldest son of Ink-pa-du-ta, who was one of the head devils in the Spirit lake massacre. He had ventured in to see his sweetheart, and was the only one of the gang that was present when we made our attack.

The question has often been asked, why the government allowed the massacre to go unpunished. Colonel Alexander of the Tenth and I had a plan by which we would have destroyed Ink-pa-du-ta and his band without a doubt, but just at the moment of putting it into execution an order came for all the companies of the Tenth at Ridgely to leave at once for Fort Bridger, in Utah, to join the expedition under General Albert Sydney Johnson, against the Mormons, and that was the end of it.

Our raid was about as foolhardy and reckless a one as ever was undertaken, and our escape can only be credited to providence or good luck.

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MUSCULAR LEGISLATION.

My attention was once arrested by a short editorial, under the caption of "Gold Lace Lawmaking," which recalled an amusing incident in my experience that occurred in 1856. The editorial said: "When the lawmakers of the province of Manitoba met at Winnipeg, the occasion was something to impress the voter. The Royal Canadian Dragoons paraded, and the Thirteenth field battery roared a salute. Mark the contrast. On one side of the line, ceremony, gold lace and honor. On the other, nothing but a few clean collars and a camp-fire of the bobby."

It is not my intention to discuss the question of which is the better method, but to relate an incident which will cast some light on the views people of the two sections take of legislative etiquette and ceremony, and the slight effect such ideas have on the practical subject of legislation and the conduct of the legislators.

In the year 1856 I was elected by the people of the Minnesota valley to the territorial council, which corresponds to the state senate under our present political organization. At the same election a neighbor of mine, George McLeod, was elected to the house of representatives from the same district. George was a Scotch Canadian, who had passed his life in that part of Canada where French is the dominant language, and it had become his most familiar tongue. He was a giant in build, being much over six feet in height, and correspondingly powerful. He was red headed, and although well educated, preferred his fists to any other weapons in argument, and generally carried his points. He was fond of good horses, boasted of his skill as a hunter, and possessed all the requisites of a successful frontiersman. He added to these accomplishments an extensive knowledge of Scotch poetry and a varied repertoire of choice songs, which he sang on all appropriate occasions. On the whole, George might be classified as an all around good fellow. Another attribute which I must not forget to mention was, that he was the brother of one of our most distinguished first settlers, Martin McLeod, who was a member of the first territorial council, which convened in 1849, and also the brother of Rev. Norman McLeod, a plucky Presbyterian preacher, who settled in Salt Lake City in the fifties, and preached the Gentile religion when Mormonism was at its height and its disciples were in the habit of killing people who differed from them.

After the excitement of the election was over, George naturally began to reflect upon his exalted position, and, of course, all his conclusions were reached from a Canadian point of view. Feeling a little doubt on some questions, he decided to consult me, supposing I was more familiar with the American way of doing things than he possibly could be; so one day he came to see me on the all-engrossing subject. We found each other in the regulation costume of the country, which consisted of blue flannel shirts, cheap slop-shop trowsers, Red River moccasins, and the whole finished off with a scarlet Hudson's Bay or a variegated Pembina sash, all of which was picturesque, but carried with it no semblance of pretentious aristocracy. I welcomed George with great cordiality, and he at once opened his budget. He said: "Flaundreau," giving my name the full French pronunciation, "when we get down to parliament, we will have to set up a coach." My surprise may be well imagined, when I tell you a journey of a hundred miles on foot was to either of us no unusual event, and that neither McLeod nor I had been the owner of a boot or a shoe for several years. I, however, restrained my astonishment, and asked: "What makes you think so?" His reply was, that it was entirely inadmissible for a member of parliament to walk from his hotel to the parliament house or to ride in a public conveyance. The question of British or Canadian etiquette flashed upon me, and explained McLeod's meaning; but it required an immense effort on my part to control my laughter, when I had fully taken in the ludicrous features of the proposition. I would no more have given way to my inclinations, however, than I would have yielded to the same desire when some ridiculous event happens at an official Indian council. The picture of a coach with liveried coachman and footman driving up to the door of the old American House in St. Paul, and two half-savage looking men, shod in moccasins, climbing into it, to be transported three or four blocks to the old capitol, with a gaping crowd of half-breeds and ruffianly spectators looking on in amazement, passed before my mind, and made me wonder what would be the result of such a phenomenal spectacle; but I simply said: "We had better wait until we get there, and see what the other fellows do; but there is one thing I can promise you, and that is, that our district shall not fall behind any of the rest of them if it takes a coach and six to hold it up."

When we arrived at the parliament, of course McLeod's ideas of etiquette and good form met with a rude check, and that was the last I ever heard of the subject.

But it was not the last I heard of my colleague. His convivial and belligerent characteristics led him into all sorts of scrapes. He was, however, usually quite competent to take care of himself, and we each followed our own trails without interference, until some political question of more than ordinary interest came up in the house, and an evening session was agreed upon for its discussion. McLeod was to speak on the subject, and he spent nearly all day in preparation, which consisted in dropping in at old Caulder's, a brother Scotchman, about every hour and taking a drink, so when the time arrived he was loaded to the guards with inspiration.

