THE UPPER MISSISSIPPI.
It had been promised to us that we should start from La Crosse by
the river steamer immediately on our arrival there; but on reaching
La Crosse we found that the vessel destined to take us up the river
had not yet come down. She was bringing a regiment from Minnesota,
and under such circumstances some pardon might be extended to
irregularities. This plea was made by one of the boat clerks in
a very humble tone, and was fully accepted by us. The wonder was
that at such a period all means of public conveyance were not put
absolutely out of gear. One might surmise that when regiments were
constantly being moved for the purposes of civil war, when the whole
North had but the one object of collecting together a sufficient
number of men to crush the South, ordinary travelling for ordinary
purposes would be difficult, slow, and subject to sudden stoppages.
Such, however, was not the case either in the northern or western
States. The trains ran much as usual, and those connected with the
boats and railways were just as anxious as ever to secure passengers.
The boat clerk at La Crosse apologised amply for the delay, and we
sat ourselves down with patience to await the arrival of the second
Minnesota regiment on its way to Washington.
During the four hours that we were kept waiting we were harboured on
board a small steamer, and at about eleven the terribly harsh whistle
that is made by the Mississippi boats informed us that the regiment
was arriving. It came up to the quay in two steamers, 750 being
brought in that which was to take us back, and 250 in a smaller one.
The moon was very bright, and great flaming torches were lit on the
vessel's side, so that all the operations of the men were visible.
The two steamers had run close up, thrusting us away from the quay
in their passage, but doing it so gently that we did not even feel
the motion. These large boats--and their size may be understood from
the fact that one of them had just brought down 750 men,--are moved
so easily and so gently that they come gliding in among each other
without hesitation and without pause. On English waters we do
not willingly run ships against each other; and when we do so
unwillingly, they bump and crush and crash upon each other, and
timbers fly while men are swearing. But here there was neither
crashing nor swearing, and the boats noiselessly pressed against each
other as though they were cased in muslin and crinoline.
I got out upon the quay and stood close by the plank, watching each
man as he left the vessel and walked across towards the railway.
Those whom I had previously seen in tents were not equipped, but
these men were in uniform and each bore his musket. Taking them all
together they were as fine a set of men as I ever saw collected. No
man could doubt on seeing them that they bore on their countenances
the signs of higher breeding and better education than would be
seen in a thousand men enlisted in England. I do not mean to argue
from this that Americans are better than English. I do not mean to
argue here that they are even better educated. My assertion goes to
show that the men generally were taken from a higher level in the
community than that which fills our own ranks. It was a matter of
regret to me, here and on many subsequent occasions, to see men bound
for three years to serve as common soldiers, who were so manifestly
fitted for a better and more useful life. To me it is always a source
of sorrow to see a man enlisted. I feel that the individual recruit
is doing badly with himself--carrying himself and the strength and
intelligence which belongs to him to a bad market. I know that there
must be soldiers; but as to every separate soldier I regret that he
should be one of them. And the higher is the class from which such
soldiers are drawn, the greater the intelligence of the men so to
be employed, the deeper with me is that feeling of regret. But this
strikes one much less in an old country than in a country that is
new. In the old countries population is thick, and food sometimes
scarce. Men can be spared, and any employment may be serviceable,
even though that employment be in itself so unproductive as that of
fighting battles or preparing for them. But in the western States of
America every arm that can guide a plough is of incalculable value.
Minnesota was admitted as a State about three years before this time,
and its whole population is not much above 150,000. Of this number
perhaps 40,000 may be working men. And now this infant State with
its huge territory and scanty population is called upon to send its
heart's blood out to the war.
And it has sent its heart's best blood. Forth they came--fine,
stalwart, well-grown fellows, looking to my eye as though they had
as yet but faintly recognised the necessary severity of military
discipline. To them hitherto the war had seemed to be an arena on
which each might do something for his country, which that country
would recognise. To themselves as yet--and to me also--they were a
band of heroes, to be reduced by the compressing power of military
discipline to the lower level, but more necessary position of a
regiment of soldiers. Ah me! how terrible to them has been the
breaking up of that delusion! When a poor yokel in England is
enlisted with a shilling and a promise of unlimited beer and glory,
one pities and if possible would save him. But with him the mode of
life to which he goes may not be much inferior to that he leaves.
