CHAPTER XX.

LINCOLN ON THE MISSOURI.

Having permanently left the service of the American Fur Company, Captain La Barge spent the three years, 1857–59, mainly on the lower river, not generally going above Council Bluffs. In the summer of 1859 he built a fine new boat, one of the best that ever went up the river. Pierre Chouteau, Jr., having heard of his undertaking, sent to him and offered any assistance that might be needed. The Company still cherished a high appreciation of Captain La Barge’s services and would gladly have taken him back into their employ. The captain thanked Mr. Chouteau, but never took advantage of his offer. When he had finished his boat he named her the _Emilie_, for one of his daughters. Soon after this he received a polite note from Mr. Chouteau, telling him to order a complete stand of colors for the boat and he would pay the bill. The captain was much embarrassed, for he knew that Mr. Chouteau had made the offer under the impression that the boat had been named in honor of his wife. When La Barge declined his generous offer and explained why, Mr. Chouteau said: “That’s all right. I am glad you have told me so frankly. You did well to name the boat for your daughter.”

[Sidenote: THE “EMILIE.”]

The _Emilie_ was one of the famous boats of the Missouri River. She was 225 feet long, 32 feet beam, with a hold 6 feet deep, and could easily carry 500 tons. She was a sidewheel boat, built on the most approved lines, and an exceedingly beautiful craft. Captain La Barge was designer, builder, owner, and master, and set out on his first voyage with her October 1, 1859, his forty-fourth birthday.

Before the boat was completed he entered into a contract with the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad, which had just reached the Missouri River at St. Joseph, to run from that point up and down the river in connection with the road. The _Emilie_ was accordingly taken at once up the river, and remained all the fall in that section, going up as far as Fort Randall once or twice.

[Sidenote: LINCOLN AT COUNCIL BLUFFS.]

[Sidenote: LINCOLN’S SPEECH.]

It was during the boating season of 1859 that Captain La Barge first saw Abraham Lincoln. Among the more obscure incidents in that great man’s career were his visits to the Missouri River in the summer and fall of this year. In August he visited Council Bluffs, and in December several towns in Kansas. The purpose of his first visit was not political, although during his stay at the Bluffs he was induced to make a political speech.[43] He had evidently come out to take a look at the great West, and possibly also to make some investments in real estate. At any rate, in November following he purchased from N. B. Judd lot 3, block 1, of Riddle’s Subdivision of Council Bluffs. In 1867 this property was conveyed back to Mr. Judd by the Lincoln heirs. It is a very singular fact that the adjoining lot 4 of this subdivision was owned by Clement L. Vallandigham, Mr. Lincoln’s greatest political enemy.

[Sidenote: UNION PACIFIC.]

General Grenville M. Dodge, who later became a distinguished officer in the Civil War, was at this time engaged in surveys for the proposed Union Pacific railroad. He had just come in from the plains, and Lincoln, hearing of the fact, sought him out and had a long talk with him in regard to his surveys. His great interest in the matter and his skill in drawing out information soon gave him all that the young surveyor knew. The latter thought no more of this at the time than that possibly he had been giving away secrets that belonged to his employers only. In 1863, while in command of the district of Corinth, Miss., he received a dispatch from General Grant directing him to proceed to Washington and report to the President. He was a good deal perturbed over the matter, for he feared it might be something pertaining to his military work that had not given satisfaction. When he appeared before Mr. Lincoln he found that the President wanted to consult with him in regard to the eastern terminus of the proposed Pacific railroad, which would soon have to be determined. Mr. Lincoln had remembered the conversation in Council Bluffs, and now sought assistance from the same source from which he drew so freely on the former occasion. The result was that Council Bluffs instead of Omaha was fixed as the terminus, and that is why the Union Pacific railroad begins just across the river in Iowa, and not, as would have seemed natural, on the west shore of the river.

[Sidenote: LINCOLN IN KANSAS.]