In the old capitol the halls of legislation were on the second floor, the house on one side and the council on the other, with an open hall between them and a stairway leading up from below. The height between the floors was about sixteen feet. It had been arranged that a keg of whisky should be put into the council chamber, to be presided over by the sergeant-at-arms of the council, who was an enormous man, larger even than McLeod.

The hour arrived, a large party attended the debate, among whom were Joe Rolette and I, many ladies also gracing the occasion. McLeod spoke, and after he had finished, he sauntered over to the council chamber to refresh himself. While the custodian of the keg was getting him a drink, McLeod asked if he had heard his speech, and how he liked it. The sergeant ventured a not very flattering criticism on some remark he had made, when George slapped him viciously across the face with a pair of buckskin gauntlets he held in his hand. He had hardly struck the blow, when the sergeant seized him, and rushed him across the hall to the railing around the staircase, reaching which, over McLeod went backwards to the bottom, sixteen feet below, with a crash that could be heard all over the building. In a moment or two, my friend, Joe Rolette, came running breathlessly to me, and gasped out, "Hiawatha, Hiawatha" [the name he always called me], "McLeod is dead." I sprang to my feet, and rushed down stairs, where I found McLeod laid out on a lounge in the office of the secretary of the territory, with Doctor Le Boutillier, a French member from St. Anthony, endeavoring to pacify him. The conversation ran as follows:

Doctor: "Georges, mon ami; ne bouge pas, tu a le bras cassé."

McLeod: "Fiche-Moi la paix, on peut courber le bras à un Ecossais; on ne peut pas le lui casser."

Which translated would read:

"George, my friend, be quiet, your arm is broken."

"Stand aside, you may bend a Scotchman's arms, but you can't break them."

Poor McLeod's right arm was broken badly, which laid him up until the end of the session.

A short time after the legislature had dissolved George was standing in a saloon on Third street, with his right arm in a sling, and a glass of whisky in his left hand, which he was about to drink, when who should walk in but the big sergeant. Without a word George discharged the contents of his glass into the face of the sergeant, and prepared for battle, crippled as he was; but the interruption of friends and the chivalry of the sergeant prevented an encounter, and so ended the legislative career of the gentleman from Canada. Whether it would have terminated otherwise had we set up our coach and livery and changed our moccasins for patent leather boots I leave to the decision of the reader.

He went with General Sibley's command to the Missouri, where I believe he remained.

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THE VIRGIN FEAST.

In all ages, and among all people who had progressed beyond absolute individualism and gained any kind of government or community interests, there must have been some kind of law to settle disputes and controversies, whether of a public or private nature, and I remember once, in the very early days of Minnesota, of witnessing a test which bore a close resemblance to a trial by jury, and involved an important question of individual character which would have been classified under our jurisprudence as an action of slander. It occurred among the Sioux Indians, and presented many features of much interest that made an impression on me which I have never forgotten. The whole proceeding was absolutely natural and aboriginal in its character and conduct, and free from the technicalities which sometimes obstruct the progress of the administration of justice in modern times.

It is well known that the value of the testimony of a witness depends very much upon his demeanor and manner of delivering it in court, and that the judge usually tells the jury that they must take these matters into consideration in giving it its true weight; but in the case I am about to relate there was nothing but the appearance and manner of the witnesses testifying upon which to base a judgment of their truth or falsity, and it was this novel feature that lent additional and peculiar interest to the controversy.

The Sioux Indians have a rude kind of jurisprudence which gets at the truth by a sort of natural intuition, and the case I witnessed convinced me that justice had been reached with more certainty than in nine out of ten of our jury trials. We have all heard of trial by battle, under the old English law, and the trial of witches by water, where, if they sank and drowned they were innocent, and if they floated they were guilty and were hanged. But this trial was based on public sentiment or the ability of bystanders to detect guilt or innocence from the appearance and conduct of the litigants during the trial, which, although a crude method, is, in my judgment, much safer than some of those practised by our ancestors at no very remote date.

The trial I refer to is called the "Virgin Feast." It is brought about in this way: Some gossip or scandal is started in a band about one of the young women. It reaches the ears of her mother. In order to test its truth or falsity, the mother commands her daughter to give a "Virgin Feast." The accused cooks some rice, and invites all the maidens of the band to come and partake. They appear, each with a red spot painted on each cheek, as an emblem of virginity. They seat themselves in a semi-circle on the prairie, and the hostess supplies each of them with a bowl of rice which is set before her. A boulder, painted red, is placed in front of them, about ten feet distant, and a large knife is thrust into the ground in front of, and close up to, the stone. All the young men attend as spectators. This ceremony is, on the part of the accused and any girl who takes a place in the ring, a challenge to the world, that, if any one has aught to say against her, he has the privilege of saying it. If nothing is said, and the feast is eaten uninterruptedly, the maiden who gave the feast is vindicated, and the gossip disbelieved; but if the challenge is taken up by any young buck, he steps forward and seizes the girl he accuses by the hand, pulls her out of the ring, and makes his charges. She has the right of swearing on the stone and knife to her innocence, which goes a great way in her vindication, but is not conclusive. If she swears, and he persists, an altercation ensues, and public sentiment is formed on view of the contestants' actions.