It may be that for him soldiering is the best trade possible in his
circumstances. It may keep him from the hen-roosts, and perhaps
from his neighbours' pantries; and discipline may be good for him.
Population is thick with us, and there are many whom it may be well
to collect and make available under the strictest surveillance. But
of these men whom I saw entering on their career upon the banks of
the Mississippi, many were fathers of families, many were owners of
lands, many were educated men capable of high aspirations,--all were
serviceable members of their State. There were probably there not
three or four of whom it would be well that the State should be rid.
As soldiers fit, or capable of being made fit for the duties they had
undertaken, I could find but one fault with them. Their average age
was too high. There were men among them with grizzled beards, and
many who had counted thirty, thirty-five, and forty years. They had,
I believe, devoted themselves with a true spirit of patriotism. No
doubt each had some ulterior hope as to himself,--as has every mortal
patriot. Regulus when he returned hopeless to Carthage, trusted that
some Horace would tell his story. Each of these men from Minnesota
looked probably forward to his reward; but the reward desired was of
a high class.
The first great misery to be endured by these regiments will be the
military lesson of obedience which they must learn before they can
be of any service. It always seemed to me when I came near them
that they had not as yet recognized the necessary austerity of an
officer's duty. Their idea of a captain was the stage idea of a
leader of dramatic banditti, a man to be followed and obeyed as a
leader, but to be obeyed with that free and easy obedience which is
accorded to the reigning chief of the forty thieves. "Wa'll Captain,"
I have heard a private say to his officer, as he sat on one seat in a
railway-car with his feet upon the back of another. And the captain
has looked as though he did not like it. The captain did not like it,
but the poor private was being fast carried to that destiny which
he would like still less. From the first I have had faith in the
northern army; but from the first I have felt that the suffering to
be endured by these free and independent volunteers would be very
great. A man to be available as a private soldier must be compressed
and belted in till he be a machine.
As soon as the men had left the vessel we walked over the side of
it and took possession. "I am afraid your cabin won't be ready for
a quarter of an hour," said the clerk. "Such a body of men as that
will leave some dirt after them." I assured him of course that our
expectations under such circumstances were very limited, and that
I was fully aware that the boat and the boat's company were taken
up with matters of greater moment than the carriage of ordinary
passengers. But to this he demurred altogether. "The regiments
were very little to them, but occasioned much trouble. Everything,
however, should be square in fifteen minutes." At the expiration of
the time named the key of our state-room was given to us, and we
found the appurtenances as clean as though no soldier had ever put
his foot upon the vessel.
From La Crosse to St. Paul, the distance up the river is something
over 200 miles, and from St. Paul down to Dubuque, in Iowa, to which
we went on our return, the distance is 450 miles. We were therefore
for a considerable time on board these boats; more so than such a
journey may generally make necessary, as we were delayed at first by
the soldiers, and afterwards by accidents, such as the breaking of
a paddle-wheel, and other causes to which navigation on the Upper
Mississippi seems to be liable. On the whole we slept on board four
nights, and lived on board as many days. I cannot say that the life
was comfortable, though I do not know that it could be made more so
by any care on the part of the boat-owners. My first complaint would
be against the great heat of the cabins. The Americans as a rule live
in an atmosphere which is almost unbearable by an Englishman. To this
cause, I am convinced, is to be attributed their thin faces, their
pale skins, their unenergetic temperament,--unenergetic as regards
physical motion,--and their early old age. The winters are long and
cold in America, and mechanical ingenuity is far extended. These two
facts together have created a system of stoves, hot-air pipes, steam
chambers, and heating apparatus so extensive that from autumn till
the end of spring all inhabited rooms are filled with the atmosphere
of a hot oven. An Englishman fancies that he is to be baked, and
for a while finds it almost impossible to exist in the air prepared
for him. How the heat is engendered on board the river steamers
I do not know, but it is engendered to so great a degree that the
sitting-cabins are unendurable. The patient is therefore driven out
at all hours into the outside balconies of the boat, or on to the top
roof,--for it is a roof rather than a deck,--and there as he passes
through the air at the rate of twenty miles an hour, finds himself