Late in the fall of 1859 Mr. Lincoln visited Kansas. He arrived at St. Joseph December 1, _via_ the new Hannibal and St. Joseph railroad. He was met at the station by D. D. Wilder and M. W. Delahay, who escorted him at once to the ferry. Mr. Wilder was a member of the reception committee, and had spent several days in the office of Lincoln & Herndon the previous summer. While waiting for the boat they sat down on the bank, and Lincoln talked freely of the recent exciting political events in Illinois. The party then crossed to Kansas, the first stop being at Elwood, where Lincoln spoke on the night of December 1. The next day he went to Troy, Kan., where he gave an address, and in the evening he made a speech at Doniphan. The following day he went to Atchison and spoke in the Methodist church. Lincoln’s speeches on these occasions were essentially the same as that delivered at a later date at Cooper Union, New York. Lincoln seems to have gone to Leavenworth on the 4th of December. He remained there two or three days, delivering two speeches at Stockton’s Hall and holding a public reception. His long stay at this place was probably due to his having to wait for the steamboat to take him back to St. Joseph. He left Leavenworth on the 7th of December, accompanied by Mr. Parrott, the Kansas delegate to Congress.

[Sidenote: LINCOLN ON LA BARGE’S BOAT.]

It was on the occasion of one of these visits to the Missouri River that Captain La Barge met Mr. Lincoln. It is understood that Mr. Lincoln made his journey to Council Bluffs by boat, either from St. Louis or St. Joseph, and returned home across the State; and that on his Kansas visit he went back by boat from Leavenworth to St. Joseph in December. On one of these trips he traveled on Captain La Barge’s boat. The Captain retained with great distinctness his impressions of the appearance and personal peculiarities of the distinguished passenger. The tall and relatively slender build of Mr. Lincoln, his high hat, sallow complexion, and not very elegant costume, gave him a somewhat comical appearance at first sight. He seemed to La Barge rather quick in his movements, and apparently a good walker. The captain noticed that he was scarcely ever alone, there being always someone listening to him. Although he made no speeches on his way up, he had an audience all the time, and his agreeable address, and interesting way of putting things, made him a constant center of attraction.

[Sidenote: LINCOLN’S ELECTION.]

La Barge remembered that he frequently came into the pilot-house, and asked many questions, particularly about the fur trade and the Indians. He expressed his desire to make a visit to the upper country. Before he left the boat he asked La Barge if he would not procure for him a fine buffalo robe and send it to him, giving him to understand that he should of course expect to pay him well for all expense he might be put to. La Barge promised to do so. Lincoln was not at this time much talked of for the Presidency, and in Missouri was unpopular on account of his attitude toward slavery.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: THE NEGROES FREED.]

Captain La Barge did not take his boat down the river in the fall of 1859, because the ice cut him off. She was laid up a little below Atchison. He himself went to St. Louis, and in February returned with his family. In the spring of 1860, when the ice was about to break up, the citizens of Atchison offered to furnish fuel for the boat if La Barge would attempt to cut through the ice to St. Joseph. He undertook it, running his boat up on the ice until her weight broke it in, and in that way succeeded in getting through. The captain remained in the service of the railroad all summer, running to Kansas City and Omaha and intermediate points. In the fall he started for St. Louis, but was caught by the ice at Liberty, Mo., and compelled to lay up his boat there. It was at this point that he first heard of Lincoln’s election. When John Baxter, keeper of Liberty Landing, came on board with the news, La Barge said to him: “Up go all your niggers.” “Oh, you don’t think that’ll make any difference, do you?” “Up go all your niggers,” replied La Barge; “they will all be set free.” “And they were all set free,” remarked the captain in narrating this dialogue, “and mine with the rest, for I had some.”

FOOTNOTES

[1] There is in the possession of the La Barge family in St. Louis a large pocketbook, still in a state of excellent preservation, which was brought from Canada by Captain La Barge’s father. In this book is a slip of paper, worn and mutilated with age, which contains the record of the elder La Barge’s birth.

[2] “I can safely recommend him to any traveler, as the best person in his line I have ever met--intelligent, sober, obliging, and never afraid to encounter any difficulty that may occur.”--_Three Years in North America_, by James Stuart, who traveled in the United States, 1828–30, and employed La Barge to convey him on his journeys in the vicinity of St. Louis and as far east as Vincennes, Ind. He was very anxious to adopt the young child, Joseph La Barge, and take him to England and educate him, but the parents would not consent.

[3] For a history of this exciting affair see “The American Fur Trade of the Far West,” p. 267.

[4] The expeditions of General W. H. Ashley to the Rocky Mountains in quest of beaver fur were very celebrated in those days. They occurred in the years 1822–26.