I remember once, at one of these trials, of seeing a young fellow of about twenty-five, step forward and rudely grasp the hand of a girl of about sixteen, jerk her to her feet, and make some scandalous charge against her. The look she gave him was so full of righteous indignation, scorn and offended virtue that no one could see it without being at once enlisted in her favor. She glared on him for a moment, with a look that only outraged innocence can assume, when shouts went up from the crowd, "Swear! Swear!" She approached the stone with the bearing of a princess, and placed her hand upon it with an air that could not be mistaken; then throwing a look of triumph at the spectators, she strode back to face her accuser with the confidence that bespeaks innocence. The fellow began to weaken, and in less than a moment was in full flight with a howling mob after him, hurling sticks and stones at him with no gentle intent. He disappeared, and the girl took her place in the ring as fully vindicated as if the lord chief justice of England had decided her case. I recollect very distinctly that my convictions of her innocence induced by the general features of the trial and conduct of the litigants were as strong as any member of the court.

It probably would not do to depend upon such evidence in the more complicated affairs of civilized life, and with a people educated in dissimulation and the control of the emotions, but with a simple and natural people I don't believe many mistakes were made in arriving at just judgments.

"Innocence unmoved
At a false accusation doth the more
Confirm itself; and guilt is best discover'd
By its own fears."

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THE ABORIGINAL WAR CORRESPONDENT.

From the earliest days of recorded history man has regarded his prowess in war as the most valuable of his exploits, and success in war has generally been measured by the number of slain on the battle-field. I don't know how the facts were arrived at in ancient times, and whether or not they had war correspondents who followed the armies and reported their doings I can't say, but as the art of printing was unknown, and the means of communication were very limited, it seems doubtful if the results were arrived at in that way. From what I know of human nature and character, I am convinced that, if the reports were made through the commanders in the field, the lists of the enemy slain may fairly be discounted about seventy-five per cent. Have we not had reports of the most exaggerated character as to the number of prisoners captured and enemies killed so recently as our Civil War? And have we ever read of a battle with the Indians or other uncivilized people where, after giving our own losses, we have not met with the old stereotyped report, "that the loss of the enemy was far greater, but as they always remove their dead and wounded, it is impossible to ascertain the exact number?" The wars now raging in the Philippines and Samoa form no exception to this familiar report. So far as our fights with the American Indians are concerned, I feel quite confident that, where we have killed one Indian, we have lost ten whites, take it through from the Atlantic to the Pacific; but you can't figure out any such results from the reports which have made up history. The temptation to exaggerate for the purpose of hero-making and future political preferment is too great to be resisted, and the consequence is that truth suffers amazingly. Perhaps it is better for mankind that the slaughter should be on paper, rather than in fact.

Modern warfare has introduced the new element of the war correspondent. He is generally either a creature of the commander, or desirous of flattering him for personal advantage or some other consideration, and he piles on the praises of the side he represents, diminishes the credit due the enemy, and resolves every doubt against him.

Now the Indian has a way of arriving at the truth of such matters which is infinitely more satisfactory than that of his white brother. He knows just as well as any one what boasters all men are on matters relating to their own exploits, and especially those relating to war, and in order that there shall be no humbug about such matters, he will give no credence to any statement that is not accompanied by the most irrefragable proof. When a warrior comes home and says, "I killed six enemies on my last raid," he is confronted with the demand to produce his evidence, and the only evidence admissible is the scalps of the dead enemies. Should he make such an assertion without the proof, he would be laughed out of the camp as a silly boaster.

Most people think the practice of scalping an enemy, generally indulged in by the Sioux, is a wanton desire cruelly to mutilate the foe. Such is not the case at all; he is prompted solely by the desire of procuring proof of his success, and he will take more chances to get a scalp than he would for any other object in life. Among the Sioux, and I believe most of the tribes of North America, for every enemy killed a warrior is entitled to wear a head-dress with an eagle feather in it, which to him fills the same place in his character and reputation as the Victoria cross or the medal of the legion of honor, or any other of the numerous decorations bestowed upon white men for deeds of bravery and honor; and to gain this distinction he is moved by the same impulse that actuated Hobson in sinking the Merrimac in the harbor of Santiago, or the actors in the thousand and one daring deeds in which men in all ages have freely risked their lives.

Scalping is an art, and the manner in which it is done, depends wholly upon the circumstances of the occasion. A complete and perfect scalp embraces the whole hair of the head, with a margin of skin all round it about two and a half inches in width, including both ears with all their ornaments. This can only be obtained when the victor has abundant time to operate leisurely. When he is beset by the enemy, all he can do, as a general thing, is to seize the hair with the left hand and hold up the scalp with it and then give a quick cut with his knife, and get as big a piece as he can. By this hurried process he rarely gets a piece larger than a small saucer, and generally not bigger than a silver dollar; but no matter how small it may be, it entitles him to his feather. Among the Sioux the killing of a full grown grizzly bear is equivalent to the killing of an enemy, and entitles the victor to the same decoration. I have known Indians who wore as many as sixteen feathers.