chilled to the very bones. That is my first complaint. But as the
boats are made for Americans, and as Americans like hot air, I do not
put it forward with any idea that a change ought to be effected. My
second complaint is equally unreasonable, and is quite as incapable
of a remedy as the first. Nine-tenths of the travellers carry
children with them. They are not tourists engaged on pleasure
excursions, but men and women intent on the business of life. They
are moving up and down, looking for fortune, and in search of new
homes. Of course they carry with them all their household goods. Do
not let any critic say that I grudge these young travellers their
right to locomotion. Neither their right to locomotion is grudged
by me, nor any of those privileges which are accorded in America to
the rising generation. The habits of their country and the choice
of their parents give to them full dominion over all hours and over
all places, and it would ill become a foreigner to make such habits
and such choice a ground of serious complaint. But nevertheless the
uncontrolled energies of twenty children round one's legs do not
convey comfort or happiness, when the passing events are producing
noise and storm rather than peace and sunshine. I must protest that
American babies are an unhappy race. They eat and drink just as they
please; they are never punished; they are never banished, snubbed,
and kept in the back ground as children are kept with us; and yet
they are wretched and uncomfortable. My heart has bled for them
as I have heard them squalling by the hour together in agonies of
discontent and dyspepsia. Can it be, I wonder, that children are
happier when they are made to obey orders and are sent to bed at six
o'clock, than when allowed to regulate their own conduct; that bread
and milk are more favourable to laughter and soft childish ways
than beef-steaks and pickles three times a day; that an occasional
whipping, even, will conduce to rosy cheeks? It is an idea which I
should never dare to broach to an American mother; but I must confess
that after my travels on the western continent my opinions have a
tendency in that direction. Beef-steaks and pickles certainly produce
smart little men and women. Let that be taken for granted. But rosy
laughter and winning childish ways are, I fancy, the produce of
bread and milk. But there was a third reason why travelling on
these boats was not as pleasant as I had expected. I could not get
my fellow-travellers to talk to me. It must be understood that
our fellow-travellers were not generally of that class which we
Englishmen, in our pride, designate as gentlemen and ladies. They
were people, as I have said, in search of new homes and new fortunes.
But I protest that as such they would have been in those parts much
more agreeable as companions to me than any gentlemen or any ladies,
if only they would have talked to me. I do not accuse them of any
incivility. If addressed, they answered me. If application was made
by me for any special information, trouble was taken to give it
me. But I found no aptitude, no wish for conversation; nay, even a
disinclination to converse. In the western States I do not think
that I was ever addressed first by an American sitting next to me at
table. Indeed I never held any conversation at a public table in the
West. I have sat in the same room with men for hours, and have not
had a word spoken to me. I have done my very best to break through
this ice, and have always failed. A western American man is not a
talking man. He will sit for hours over a stove with his cigar in
his mouth, and his hat over his eyes, chewing the cud of reflection.
A dozen will sit together in the same way, and there shall not be
a dozen words spoken between them in an hour. With the women one's
chance of conversation is still worse. It seemed as though the
cares of the world had been too much for them, and that all talking
excepting as to business,--demands for instance on the servants
for pickles for their children,--had gone by the board. They were
generally hard, dry, and melancholy. I am speaking of course of aged
females,--from five and twenty perhaps to thirty, who had long since
given up the amusements and levities of life. I very soon abandoned
any attempt at drawing a word from these ancient mothers of families;
but not the less did I ponder in my mind over the circumstances of
their lives. Had things gone with them so sadly, was the struggle
for independence so hard, that all the softness of existence had
been trodden out of them? In the cities too it was much the same. It
seemed to me that a future mother of a family in those parts had left
all laughter behind her when she put out her finger for the wedding
ring.
For these reasons I must say that life on board these steam-boats was
not as pleasant as I had hoped to find it, but for our discomfort in
this respect we found great atonement in the scenery through which we
passed. I protest that of all the river scenery that I know, that of
the Upper Mississippi is by far the finest and the most continued.
