On these waved
thickly the mysterious purple flower, of which I have spoken before. I
think it springs from the blood of the Indians, as the hyacinth did from
that of Apollo's darling.
The ladies of our host's family at Oregon, when they first went there,
after all the pains and plagues of building and settling, found their
first pastime in opening one of these mounds, in which they found, I
think, three of the departed, seated in the Indian fashion.
One of these same ladies, as she was making bread one winter morning,
saw from the window a deer directly before the house. She ran out, with
her hands covered with dough, calling the others, and they caught him
bodily before he had time to escape.
Here (at Kishwaukie) we received a visit from a ragged and barefoot, but
bright-eyed gentleman, who seemed to be the intellectual loafer, the
walking Will's coffeehouse of the place. He told us many charming snake
stories; among others, of himself having seen seventeen young ones
reenter the mother snake, on the intrusion of a visiter.
This night we reached Belvidere, a flourishing town in Boon county,
where was the tomb, now despoiled, of Big Thunder. In this later day we
felt happy to find a really good hotel.
From this place, by two days of very leisurely and devious journeying,
we reached Chicago, and thus ended a journey, which one at least of the
party might have wished unending.
I have not been particularly anxious to give the geography of the
scene, inasmuch as it seemed to me no route, nor series of stations, but
a garden interspersed with cottages, groves and flowery lawns, through
which a stately river ran.
Pages:
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74