It is not alone the importance that these decorations give the wearer which enters into their value. When he returns from the war path, bearing scalps, he is received by all his band with demonstrations of the greatest pride and honor. If you can imagine Dewey landing at New York from the Philippines, you can form some idea of the honors that would be heaped upon a victorious savage. If the weather is pleasant, he strips to the waist, and paints his body jet black. He places on the top of his head a round ball of pure white swan's down, about the size of a large orange, and takes in his hand a staff, about five feet long, with a buckskin fringe tacked on to the upper three feet of it. On the end of each shred of the fringe is a piece of a deer's hoof, forming a rattle, by striking together when shaken up and down. When arrayed in this manner he marches up and down the village, recounting in a sort of a chant the entire history of the events of the raid on the enemy, going into the most minute details, and indulging in much imagination and superstition. He tells what he dreamed, what animals he saw, and how all these things influenced his conduct. He continues this ceremony for days and days, and is the admiration of all his people. I have seen four or five of them together promenading in this way, and have taken an interpreter and marched with them by the hour listening to their stories.

When this part of the performance is over, the scalps are tanned by the women, as they would tan a buffalo-skin, the inside painted red, and the whole stretched on a circular hoop, about the size of a barrel hoop, to which is attached a straight handle, about four feet long, so that it can be carried in the air above the heads of the people. It is also decorated with all the trinkets found on the person of the slain.

Then begins the dancing. When night comes the men arrange themselves in two lines, about fifteen feet apart, facing each other, all provided with tom-toms, and musical instruments of all kinds known to the savage. When everything is ready, they sing a kind of a weird chant, keeping time with the instruments and their feet. Then the squaws, with the scalps held aloft, dance in between the lines of men from opposite directions, until they meet, when they chassé to the right and left, then dance back and forward again, every once in a while emitting a sharp little screech which I have never known to be successfully imitated. During the dance, the men join in a kind of shuffle from right to left, and back again, keeping the music going all the time. The whole performance is one of the most savage and weird ceremonies I have ever witnessed. It is kept up for weeks.

It was a frequent amusement for half a dozen of us to throw blankets over our heads, and join in the dance for half an hour or so. I have been lulled to sleep many times by this wild music, heard from a distance of half a mile, on a still night.

It was supposed that when the scalp was taken while the leaves were on the trees, it was danced over until they fell, and then buried, and when taken in winter it was buried when the leaves came in the spring, but I never was quite sure about this. I wanted one very much once, and a party of us went in the night just back of St. Peter, where we supposed they had been buried, and dug for them, and to our horror struck the toes of a dead Indian. That cured my desire in this direction.

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BRED IN THE BONE.

In the early days of what is now Minnesota there were two families of missionaries living among the Sioux of the Mississippi, who, like many of their profession, devoted their whole lives to spreading the gospel of Christ among the savages. They were those of Dr. Williamson and the Rev. Stephen R. Riggs, both of whom had lived with these Indians long before I came among them. When I first became connected with these Indians I found the missionaries comfortably installed at the Yellow Medicine agency, with quite a village around them. They had dwelling houses, and a commodious schoolhouse, where they took Indian children at a very early age, with a view of civilizing and Christianizing them. They had also a very pretty church, with a steeple on it, and a bell in the steeple, and all the other buildings necessary for the complete and efficient operation of their laudable undertaking. They were full of zeal and enthusiasm in the cause, and had progressed to a point where it looked to an outsider as if success was only a question of a short time, if it was not already an accomplished fact. The Bible had been translated into the Sioux language, and they had hymn books and catechisms in the same language. They had learned to speak Sioux thoroughly, and could preach and sing in that language. Many is the time I have attended church at the little meeting house, and heard the simple old Presbyterian hymns sung to the tunes that have resounded for generations through the meeting houses of New England. It was a most solemn and impressive spectacle, in the heart of the Indian country, to see a Christian church filled with devout worshippers all in the costume of savagery, and to listen to the oft-told story of the Saviour who died that man might live. Such a scene carries with it a much more convincing proof of the universality of the Christian religion than a church full of fashionably dressed people in a great city. It suggests its limitless application to all the human race, even if dwelling in the remotest part of the earth.

The experience of these good missionaries had taught them that civilization was the most potent auxiliary to religion, and, for the success of either, the other was a necessary aid and adjunct when dealing with these primitive people. So they set themselves to work to devise plans to instill into the Indians the elemental principles of government based on law. They organized a little state or community among them, through which they endeavored to prove to them the advantages of civilized rule through the agency of officers of their own choice and laws of their own making. They called their state "The Hazelwood Republic," which embraced all the missionary establishment, and all the Indians they could induce to unite in the enterprise. They drew a written constitution, the provisions of which were to govern and direct the conduct of the members and the workings of the community. Of course, the fundamental principles upon which the whole fabric rested were similar to those taught by the ten commandments. The Indians, with the advice of the missionaries, elected a president for the young republic, and the choice fell upon a wise and upright man, about fifty years of age, whose name was Ma-za-cu-ta-ma-mi, or "The man who shoots metal as he walks," and to give the matter a more pronounced ecclesiastical aspect, they added a scriptural name by way of a prefix to the names of all the officers. For instance, they called the president, Paul Ma-za-cu-ta-ma-mi, and one of the deacons, Simon Ana-wang-ma-ni, which means "The man who can keep up with any moving object;" or, as things turned out in the end, it could well have been translated into the "Fast Man."