[5] The data for the sketch here given of the ancestry of the La Barge family are mainly derived from letters by Dr. Philemon Laberge, Sheriff of the district of Beauharnois, Quebec, to Captain La Barge. Dr. Laberge had chanced to come across a copy of the St. Louis _Republic_ of January 9, 1898, in which there were a biographical sketch and photograph of Captain La Barge. Knowing that there was but one family of the name in America, he set about to trace the relationship, and presently sent to Captain La Barge a complete genealogical table of the family from Robert Laberge down.

The data relating to the maternal line are gleaned from Scharff’s “History of St. Louis.”

[6] The following tradition concerning the Lafayette visit is taken from the obituary sketch of Captain La Barge in one of the St. Louis papers:

“When General Lafayette visited the city in 1825 the populace turned out to greet him. He was a French nobleman and an American patriot--two distinctions that entitled him to the greatest courtesy. The children of the town had gathered to welcome his coming. When he was driven away hundreds paid homage by following the route of his carriage. To follow was not enough for Joe La Barge. He broke from the crowd and ran to the carriage in which Lafayette rode. Jumping upon the rear axle, he remained there a considerable time. The crowd was horrified, but Lafayette was too great a man to be thus wounded. Gently stroking the lad on the head, he asked his name. The boy responded: ‘La Barge.’ ‘Ah,’ said the General, ‘then we are both Frenchmen, and the only difference is in the ending of our names.’”

[7] The term _engagé_ was applied to the common hands who did the ordinary work of the fur trade. The term _bourgeois_ was used to designate the person in charge of a trading post.

[8] “Captain Pratt of the _Assiniboine_ reports that he met the _Yellowstone_ at the mouth of the Kansas River, having lost her best pilot from the cholera, and four or five men in the space of twenty-four hours. I fear that, in this situation, she will not be able to continue her voyage.”--_Pierre Chouteau, Jr., to John Jacob Astor, July 12, 1833._

[9] See account of American and Rocky Mountain Fur Companies, in “American Fur Trade of the Far West.”

[10] This man had a long and honorable career in the West. As late as 1859–60 he was in the service of the government as interpreter on the expedition of Captain W. F. Reynolds, Corps of Engineers, U. S. A.

[11] A curious illustration of the great changes which have taken place along the Missouri Valley occurred a few years ago. In 1896 a farmer was digging a well near the mouth of Grand River, Mo., several miles from the present channel of the Missouri. A Bible was found in the excavation, and on its cover was the name _Naomi_. The book was sent to Captain La Barge to see if he could suggest any explanation of its presence where it was found. The Captain recalled perfectly the fact that the steamer _Naomi_ was wrecked at that precise spot fifty-six years before. In those days the missionaries always left Bibles on board the various boats, attached by chains to the tables or other parts of the cabin, and lettered with the names of the boats to which they belonged.

[12] The first _Yellowstone_, built in the winter of 1830–31, is a good example of the original river boat. It was 130 feet long, 19 feet beam, 6 feet hold: beautiful model; side wheels; single engine; flywheel; cabin aft of shaft; ladies’ cabin in stern hold; boiler decks open; no hurricane roof; pilot-house elevated; two smokestacks; one rudder; 6-foot wheel bucket; 18-foot wheel; stages aft; draft, light, 4½ feet; loaded to 75 tons, 5½ feet.

In the river boats the main or forecastle deck was the first above the water, and the one covering the hold; the boiler deck was the second one, just over the boilers, covered by the hurricane roof; the hurricane deck was the third deck. Upon this were situated the texas and the pilot-house.

[13] A noted steamboat that ran on the lower river during a portion of the fifties was the _Felix X. Aubrey_. Between the smokestacks was the figure of a man riding at full speed on horseback. The reference was to a horseback ride, very celebrated in its day, from Santa Fe to Westport, where Kansas City now stands. In the year 1853 Felix X. Aubrey made this ride in five days and thirteen hours. The distance was 775 miles.

[14] “Of all the variable things in creation the most uncertain are the action of a jury, the state of woman’s mind, and the condition of the Missouri River.”--_Sioux City Register_, March 28, 1868.

[15] As an example of primitive lighthouse or fog-signal work, the story is told of a steamboat captain who always made a certain crossing on the lower river, if at night, by the aid of the bark of a dog belonging to a farmhouse directly in line with the course of the boat. The dog came out on the bank whenever boats were approaching, and saluted them vigorously until they had passed. The captain ran by this bark with the most implicit confidence. But unhappily the dog _did_ change his position--once--and the captain ran by its bark no more, for the next morning his own bark was a hopeless wreck upon a neighboring sandbar.

