Ten o’clock, Wednesday morning, April 22d, Meacham is being transported to Ferree’s ranch at the south end of the Klamath lake twelve miles from Linkville. We have been here before. It was on the 27th of December, 1869, when conducting Captain Jack’s band on to Klamath Reservation. Then Captain Jack acknowledged the authority of the Government and was endeavoring to be a man. Now he is an outlaw. After a stormy passage across Tule lake last night, Fields and Dr. Cabanis landed at Gilliam’s camp. The surgeons are visiting the hospitals. Some of the patients are improving, but on one poor fellow we see the signet of the grim monster. The sunset gun tonight will not disturb him.
Lieut. Eagan is still improving. Fairchild is in camp, and assuring Gen. Gilliam that as “soon as the Oregon volunteers arrive, the Modocs will throw down their guns and come right out and surrender;” Riddle and wife in camp also, and assisting to care for the sick. “Muybridge,” the celebrated landscape artist, of San Francisco, is here with his instruments, photographing the “Lava Beds,” the council tent, and the scene of the assassination. “Bunker,” of the “San Francisco Bulletin,” is on the ground reporting for his paper. “Bill Dad,” with his long hair floating in the
wind and a pipe in his mouth, slipshod and sloven, still hovers around to keep the readers of the “Record” posted.
Gen. Gilliam is consulting with his officers; they are indignant at the inaction manifested. Donald McKay and his Warm Springs Indians are scouting under the direction of army officers. Both Donald and his men are disgusted with the red-tape way of fighting Modocs.
Captain Jack and his people are quiet this morning. They are so closely hidden that even the sharp eyes of Donald McKay cannot discern their whereabouts. Captain Jack’s men are anxious to be on the warpath; but the chief restrains them. They, in turn, reproach him with want of courage. He insists that they must act on the defensive. Bogus, Boston, Shacknasty Jim and Hooker Jim are rebellious and threaten to desert. Couriers are bearing despatches to Y-re-ka announcing that “the Modocs cannot escape.”
A gun from the deck of the “Oriflamme” tells the people of San Francisco of her arrival with the remains of Gen. Canby. An immense concourse of citizens escort the hearse to the head-quarters of the army.
The widow sits in a carriage, with unmoistened eyes, while the populace pay homage to the great character of her husband. The body of Dr. Thomas is quietly resting with the dead, while he in spirit is enjoying the glories of eternal life; his last sermon preached, his trials over.
The three children of Meacham are drying their tears, and thanking God that they are not fatherless, and for the love of a brotherhood that brings to their home sunshine in the faces and words of Secretary
Chadwick and Col. T. H. Cann, who have called this morning.
Away up in Umatilla, a young man, who has been bowed down with grief over a second great bereavement, this morning reads to the little orphans that climb on his knees, and their widowed mother, the telegram signed by Capt. Ferree, announcing the recovery of his brother. His joy is unbounded. A great load has been lifted from his shoulders and his heart.