The first act necessary for initiation as a citizen of the republic was cutting off the long hair universally worn by the Sioux, and if any act could be taken as indicative of sincerity, this one seemed to be conclusive. It is quite as much of a sacrifice for an Indian to cut off his hair as it would be for a young lady in society possessed of a splendid suit of hair to cut it off short and appear at a grand ball with her head thus denuded.

The next step was to wear a hat, and exchange the breech-clout for pantaloons, and the blanket for a shirt or coat. Notwithstanding this terrible ordeal of naturalization, the population of the republic increased, and the church was well attended. The praying and singing was participated in quite generally by the members, and the future republic looked promising. One of the most exemplary citizens and devout worshippers was deacon Simon Ana-wang-ma-ni. He led in prayer, and labored heart and soul for the good of the republic and the church. He was the last man that anyone would have expected to fall from grace, and no one ever thought of such a thing; but, strange as it may appear, he one day sought an interview with the missionaries, and announced the astounding fact that an Indian who had killed his cousin some eight years before had returned from the Missouri river country, and he thought it was his duty to kill him in retaliation. The astonishment of the missionaries may be well imagined. They cited to him the commandment, "Thou shalt not kill," and dwelt upon the awful sinfulness of such an act, and he would say, "I know what the Bible says, and I believe in Sundays, but he killed my cousin." Then they would attack him on the laws of the republic of which he was a high official, and dwell upon the dreadful example such an act would set before the brethren of the church, and he would reply, "Oh, yes; I know all that; but he killed my cousin." Then, in despair, they would tell him that he was no longer an Indian; that he had become a white man, and the laws of the white man forbid such revenge. "I know all that," he would say, "but he killed my cousin." As a final resort, the faithful and believing missionaries concluded to call in the aid of heaven to assist them, and they prayed with Simon for hours, days and nights, in all of which he joined with fervor and unction; but he could not divest himself of the all-pervading idea that his cousin had been killed, and the sacred duty had devolved upon him to avenge his death. This belief had been born in him, and no religion of the white man could eradicate it. True to the creed of his ancestors, he got a double-barrelled shotgun and went out and killed his enemy.

Of course, this murder opened up a new feud, arraying relative against relative, and destroyed Simon's influence as a deacon in the church and an officer of the republic to such a degree as almost to destroy all the good that both had accomplished. I mention this incident to show what uncertain ground the missionaries find to sow the seeds of Christianity in when working among savages.

Notwithstanding such discouragements as the above, I believe much good was done through the efforts of the missionaries. In times of great trouble and excitement I always found the best friends of the whites among the Indians who had felt the enlightening influences of the missionaries, not excepting Simon, who with Paul, John Otherday, and many others, performed heroic services for the whites when friends were most needed; but I have never been able to settle the question in my mind as to whether any of them ever grasped the principles of the Christian religion.

In 1862 the Sioux openly rebelled against the whites, and it was solely through the good offices of Otherday and Paul that these missionaries escaped massacre. All their buildings and their labor of long years were destroyed, and they were driven out of the country. Most people would have thought that they would have had enough of such a life. I know I thought so, but not so with these devoted people. Shortly after the suppression of the outbreak I met Dr. Williamson, and asked him what were his future intentions. Without the least hesitation he answered that he would look up the remnant of his tribe, and continue his work.

All the heroes are not found in the ranks of the fighters.

NOTE.—The reader of both the history and the frontier stories will notice that many of the facts stated in the history are repeated in the stories. I decided to insert both because the different way in which they are related led me to believe that the elimination of either would detract from the interest of the work.

THE AUTHOR.

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AN ACCOMPLISHED RASCAL.

In the late fifties a young man of very attractive manners and extraordinary accomplishments appeared in St. Peter. His name was La Croix, or at least he said it was, and no questions were asked. We had not at that time acquired the habit of asking newcomers what names they went by in the States, as was the usual practice in the early settlement of Texas and California. We were an unsuspicious people, and accepted those who settled among us for what they said they were and appeared to be.

It was soon discovered that La Croix spoke French fluently; nearly all our first settlers were French. He said he learned it while living in New Orleans. He soon developed a large acquaintance with military matters, and we made him captain of our militia company (now the national guard), and he drilled us up to a high state of discipline and skill in company tactics and movements. I had the honor of being second lieutenant of the company. This art, he said, he acquired as sergeant of a company in the crack New York Seventh.

He was a graceful and adroit fencer, and could explain the difference between the French system and the American plan as taught at West Point. I learned both from him. His conversational powers and the extent of his general knowledge surpassed anything that ever graced the border. In a word, he possessed all the qualities, including personal beauty, that were necessary to make him a general favorite with both men and women. He did not fail to improve all his advantages.