[16] About 1856 this matter was made the subject of military investigation under General Harney.

[17] The practicability of commercial steamboating on the Missouri River had begun to be recognized about 1829. In the summer of that year the _W. D. Duncan_ commenced a regular packet trade to Fort Leavenworth.

[18] Kenneth McKenzie, the ablest trader the American Fur Company produced, was at this time in charge of Fort Union, at the mouth of the Yellowstone, and of all the company’s operations in the tributary country along the upper rivers.

[19] This affords a glimpse at the crafty and oppressive methods of the company, which bore with intolerable hardship upon its employees. To pay wages in merchandise at an advance of three or four hundred per cent. upon their cost was a great saving to the company, but an unqualified fraud upon its servants.

[20] Fort McKenzie was six miles above the mouth of the Marias River; Fort Union was three miles above the mouth of the Yellowstone: and Fort Clark was about fifty-six miles above the modern Bismarck, N. D.

[21] Log of steamboat _Omega_, May 10, 1843: “Nous venons très bien jusqu’aux cotes à Hart où, à sept heures, nous sommes sommés par un officier de dragoons de mettre à terre. Je reçois une note polie du Capitaine Burgwin m’informant que son devoir l’oblige de faire visiter le bâteau. Aussitôt nous nous mettons à l’ouvrage, et pendant ce temps M. Audubon va faire une visite au Capitaine. Ils reviennent ensemble deux heures après. Je force en quelque sorte l’officier à faire un recherche aussi stricte que possible, mais à la condition qu’il en sera de même avec les autres traiteurs.”

[22] The above description of this inspection is from “The American Fur Trade of the Far West,” by the present author.

[23] Captain Sire, in the logbook of the _Nimrod_, Friday, May 10, 1844, says: “Il s’est passé encore longtemps avant que Messieurs les agents faisaient leur visite. Tout se trouvait satisfaisante. J’ai décidé de ne partir que demain matin, et pour cause.--May 11. Nous nous mettons en route avant le jour.”

[24] It appears that the company’s bond was to have been put in suit; but the United States Attorney would not bring the case to trial unless he could get La Barge as a witness. When La Barge got back to St. Louis Sarpy came on board and told him to make himself scarce immediately. The Captain hastened to St. Charles and took service on the _Iatan_, where he remained until the storm had blown over. The case was finally compromised through the influence of Thomas H. Benton.

[25] While detained at the Omaha villages the crew had cut and piled about fifty cords of wood.

[26] The original journal is silent about this affair, but the facts were suppressed, says Captain La Barge, by clerk Finch, of the American Fur Company, in order not to expose the questionable conduct of Campbell and Matlock in regard to the annuities. La Barge himself wrote the following marginal note opposite the entry for June 9: “The Indians fired on the boat while we were lying there and killed Charles Smith, deckhand.”

[27] _The Republican_, March 19, 1849, in an editorial notice of the event, thus referred to Captain La Barge: “There is no Captain on the Western waters more highly esteemed than Captain La Barge. He is a St. Louisan born, and has been familiar with the river from early life.”

[28] This island took its name from the fact that it was a famous dueling ground. Its history in this connection dates from the past century, but its fame rests upon a few celebrated contests, among which the following may be noted: Thomas H. Benton and Charles Lucas fought here twice, on August 12 and September 27, 1817. In the last encounter Benton killed his antagonist. Joshua Barton, brother of the first U. S. Senator from Missouri, and Thomas C. Rector fought here June 30, 1823, and Barton was killed. The most celebrated duel of all took place August 27, 1831, between Major Thomas Biddle, Paymaster U. S. A., and Congressman Spencer Pettis of St. Louis. Both principals were killed. Another duel occurred in which one of the principals, B. Gratz Brown, editor of the _Democrat_, received a wound in the knee. When dueling fell into disuse the island became a noted resort for prize-fighters. Overlooking the island stood a large cottonwood tree, near which these duels were fought. It was certainly more than two hundred years old, and it fell from old age, July 18, 1897.

[29] The City of St. Louis passed an ordinance at this time that vessels should be moored with iron cables, and it placed permanent rings in the levee for that purpose, so that boats could not be cut loose in case of fire.

[30] The Aricara language is related to that of the Pawnees, which La Barge, as we have seen, had learned in his first years in the Indian country.

