For answer, Mr. Bryant pointed out a line of blue slopes in the distance. “Those are not very high hills, my boy, to be sure, but they are on the rolling prairie beyond, and as soon as we get away from the river we shall find a bluffy and diversified country, I’ll warrant you.”
“Yes; don’t you remember,” broke in Oscar, eagerly, “Governor Robinson’s book told all about the rolling and undulating country of the Territory, and the streams that run under high bluffs in some places?”
Sandy admitted that this was true of the book; but he added, “Some books do lie, though.”
“Not Governor Robinson’s book,” commented his brother Charlie, with a slight show of resentment. For Charlie had made a study of the reports from the Promised Land.
But a more pressing matter was the attitude of the border-State men toward the free-State emigrants, and the question of making the necessary purchases for their farming scheme. Parkville was all alive with people, and there were many border-State men among them. Some of these 25 regarded the newcomers with unmistakable hostility, noting which, Sandy and Oscar took good care to keep near their two grown-up protectors; and the two men always went about with their weapons within easy reaching distance. All of the Borderers were opposed to any more free-State men going into the Territory; and many of them were disposed to stop this by force, if necessary. At one time, the situation looked very serious, and Sandy got his “pepper-box” into position. But the trouble passed away, and the arrival of fifteen or twenty teams, accompanied by a full complement of men, checked a rising storm of wrath.
From Platte City, a short distance up the river, however, came doleful and distressing stories of the ill-treatment of the free-State men who had gone that way. They were harassed and hindered, and, in some cases, their teams were deliberately turned about and driven back on the road by which they had come. It was useless to remonstrate when the rifles of a dozen men were levelled at the would-be immigrants. But our travellers in Parkville heard a good story of the bravery of one free-State man who had been refused transportation across the ferry at Platte City, kept by an ardent pro-slavery man. The intending immigrant, unconscious of any hindrance to his crossing, was calmly driving down to the ferry-boat, a flat-bottomed craft propelled by long oars, or sweeps, when the ferryman stopped him with the question, “What hev ye got into yer waggin?” 26
“Oxen,” sententiously replied the newcomer.
“And what’s them thar cattle follering on behind?” he asked, pointing to a drove of milch-cattle in the rear.
“Caouws,” answered the immigrant, in the broad pronunciation peculiar to provincial people of the New England States.
“All right,” was the rejoinder; “a man that says ‘caouws’ can’t go over this yere ferry withouten he’s got the tickets.” No argument would induce the ferryman to explain what the tickets were and where they could be procured. Finally, his patience exhausted, the free-State man suddenly drew from the big pockets of his frock a pair of tremendous pistols, ready cocked, and, holding them full in the face of the surprised ferryman, he said,––