He soon became the trusted bookkeeper for one of our business concerns, courted and married a lovely young girl from a neighboring town, and settled down to a life of domestic felicity, esteemed by all, questioned by none.

Shortly after his marriage the Civil War began, and in due course of time a baby was born to his house. Shortly after the latter event he announced that news had arrived that certain stock of the Chemical Bank, in New York, which he had inherited from his father, who had died in New Orleans, was in danger of confiscation by the federal government as rebel property, and he was obliged to go East and take care of it. He made the most elaborate preparations for the comfort of his wife and child during his absence, and departed. We gave him a splendid send-off, and several of us, I among the rest, entrusted him with commissions to perform for us in New York, and for a long time that was the last we heard of La Croix.

Of course, there were many who said, "I told you so," but they had not done anything of the kind; we were all taken in without exception. His wife was the last to lose confidence in his return. I followed up every clue she could give me, but without results. He had disappeared as completely as if the ground had opened and swallowed him up, and we forgot him.

The war was fought out, and peace returned. A Connecticut regiment, commanded by Colonel Brevet Brigadier General Thompson (I will call him that for certain reasons) was mustered out in one of the chief cities of that state, and nothing was too good for its gallant commander. He was sought after socially, and by the business community, and soon became as popular as La Croix had been in St. Peter. He married one of the most beautiful and aristocratic young ladies of the state, and was appointed to the position of general inspector of agencies of one of the great insurance companies of Connecticut, and he decided to improve the opportunity of his first tour as a pleasant way of passing his honeymoon. So he started west with his confiding wife.

I forgot to mention that, when La Croix reached St. Paul, after leaving St. Peter, he drew and cashed a small draft of a few hundred dollars on his employer, and appropriated the proceeds.

Thompson's luck seemed to have deserted him on his wedding trip, as, on arriving at Cleveland, Ohio, a citizen of St. Peter met and recognized him as his old friend La Croix, and not knowing he was a brigadier general slapped him familiarly on the shoulder and said: "Hello, La Croix; I am glad to see you." The general was immensely indignant, and spurned his new found friend, which angered the latter exceedingly, and he at once telegraphed to St. Peter, and received a reply to have the party arrested and held, which he did. The general wired to his principals, setting forth his difficulty, saying it was all a case of mistaken identity. They instructed their agent in Cleveland to go General Thompson's bail for any amount required, which was done, and he at once started for home to procure evidence, leaving his wife to await his return, and that was the last seen of General Thompson for many years. I believe, however, he was once recognized in Vienna.

Time passed; the West grew and expanded; many new states were added to the Union; many immigrants were attracted to its fertile fields and booming cities, very few of their number hailing from either Minnesota or Connecticut. Among them, however, was a gentleman of most attractive mien. He went into the real estate business, and greatly prospered. His varied accomplishments soon made him the most popular man in his state. He united with the political party which held the power. He married an attractive young woman, and settled down to a quiet and respectable domesticity. In the course of events a United States senator was to be elected, and what was more natural than that this intelligent, respectable and popular citizen should be considered a worthy candidate. The legislature convened, his prospects of election were more than promising, and he would undoubtedly have been chosen had not some meddlesome fellow recognized him as the long lost La Croix. Of course, he disappeared, and this time, permanently.

The moral of this story is, that it is better, as a general thing, to find out what name people went by in the States before you either marry them or elect them to the United States senate.

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AN ADVOCATE'S OPINION OF HIS OWN ELOQUENCE IS NOT ALWAYS RELIABLE.

In the early days of the territory a large part of the legal business arose out of misunderstandings about claim lines and the attempts of settlers to jump the claims of other people. These suits usually took the shape of trespass and forcible entry and detainer. In some instances they ripened into assaults and batteries, and were generally tried before justices of the peace. Nearly all the people were French, and that language was quite as usually spoken as English. The town of Mendota was almost exclusively French and half-breed Sioux, the latter speaking French if they deviated from their native tongue. One of our earliest lawyers was Jacob J. Noah, from New York. He was the son of a very celebrated journalist of that city, and was a very cultured and accomplished gentleman. He spoke French like a native, which, no doubt, had a good deal to do with his living at Mendota. That town boasted of a justice of the peace, who occupied an exalted position in the estimation of the French inhabitants, on account of his learning and established character for justice and fair dealing. He was a handsome old gentleman, with white hair and beard and impressive judicial manner. About the year 1855, among the new arrivals in the legal fraternity, was Mr. John B. Brisbin, also from New York. He was a graduate of Yale, and acquainted with some of the leading lawyers in St. Paul, so his advent was announced with a good many flourishes, and he soon took a leading stand in the profession. Mr. Brisbin was a cultured and eloquent lawyer, and no one knew it better than himself. He settled in St. Paul. Soon after his arrival a controversy arose between a couple of settlers in Dakota county about their claim boundaries, and a suit was brought before the French justice at Mendota. Major Noah represented the plaintiff and the defendant employed Mr. Brisbin. It being Brisbin's first appearance in court, he made extraordinary preparations, intending to create a favorable impression. He discovered some fault in the law of the plaintiff's case, and when the parties met in court, he demurred to the plaintiff's complaint, and made an exhaustive argument in support of his position. He was fortified with numerous citations from English and New York cases, all of which he read to the court. When he would become particularly impressive, the court would evince signs of deep interest, which convinced the speaker that he was carrying everything before him. When he finished his argument, he looked at his adversary with a confident and somewhat exultant expression, as if to say, "Answer that if you can."