[31] La Barge Avenue, St. Louis, extending from Union Avenue west to the city limits, was in part given by Captain La Barge and recorded in his name. A later generation, with an amazing indifference to the work of one of the most noted characters in the history of the city, has changed the name to “Maple Avenue.”

[32] One of the medical officers accompanying the troops, and possibly the surgeon in this case, was Dr. George L. Miller of Omaha, Neb., who had early established himself in the West to seek his fortune there, and afterward became one of Nebraska’s most eminent citizens and well known throughout the country. He had gone up with the troops for temporary service because they had no regular surgeon. Dr. Miller returned to Omaha on the _St. Mary_, and many years later prepared an account of his personal experiences on the trip. His reference to Captain La Barge is interesting in this connection. He described him as “a short, stout, alert, and energetic man, with the eye of an eagle, which had been trained by twenty years’ service as a student of the mysterious and muddy waters of the Missouri.” A few years before these reminiscences were written by Dr. Miller, Captain La Barge’s brother John died, and Dr. Miller had mistakenly understood it to be his old river friend of 1855. The event called forth this further reference to the Captain: “The death of Joe La Barge, the brown-faced and black-eyed pilot, two or three years ago, caused a pang of regret in the hearts of tens of thousands who dwell along the valley of the great river, and who knew and admired him both in character and calling.”

[33] For a vivid picture of those early steamboat days, see _Everybody’s Magazine_, October, 1892.

[34] “Captain John La Barge, one of the oldest and best steam boat men on the river, takes command of the _Chippewa_, and if the trip to Fort Benton can be made, he will make it!”--_Sioux City Eagle_, July 23, 1859.

[35] For a complete record of this event, see letter from Alfred Vaughn, Indian Agent for the Blackfeet--Report Commissioner of Indian Affairs for 1859.

[36] The _Tom Stevens_ is said to have gone to the mouth of Portage creek, within five miles of the Great Falls the same year, and one authority states that the _Gallatin_, either in 1866 or 1867, went nearer to the Falls than any other boat before or since. The exact point is not stated.

[37] The Blackfeet nation, as understood by the early traders and trappers, comprised four bands--the Piegans, the Bloods, the Blackfeet, and the Grosventres of the Prairies. Only the first three were really Blackfeet. The tribal affinity of the Grosventres was with the Arapahoes. In some way these two tribes had become widely separated, the Arapahoes going far to the south, and the Grosventres to the country of the Blackfeet. So far did the Grosventres adopt the language and customs of the Blackfeet that they were ordinarily considered in early times as a part of that tribe and were commonly referred to as Blackfeet. They were relentlessly hostile to the whites during the first twenty-five years after Lewis and Clark passed through their country. Next to them in point of hostility came the Blood Indians. The Piegans were the most favorably disposed of any of the Blackfeet tribes and were also the best beaver hunters, and it was with this band that trade relations were first opened.

[38] There has been a good deal of confusion about this date, and it cannot yet be considered as definitely settled. The weight of authority is as given above. Chardon had other difficulties with the Indians which may have been confused with this affair. Thus the journal of one of the inmates of the Blackfoot post (whether Fort McKenzie or Fort Chardon is uncertain) says: “February 19, 1844. Fight with the north Blackfeet, in which we killed six and wounded several others; took two children prisoners. The fruits of our victory were four scalps, twenty-two horses, 350 robes, and guns, bows, and arrows, etc.” This answers very closely to the description of the “Blackfoot Massacre” at Fort McKenzie. If it is the same, the founding of Fort Chardon was in 1844 instead of 1843.

[39] In 1864 Malcolm Clark shot and instantly killed Owen McKenzie, son of Kenneth McKenzie. The affair took place on the _Nellie Rogers_, American Fur Company boat, near the mouth of Milk River. McKenzie and Clark had some standing cause of dispute between them, and Clark shot his opponent while the latter was in a state of intoxication. The family of Clark have tried to screen his name from any blame in this affair, and have claimed that the deed was done in self-defense. On the river it was everywhere considered at the time a cold-blooded murder.

[40] By W. W. DeLacy, a civil engineer of high reputation, and closely identified with the early history of Montana.

[41] June 11, 1866, there were seven steamboats at one time at the levee of Fort Benton.

