Part 4 (2/2)
Here were wood, water, and gra.s.s, the three requisites for campers, as they had already found. The country was undulating, interlaced with creeks; and groves of black-jack, oak, and cottonwood were here and there broken by open glades that would be smiling fields some day, but were now wild native gra.s.ses.
There was a preacher in the camp, a good man from New England, who preached about the Pilgrim's Progress through the world, and the trials he meets by the way. Oscar pulled his father's sleeve, and asked why he did not ask the preacher to give out ”The Kansas Emigrant's Song” as a hymn. Mr. Bryant smiled, and whispered that it was hardly likely that the lines would be considered just the thing for a religious service. But after the preaching was over, and the little company was breaking up, he told the preacher what Oscar had said. The minister's eyes sparkled, and he replied, ”What? Have you that beautiful hymn? Let us have it now and here. Nothing could be better for this day and this time.”
Oscar, blus.h.i.+ng with excitement and native modesty, was put up high on the stump of a tree, and, violin in hand, ”raised the tune.” It was grand old ”Dundee.” Almost everybody seemed to know the words of Whittier's poem, and beneath the blue Kansas sky, amid the groves of Kansas trees, the st.u.r.dy, hardy men and the few pale women joyfully, almost tearfully, sang,--
We crossed the prairie, as of old The pilgrims crossed the sea, To make the West, as they the East, The homestead of the free!
We go to rear a wall of men On freedom's Southern line, And plant beside the cotton-tree The rugged Northern pine!
We're flowing from our native hills As our free rivers flow; The blessing of our Mother-land Is on us as we go.
We go to plant her common schools On distant prairie swells, And give the Sabbaths of the wild The music of her bells.
Upbearing, like the Ark of old, The Bible in our van, We go to test the truth of G.o.d Against the fraud of man.
No pause, nor rest, save where the streams That feed the Kansas run, Save where our pilgrim gonfalon Shall flout the setting sun!
We'll tread the prairie as of old Our fathers sailed the sea, And make the West, as they the East, The homestead of the free!
”It was good to be there,” said Alexander Howell, his hand resting lovingly on Oscar's shoulder, as they went back to camp. But Oscar's father said never a word. His face was turned to the westward, where the sunlight was fading behind the hills of the far-off frontier of the Promised Land.
[Ill.u.s.tration: OSCAR WAS PUT UP HIGH ON THE STUMP OF A TREE, AND, VIOLIN IN HAND, ”RAISED THE TUNE.”]
The general opinion gathered that day was that they who wanted to fight for freedom might better go to Lawrence, or to Topeka. Those who were bent on finding homes for themselves and little ones should press on further to the west, where there was land in plenty to be had for the asking, or, rather, for the pre-empting. So, when Monday morning came, wet, murky, and depressing, Bryant surrendered to the counsels of his brother-in-law and the unspoken wish of the boys, and agreed to go on to the newly-surveyed lands on the tributaries of the Kaw. They had heard good reports of the region lying westward of Manhattan and Fort Riley. The town that had changed its name was laid out at the confluence of the Kaw and the Big Blue. Fort Riley was some eighteen or twenty miles to the westward, near the junction of the streams that form the Kaw, known as Smoky Hill Fork and the Republican Fork. On one or the other of these forks, the valleys of which were said to be fertile and beautiful beyond description, the emigrants would find a home. So, braced and inspired by the consciousness of having a definite and settled plan, the Dixon party set forth on Monday morning, through the rain and mist, with faces to the westward.
CHAPTER VI.
WESTWARD HO!
The following two or three days were wet and uncomfortable. Rain fell in torrents at times, and when it did not rain the ground was steamy, and the emigrants had a hard time to find spots dry enough on which to make up their beds at night. This was no holiday journey, and the boys, too proud to murmur, exchanged significant nods and winks when they found themselves overtaken by the discomforts of camping and travelling in the storm. For the most part, they kept in camp during the heaviest of the rain. They found that the yokes of the oxen chafed the poor animals' necks when wet.
And then the mud! n.o.body had ever seen such mud, they thought, not even on the black and greasy fat lands of an Illinois prairie.
Sometimes the wagon sunk in the road, cut up by innumerable wheels, so that the hubs of their wheels were almost even with the surface, and it was with the greatest difficulty that their four yoke of oxen dragged the wagon from its oozy bed. At times, too, they were obliged to unhitch their team and help out of a mud-hole some other less fortunate brother wayfarer, whose team was not so powerful as their own.
One unlucky day, fording a narrow creek with steep banks, they had safely got across, when they encountered a slippery incline up which the oxen could not climb; it was ”as slippery as a glare of ice,”
Charlie said, and the struggling cattle sank nearly to their knees in their frantic efforts to reach the top of the bank. The wagon had been ”blocked up,” that is to say, the wagon-box raised in its frame or bed above the axles, with blocks driven underneath, to lift it above the level of the stream. As the vehicle was dragged out of the creek, the leading yoke of cattle struggling up the bank and then slipping back again, the whole team of oxen suddenly became panic-stricken, as it were, and rushed back to the creek in wild confusion. The wagon twisted upon itself, and cramped together, creaked, groaned, toppled, and fell over in a heap, its contents being shot out before and behind into the mud and water.
”Great Scott!” yelled Sandy. ”Let me stop those cattle!” Whereupon the boy dashed through the water, and, running around the hinder end of the wagon, he attempted to head off the cattle. But the animals, having gone as far as they could without breaking their chains or the wagon-tongue, which fortunately held, stood sullenly by the side of the wreck they had made, panting with their exertions.
”Here is a mess!” said his father; but, without more words, he unhitched the oxen and drove them up the bank. The rest of the party hastily picked up the articles that were drifting about, or were lodged in the mud of the creek. It was a sorry sight, and the boys forgot, in the excitement of the moment, the discomforts and annoyances of their previous experiences. This was a real misfortune.
But while Oscar and Sandy were excitedly discussing what was next to be done, Mr. Howell took charge of things; the wagon was righted, and a party of emigrants, camped in a grove of cottonwoods just above the ford, came down with ready offers of help. Eight yoke of cattle instead of four were now hitched to the wagon, and, to use the expressive language of the West, the outfit was ”snaked” out of the hole in double-quick time.
”Ho, ho, ho! Uncle Charlie,” laughed Sandy, ”you look as if you had been dragged through a slough. You are just painted with mud from top to toe. Well, I never did see such a looking scarecrow!”
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