The major opened his case to the court in French, and had hardly begun before Mr. Brisbin interposed an objection, that he did not understand French, and that legal proceedings in this country had to be conducted in English. The major answered by saying: "I am only interpreting to the court what you have been saying." Mr. Brisbin indignantly replied: "I don't want any interpretation of my argument; I made myself perfectly clear in what I said." "Oh, yes," said the major, "you made a very clear and strong argument; but his honor, the judge, does not understand a single word of English," which was literally true. Tradition adds that when the court adjourned, the judge was heard to ask the major: "Est ce qu'il y a une femme dans cette cause la?" Whether the court decided the case on the theory of there being a woman in it or not, history has failed to record.

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A MOMENTOUS MEETING.

The people of St. Paul have often been proud of a remark which was made by Hon. Wm. H. Seward, in a speech delivered by him in 1860, at the old capitol on Wabasha street, where he said he believed that the center of power on the North American continent would be very near the spot where he stood. Everybody, while they liked the prediction, looked upon it as a pleasant way the speaker had of giving his hosts and St. Paul a little "taffy," and nothing more. Such, however, was not the case, and Mr. Seward, when he uttered the prophecy, was thoroughly impressed with the truth of what he said, as I will prove further on.

This speech was delivered on the 18th of September, 1860. If I remember correctly, Mr. Seward was on an electioneering tour in support of Lincoln's candidacy for the presidency, and that Hon. James W. Ney of New York, afterwards governor of Nevada, was of the party; but I am not very sure of these facts, and they are not at all material to the point I am about to make. Mr. Seward stayed at the Merchant's Hotel, at the foot of Jackson street, kept by our well known host, Colonel Allen, while he remained in St. Paul.

Many of the older settlers will remember James W. Taylor of St. Paul, who, for many years, represented the United States as consul at Winnipeg. Mr. Taylor was the most popular man in that city. He was not only esteemed for his superior ability as an official, but was beloved by all classes of the people for his gentle and genial manners. He was a great friend of Bishop Anderson of Rupert's Land, who, for twenty years, had performed the duties of missionary bishop of that far away country. He had travelled the McKenzie river to its mouth in the Arctic ocean. He had been all over Alaska, up and down the Yukon, and, in fact, knew more about the vast country that lies north and northwest of the United States than any living man at the date we are speaking of. It so happened that the bishop and Consul Taylor were on a visit to St. Paul at the time of the arrival of Mr. Seward, and were also guests at the Merchant's Hotel. They, of course, called on the distinguished American, Mr. Seward, who became deeply interested in the conversation of the bishop about his travels through this vast upper region, and was so impressed with the immensity and future possibilities of the country that he forgot all about his appointment to speak at the capitol, and kept his audience waiting for nearly an hour before he could tear himself away from the fascination of the bishop's conversation.

The topic Mr. Seward had selected for his speech was one in which he was profoundly interested. It was, "The Duty, Responsibility, and Future Power of the Northwest," which was a magnificent subject for discussion by such a thoughtful statesman. Before meeting Bishop Anderson, Mr. Seward had conceived certain theories on the question, as the quotation which I shall make from his speech clearly establishes, and that these preconceived ideas had been, by his intercourse with the bishop, radically changed, if not thoroughly overthrown, seems equally clear. It must be remembered that, in 1860, very little was known about Alaska and the British possessions in the far northern regions, and it is quite possible that even a man of Mr. Seward's learning may not have included them in his calculations for the future. Of course, what he said about his preconceived conclusions, and the subsequent changes made in them, involved the fact of the absorption into the United States of the whole continent, which in all probability will happen at some future time.

When Mr. Seward arrived at the capitol, he was introduced by John W. North, and, among other things, said:

"In other days, studying what might perhaps have seemed to others a visionary subject, I have cast about for the future—the ultimate central power of the North American people. I have looked at Quebec and New Orleans, at Washington and at San Francisco, at Cincinnati and St. Louis, and it has been the result of my last conjecture that the seat of power of North America would yet be found in the Valley of Mexico,—that the glories of the Aztec capital would be renewed, and that city would become ultimately the capital of the United States of America. But I have corrected that view, and I now believe that the last seat of power on this great continent will be found somewhere within a radius of not very far from the very spot where I now stand, at the head of navigation on the Mississippi river and on the great Mediterranean lakes."