[42] In this sketch of Fort Benton I have drawn somewhat, for the period after 1843, from the notes of Lieutenant James H. Bradley, as published in vol. iii. Proceedings Mont. Hist. Soc. The notes were taken by dictation from Alexander Culbertson. Unfortunately, as in most cases of personal narrative, this one abounds in errors, and is controlled throughout by the desire of the narrator to magnify his own importance in the events he describes. The notes possess, however, great intrinsic value, and are an important contribution to the history of the West. Their preservation is due to the zealous forethought of an army officer who recognized the importance of collecting original data on the history of the West before its principal actors should have passed away. He did not live to prepare these notes for publication himself. They found their way to the Montana Historical Society, which, with the intelligent zeal that has always characterized that body, has given them to the public in a well-gotten-up volume of the society’s proceedings.

Lieutenant James H. Bradley was born in Sandusky, O., May 25, 1844; enlisted as a private in the 14th Ohio Volunteers, April, 1861; re-enlisted in the 45th Ohio Volunteers, June, 1862; mustered out as Sergeant, July, 1865; appointed Second Lieutenant 18th U. S. Infantry, February 23, 1866; promoted to First Lieutenant, July 9, 1866, transferred to 7th Infantry, November 28, 1871; killed in the Battle of the Big Hole by the Nez Percé Indians, August 9, 1877.

[43] “Hon. Abe Lincoln, and the Secretary of State for Illinois, Hon. O. M. Hatch, arrived in our city last evening, and are stopping at the Pacific House. The distinguished ‘sucker’ has yielded to the earnest importunities of our citizens,--without distinction of party,--and will speak upon the political issues of the day, at Concert Hall, this evening. The celebrity of the speaker will most certainly insure him a full house. Go and hear ‘Old Abe.’”--_From the Council Bluffs “Weekly Nonpareil,” Saturday Morning, August 13, 1859._

The reports upon this speech in the Republican and Democratic papers of the town were as follows:

From the _Nonpareil_, August 20, 1859:

“ABE LINCOLN.

“This distinguished gentleman addressed a very large audience of ladies and gentlemen at Concert Hall in this city, Saturday evening. The clear and lucid manner in which he set forth the true principles of the Republican party--the dexterity with which he applied the political scalpel to the Democratic carcass--beggars all description at our hands. Suffice it, that the speaker fully and fairly sustained the great reputation he acquired in the memorable Illinois campaign as a man of great intellectual power--a close and sound reasoner.”

From the _Weekly Bugle_, August 17, 1859:

“ABE LINCOLN ON THE SLOPE.

“The people of this city were edified last Saturday evening by a speech from Honorable Abe Lincoln. He apologized very handsomely for appearing before an Iowa audience during a campaign in which he was not interested. He then, with many excuses and a lengthy explanation, as if conscious of the nauseous nature of the black Republican nostrum, announced his intention to speak about the ‘eternal negro,’ to use his own language, and entered into a lengthy and ingenious analysis of the nigger question, impressing upon his hearers that it was the only question to be agitated until finally settled. He carefully avoided going directly to the extreme ground occupied by him in his canvass against Douglas, yet the doctrines which he preached, carried out to their legitimate results, amount to precisely the same thing. He was decidedly opposed to any fusion or coalition of the Republican party with the opposition of the South, and clearly proved the correctness of his ground, in point of policy. They must retain their sectional organization and sectional character, and continue to wage their sectional warfare by slavery agitation; but if the opposition South would accede to their view and adopt their doctrines, he was willing to run for President in 1860, a Southern man with Northern principles, or in other words, with abolition proclivities. His speech was of the character of an exhortation to the Republican party, but was in reality as good a speech as could have been made for the interest of the Democracy. He was listened to with much attention, for his Waterloo defeat by Douglas has magnified him into quite a lion here.”

Transcriber’s Notes

Old English lettering on the pages preceding the Table of Contents is represented here within =equals signs=.

Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left unbalanced.

Illustrations in this eBook have been positioned between paragraphs and outside quotations. In versions of this eBook that support hyperlinks, the page references in the List of Illustrations lead to the corresponding illustrations.

Running page headers are shown here as Sidenotes, usually positioned just above the paragraph they summarize. When such Sidenotes summarize footnotes, they are positioned above the paragraphs that referenced those footnotes.

This is Volume I of a two-volume set. The Index for both volumes is at the end of Volume II, and that volume also is available at Project Gutenberg.

Page 196: “drouth” (drought) was printed that way, and in use in the 1800s.

Page 206: “5 1-2 o’clock” was printed that way.