very suitable to that community; quarrelling and contending, as the people were, about claims and town lots. The editor of "The Kansas Pioneer" was there —his name was Sexton; indeed, the paper was printed and published under the same roof which covered us while preaching. I did not ask the editor to notice my sermon, or the circumstances under which it was delivered. He did so, however; but he never did it again. It was whispered to him, from some source, that I was not sound on the "goose"! I made an appointment for the next service to be held in two weeks. I had purposed giving the next to Leavenworth City. When I returned, to fulfil my engagement, I was met by the Missionary of the Kickapoo Indians, who remarked to me, "I suppose that you are aware that I have made an appointment to preach for the whites, to-day?" I told him that I was not at all aware of it. He had never done so before, and never would have done so, had I not made appointment there. This old gentleman belonged to the "Methodist Episcopal Church, South." He could not read a chapter in the Bible more correctly than most children of ten years in our common schools. His name is N. T. Shaler. He was sound on the "goose;" consequently, the loghouse, which had now passed, by conquest, into the hands of the whites, was offered to him to preach in, and denied to me! I would not postpone my service, but went to the house of one of the citizens, whose sentiments on the "goose" were like mine own. We had a very small congregation. I officiated, and returned to Weston. If any other sacrifice had been

A MISTAKE, BUT NO MATTER.

61

asked of me, than to postpone my service, I would have made it. I saw the trap which was laid for me, very plainly. But now they had got a slight pretext to injure me; and the most was made of it.

"The Kickapoo City Association" had passed a resolution that any religious body might, by its agents, select a lot in the town, on the condition that such and such a building should be erected thereon in the course of eighteen months. The "Self-Defensives," individually, had a large interest in this town, and it is amazing to me that there was not coupled with the conditions, that the religious body should be sound on the "goose." But this was an oversight such as the farthest-sighted cannot always guard against. I went and claimed the lot-selected it, and had the certificate made out. I was much encouraged at this success; I had got a foothold. But, bless you, talk about footholds! when you had "Self-Defensives" to deal with! However, I went to an old friend of mine, sound to the core on the goose," and sent to the Legislature without opposition. Said I, "Doctor, you are going to live at Kickapoo; I have got a lot for our church there; do get up a subscription, and for every dollar that you get subscribed and paid, I will add one to it, and we shall have a church built at once." The doctor took the bait. disliked the old Kickapoo missionary. The subscription was got ready in a week or two; the sums subscribed amounted to $350. But the doctor pocketed the subscription, and I never could get him to explain to me why he did it. I think that I can account for it in a future chapter.

แ

He

I continued to preach regularly at Kickapoo City in the private house of William Braham, a settler, from Michigan City, Indiana. He had a wife and two children, a son and daughter. Many and many a time did the wife weep over her loneliness, and the many petty persecutions which she endured because her husband had the misfortune to be appointed a justice of the peace by Governor Reeder! To add to her afflictions, and to remove her only companion, her daughter of fifteen years died! I attended that sad funeral. The accustomed sympathy of the neighborhood was not extended to that heart-broken mother. I ventured once to say to a friend of mine in the street of Kickapoo— "You and others ought not to treat poor Braham's family with such neglect." "He is a villain, sir," was the answer! Braham's family had been educated in our church, and their children had been baptized in the church—it was really the only family on whom I had much claim, in a spiritual point of view. I would not neglect them on any account.

Under the caption of this sketch, I must mention that Mr. Sexton, the first editor of the "Kansas Pioneer," and who baptized it to advocate bloodshed, became converted under the pious ministry of Parson Shaler, has since entered the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. I understand that he is a burning, if not a shining light!

CHAPTER XIV.

TWENTY-NINE BED-FELLOWS AT LEAVENWORTH CITY.

I WALKED down to the city of Leavenworth on a Saturday, in the middle of November, 1854. It had been announced that I would preach there on the following day. Everything was bustle and confusion. There were many notables there on that Saturday. A. J. Donaldson, Marshal of the Territory, was there; Mr. Woodson, Secretary of the Territory, was there that day; John Calhoun, Surveyor-General of the Territory, was there that day; Judge Johnson was there; Judge Fleniken, candidate for Congress, was there that day; Martin F. Conway, who came with indorsements from the best democrats in Baltimore and New York, was there that day; Major Macklin and Major Ogden of the army, were there that day; and many other lesser lights were there that day. What brought all the talent together there that day? I will tell it here, though I hope that it will not reach the eyes or the ears of Manypenny, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Caleb Cushing, Attorney-General, or even Jefferson Davis, Secretary-at-War. Many of the above-named had come to attend a meeting of the Leavenworth Association. This association had laid off a town, on lands not subject to pre-emption. They had been

warned by Commissioner Manypenny and Caleb Cushing, and gently catechised by Jefferson Davis. The town is either laid off on the " Military Reserve," and therefore not subject to pre-emption any more than the lands on which Pawnee was laid out at Fort Riley, and decided by Jefferson Davis to be given up—or it is laid off on Delaware Indian lands, not subject to preemption, but to be sold to the highest bidder for the benefit of the poor Indians. Take which horn you please, gentlemen, you are all interlopers! So the most of these gentlemen were down at Leavenworth to-day on a speculation! Yes, gentlemen, you were all fishing in forbidden waters to-day. Governor Reeder was removed for giving a quid pro quo to the Indians for a few hundred acres away in the interior of the Territory. Officers in the United States army were allowed to wear the uniform while they continued to buy and sell that which belonged to the Indians, and that which belongs to them to this day, in the most important section of their country. Oh, shame shame!

But the most of the speculators have departed. Many have gone to their homes, i. e., to their snug quarters at the garrison. Many of them have gone to Weston. I could now see who were likely to be on hand to-morrow. Pennsylvania was pretty well represented. There was Doctor Lieb, who must figure in a chapter "all alone by himself." The doctor is worthy of this distinction. I will just here observe that the doctor had not the least objection to balance a tumbler in his hand, and say, "My respects, sir," and then ap