When and where had this correction been made? Doubtless an hour before, at the Merchant's Hotel, through the influence of the interview with Bishop Anderson. While at the capitol they visited the rooms of the Historical Society, where the bishop made a short address to Mr. Seward, to which Mr. Seward responded. Now, all this might have happened, and been of no particular interest to the world, except as a pleasant episode between two distinguished men. But in this instance it turned out to be of vital importance to three of the greatest nations of the world. Mr. Seward was so deeply impressed with the St. Paul incident that, immediately after his return to Washington, he opened negotiations with the Russian government for the purchase of Alaska, and persistently carried them on, until he succeeded in acquiring that vast empire for a mere bagatelle of seven or eight millions of dollars. This remarkable prevision of Mr. Seward has stamped its effect on our present and future destiny and relations with England, Canada, Russia and perhaps all the nations of the Orient. Had not Mr. Seward visited St. Paul on that exact day, would this great change have been made in the map of North America? It certainly would not after the discovery of gold in Alaska. So I claim that Minnesota played an all-important role in the purchase of Alaska.

Having spoken of my dear old friend, James W. Taylor, I cannot omit to mention a most touching tribute paid to his memory by the people of Winnipeg. The municipality has placed upon the walls of its city hall a fine portrait of the faithful consul, under which hangs a basket for the reception of flowers. Every spring each farmer entering the city plucks a wild flower, and puts it in the basket. The great love of a people could not be expressed in a more beautiful and pathetic manner, and no man was more worthy of it than Consul Taylor.

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A PRIMITIVE JUSTICE.

The lands west of the Mississippi river, in Minnesota, were the property of the Sioux Indians until treaties were made with them in 1851, by which they ceded them to the United States, but these treaties were not fully ratified until 1853, on account of amendments which deferred final action. But immigration was pouring into the territory, and it naturally found a lodgment on the west side of the river, from the Iowa line up to Fort Snelling, and gradually extended up the Minnesota river to Mankato. Of course, all the settlers on the Indian lands were trespassers, and as the lands were unsurveyed, no claim rights could be acquired, but the settlers did the best they could to mark their claims, and gain what right they could by possession. The usual and best way of marking claim lines, was by running a plow furrow around the land. When the prairie was once broken, the line was indelible, because an entirely new growth would spring up in the furrow that never could be eradicated.

In 1854 a law of congress was passed, by which settlers in Minnesota were given rights in unsurveyed lands, their claims to be adjusted to the surveyed lines, when they were run, "as near as may be."

Of course, this condition of things gave rise to many disputes about claim lines and rights, and as there were no legal tribunals to appeal to, we organized claim associations to protect our rights. In my part of the territory we had an association that covered what is now Blue Earth, Nicollet and Le Sueur counties, and most of the actual settlers were members, and all were pledged to support each other against any one attempting to jump the claim of any member. Protection, of course, meant driving out the intruder and restoring the rightful owner to his possession. The means of reaching the object were not defined, but were understood to be adequate to the necessities of the occasion.

I had made a claim on the second plateau, back of what afterwards became the town site of St. Peter, and Gibson Patch, the sheriff of Nicollet county, had settled on the adjoining quarter section. These claims covered the ground where the Scandinavian college now stands, called, I think, "Gustavus Adolphus."

I was the president of the Nicollet county branch of the claim association.

About 1855 the government survey lines were extended over our lands, and we had to adjust our lines to those of the official surveys as best we could. It so happened that the established lines left the shanty of my neighbor, the sheriff, outside of the quarter section he had always claimed, and before he discovered this fact, a man designing to take advantage of the sheriff's peculiar situation, and intending to jump his claim, erected a shanty on his land and moved his family into it. It was soon discovered, and Patch notified the claim association, which immediately assembled and decided that the jumper must be ejected and banished from the county. It was winter time. A committee of one hundred and fifty was delegated to perform the work at a certain day and hour. The jumper heard of it, and in the morning of the day fixed, he prudently fled down the river. Being president of the association, it devolved upon me to lead the party. We arrived at the house, and finding no opposition, we politely informed the family of our mission, and offered them comfortable transportation to any point they would name for themselves and their portable belongings, which they accepted. We then burned the house, and appointed two committees of ten each to chase the jumper down each side of the river, with full discretion to punish him as they saw fit. They pursued him for about forty miles, and it was fortunate for the fugitive that they did not overtake him, because had they caught him after two p. m., I think they would have been in a condition of mind that would have resulted in his summary execution.

Of course, we thought no more about it, as matters of that kind were of frequent occurrence; but that was not the last of it. It turned out that the jumper was a Mason of high degree, and when he got to St. Paul he made a most pitiable complaint, charging me with destroying his home, and with attempting to murder him. I was a small Mason, and was cited before the lodge to defend myself. I simply denied the jurisdiction, and did not appear. I was tried, and triumphantly acquitted.

On another occasion a claim was jumped in Le Sueur, just between upper and lower town, and the jumper had a great many friends who rallied to his defense. The associations of all three counties were called out, and when we appeared at Le Sueur, we found about seventy-five Irishmen, all well armed, camped on the contested claim ready to defend it to the death. We camped at a short distance, and negotiations were opened between the hostile armies, which finally resulted in some sort of a compromise, satisfactory to the contesting parties, one of whom (the original claimant) was K. K. Peck, who was left in possession of the disputed territory. Mr. Peck laid his claim out into lots, and gave each one of the members of the association that had come to his rescue a deed for a lot, which we called a "land warrant," on account of services in the Peck war; but before we could realize on our warrants, the government surveys located a school section on the battle-field, and destroyed all our hopes.