"If I strike a man here, as I frequently do, who has been to these other places in early times I follow him up there for all it is worth of course, the same as here."
At Colorado Springs Mrs. Helen Hunt Jackson, author of a Century of Dishonor, asked Mr. Bancroft to adopt her views on the Colorado Indian wars. With reference to this matter, he wrote on October 13th, the day of his departure for Denver, as follows:
"She wishing a thing done would be the very reason I would not do it if I could help it. I speak of it that you may get the work and use the information. I do not care about mentioning her name one way or another in the whole work. She has been polite enough here, although she has a broken leg, but I don't care for her politeness. I should have had fair recognition for the service I did her in the matter of her California articles in the Century which I never got."
Writing subsequently from Denver on November 2d, he says: "Everybody in Colorado, nearly, is against Mrs. Jackson on what some call the Chevington massacre. That side don't call it a massacre, but a fight. I should give their side in full, then say some few took exception to this action, and there let it stand on its merits—that is, I think so now."
In the same letter Mr. Bancroft announced that he was going over the Rocky Mountain News with Mr. Byers, the founder and former editor, "a man of remarkable ability and memory," whose dictation to a shorthand reporter was given, he said, in such a way that it was almost pure history and could be taken from his manuscript as fast as one could write. This he advised Mrs. Victor to take as a basis for Colorado history, building upon it and giving it the preference in regard to discrepancy of statement. He also called attention to the fact that "a lot of people" had in one way and another wandered over the region before white men settled there, and said he supposed that what Coronado did should first be considered. As to the wanderings of Spaniards in Colorado, a schedule sent about this time refers Mrs. Victor to all Oak had written on the subject, to the first few pages of the History of Utah, and to the original authorities upon which the latter was based. After calling attention to some works of travel, such as Fremont's writings and Renton's Adventures in Mexico and the Rocky Mountains, he asked Mr. Nemos to see that the material for Mrs. Victor's use in preparing the volume be taken out more thoroughly than had heretofore been the case, and upon this point directed him to consult the early volumes of the series and make this correspond. Mrs. Victor subsequently asked that she be permitted to take out her own notes, and the request was granted as Mr. Bancroft had now decided to reduce the number of his force as fast as possible and bring the work to a conclusion. Already on October 25th, he had given as his opinion that Colorado should make about half of the volume, at the same time inquiring what laws of Colorado and Wyoming were desired, and recommending a study of "Hepworth Dixon's work on the Great West, Bonneville's Adventures, and Bayard Taylor's Travels."
Writing from Cheyenne on November 8th, Mr. Bancroft announced the shipment of a small package of Wyoming stuff, all that he had been able to secure, and also his intention to have some one take matter from the office files of the newspapers of that place, the Sun and Leader, the latter of which was very complete. Though returning himself to Denver, that day, he promised to have more Wyoming dictations taken.
In a letter dated the next day, he expressed the opinion that a proper division of the work would be made by devoting three hundred and fifty pages to Colorado, two hundred and twenty-five to Nevada, and one hundred and seventy-five to Wyoming, and requested that the writing be done on that basis until some change should be found necessary. In closing, he suggests another line of research to be carried through the volume in the words: "And all the way from the Gulf of Mexico to British Columbia, I want to pay special attention to the cattle interest and cattle men, the origin and development of the industry, one of the most marvelous and important of modern times."
The last letter dealing with the manner of treatment of material dated October 9, 1885, asks Mrs. Victor to do the best she can with Mackey and the silver question in order to satisfy Mr. Stone, the publishing agent, whose work, Mr. Bancroft said, was hard enough at best.
It thus appears that three leading objects were kept constantly in mind at this time: one, the handling of the various subjects in such a way as not to displease the people in the district written up, that the work might be popular and the work of the canvassers easy as they went about soliciting subscriptions for it; another, the writing of the various chapters in such a way that the first draft would constitute finished history and take up no more space than that assigned in the volume; and finally, and really at the bottom of the preceding, a desire to have the history written as soon as possible. Evidence that Mr. Bancroft wished to have the work done in the least possible time and with the least possible cost is abundant in these letters.
In October Nemos had been set to counting the pages which Mrs. Victor had written since entering the library, a proceeding which she resented, believing that it afforded no just basis for judging her historical work. The next letter from Mr. Bancroft, on October 20th, brought the request that she bring the work "at first writing within the requisite compass so as not to make it so terribly costly." An intimation that greater haste would be pleasing was again conveyed on November 1st, when Mr. Bancroft expressed the confidence that if Mrs. Victor were to write three volumes more, they would be done in three years instead of six, a view of the case most contrary to hers, since before entering the library she had already worked out many of the problems in Oregon history, and now that she was entering upon another field, found more time necessary. That Mr. Bancroft did not make allowance for this, however, is shown by a letter written on November 17th. Here he begins the subject by stating that it would be a great mistake to suppose that he was dissatisfied with Mrs. Victor's work, or that any one had in the faintest degree criticised it, and says that all he wants is to practice such economy of time and money as will enable him to complete the work before he is dead or has failed in business. Then he proceeds to reckon up results thus: