"At another landing a mob collected and began throwing stones through the cabin windows, smashing the glass and sash, and jeopardizing the lives of the passengers. This was a little too much for human forbearance. The boat was in command of the famous Mormon captain, Dan Jones; his Welsh blood was now thoroughly warm; he knew what mobs meant. Mustering the brethren, with determined wrath he ordered them to parade with loaded muskets on the side of the boat assailed. Then he informed the mob that if they did not instantly desist, he would shoot them down like so many dogs; and like so many dogs they slunk away.
"As the Maid of Iowa had made slow progress, and had been frequently passed by more swift-going steamers, her progress was well known by the friends of Nauvoo. So on the day of our arrival the saints were out en masse to welcome us. I had never before seen any of those assembled, yet I felt certain, as the boat drew near, that I should be able to pick out the prophet Joseph at first sight. This belief I communicated to Mrs. Bennett, whose acquaintance I had made on the voyage. She wondered at it; but I felt impressed by the spirit that I should know him. As we neared the pier the prophet was standing among the crowd. At the moment, however, I recognized him according to the impression, and pointed him out to Mrs. Bennett, with whom I was standing alone on the hurricane deck.
"Scarcely had the boat touched the pier when, singularly enough, Joseph sprang on board, and, without speaking with any one, made his way direct to where we were standing, and addressing Mrs. Bennett by name, thanked her kindly for lifting the embargo from his boat, and blessed her for so materially aiding the saints."
CHAPTER XXX.
RISE OF NAUVOO—INTRODUCTION OF POLYGAMY—MARTYRDOM OF JOSEPH AND HYRUM—CONTINUATION OF ELIZA R. SNOW'S NARRATIVE—HER ACCEPTANCE OF POLYGAMY, AND MARRIAGE TO THE PROPHET—GOVERNOR CARLIN'S TREACHERY—HER SCATHING REVIEW OF THE MARTYRDOM—MOTHER LUCY'S STORY OF HER MURDERED SONS.
Meanwhile, since the reader has been called to drop the historical thread of the saints in America for a view of the rise of Mormonism in foreign lands, Nauvoo, whose name signifies "the beautiful city," has grown into an importance worthy her romantic name and character as the second Zion. Nauvoo was bidding fair to become the queen of the West; and had she been allowed to continue her career for a quarter of a century, inspired by the gorgeous genius of her prophet, although she would not have rivaled Chicago or St. Louis as a commercial city, yet would she have become the veritable New Jerusalem of America—in the eyes of the "Gentiles" scarcely less than in the faith of our modern Israel.
Polygamy, also, by this time has been introduced into the Church, and the examples of the patriarchs Abraham and Jacob, and of kings David and Solomon, have begun to prevail. That the "peculiar institution" was the cross of the sisterhood in those days, it would be heartless to attempt to conceal, for, as already seen, the first wives of the founders of Mormondom were nearly all daughters of New England, whose monogamic training was of the severest kind, and whose monogamic conceptions were of the most exacting nature.
Polygamy was undoubtedly introduced by Joseph himself, at Nauvoo, between 1840 and 1844. Years afterwards, however, a monogamic rival church, under the leadership of young Joseph Smith, the first born of the prophet, arose, denying that the founder of Mormondom was the author of polygamy, and affirming that its origin was in Brigham Young, subsequent to the martyrdom of the prophet and his brother Hyrum. This, with the fact that nearly the whole historic weight of polygamy rests with Utah, renders it expedient that we should barely touch the subject at Nauvoo, and wait for its stupendous sensation after its publication to the world by Brigham Young—a sensation that Congress has swelled into a national noise, and that General Grant has made the hobgoblin of his dreams.
Nor can we deal largely with the history of Nauvoo. It is not the representative period of the sisters. They only come in with dramatic force in their awful lamentation over the martyrdom, which was not equaled in Jerusalem at the crucifixion. The great historic period of the women of Mormondom is during the exodus of the Church and its removal to the Rocky Mountains, when they figured quite as strongly as did the women of ancient Israel in the exodus from Egypt. We can scarcely hope to do full justice to that period, but hasten to some of its salient views. And here the historic thread shall be principally continued by Eliza R. Snow. She, touching the city of the saints, and then slightly on the introduction of polygamy, says:
"The location of the city of Nauvoo was beautiful, but the climate was so unhealthy that none but Latter-day Saints, full of faith, and trusting in the power of God, could have established that city. Chills and fever was the prevailing disease. Notwithstanding we had this to contend with, through the blessing of God on the indefatigable exertions of the saints, it was not long before Nauvoo prompted the envy and jealousy of many of the adjacent inhabitants, and, as the 'accuser of the brethren' never sleeps, we had many difficulties to meet, which ultimately culminated in the most bitter persecutions.