One thinks of course of the Rhine; but, according to my idea of
beauty, the Rhine is nothing to the Upper Mississippi. For miles upon
miles, for hundreds of miles, the course of the river runs through
low hills, which are there called bluffs. These bluffs rise in every
imaginable form, looking sometimes like large straggling unwieldy
castles, and then throwing themselves into sloping lawns which
stretch back away from the river till the eye is lost in their twists
and turnings. Landscape beauty, as I take it, consists mainly in four
attributes: in water, in broken land, in scattered timber,--timber
scattered as opposed to continuous forest timber,--and in the
accident of colour. In all these particulars the banks of the Upper
Mississippi can hardly be beaten. There are no high mountains; but
high mountains themselves are grand rather than beautiful. There
are no high mountains, but there is a succession of hills which
group themselves for ever without monotony. It is perhaps the
ever-variegated forms of these bluffs which chiefly constitute the
wonderful loveliness of this river. The idea constantly occurs that
some point on every hillside would form the most charming site ever
yet chosen for a noble residence. I have passed up and down rivers
clothed to the edge with continuous forest. This at first is grand
enough, but the eye and feeling soon become weary. Here the trees are
scattered so that the eye passes through them, and ever and again
a long lawn sweeps back into the country, and up the steep side of
a hill, making the traveller long to stay there and linger through
the oaks, and climb the bluffs, and lie about on the bold but easy
summits. The boat, however, steams quickly up against the current,
and the happy valleys are left behind, one quickly after another.
The river is very various in its breadth, and is constantly divided
by islands. It is never so broad that the beauty of the banks is
lost in the distance or injured by it. It is rapid, but has not the
beautifully bright colour of some European rivers,--of the Rhine for
instance, and the Rhone. But what is wanting in the colour of the
water is more than compensated by the wonderful hues and lustre of
the shores. We visited the river in October, and I must presume that
they who seek it solely for the sake of scenery should go there in
that month. It was not only that the foliage of the trees was bright
with every imaginable colour, but that the grass was bronzed, and
that the rocks were golden. And this beauty did not last only for a
while and then cease. On the Rhine there are lovely spots and special
morsels of scenery with which the traveller becomes duly enraptured.
But on the Upper Mississippi there are no special morsels. The
position of the sun in the heavens will, as it always does, make much
difference in the degree of beauty. The hour before and the half-hour
after sunset are always the loveliest for such scenes. But of the
shores themselves one may declare that they are lovely throughout
those 400 miles which run immediately south from St. Paul.
About half-way between La Crosse and St. Paul we came upon Lake
Pepin, and continued our course up the lake for perhaps fifty or
sixty miles. This expanse of water is narrow for a lake, and by those
who know the lower courses of great rivers, would hardly be dignified
by that name. But, nevertheless, the breadth here lessens the beauty.
There are the same bluffs, the same scattered woodlands, and the
same colours. But they are either at a distance, or else they are
to be seen on one side only. The more that I see of the beauty
of scenery, and the more I consider its elements, the stronger
becomes my conviction that size has but little to do with it, and
rather detracts from it than adds to it. Distance gives one of its
greatest charms, but it does so by concealing rather than displaying
an expanse of surface. The beauty of distance arises from the
romance,--the feeling of mystery which it creates. It is like the
beauty of woman which allures the more the more that it is veiled.
But open, uncovered land and water, mountains which simply rise to
great heights with long unbroken slopes, wide expanses of lake, and
forests which are monotonous in their continued thickness, are never
lovely to me. A landscape should always be partly veiled, and display
only half its charms.
To my taste the finest stretch of the river was that immediately
above Lake Pepin; but then, at this point, we had all the glory of
the setting sun. It was like fairy land, so bright were the golden
hues, so fantastic were the shapes of the hills, so broken and
twisted the course of the waters! But the noisy steamer went groaning
up the narrow passages with almost unabated speed, and left the fairy
land behind all too quickly. Then the bell would ring for tea, and
the children with the beef-steaks, the pickled onions, and the light
fixings would all come over again. The care-laden mothers would tuck
the bibs under the chins of their tyrant children, and some embryo
senator of four years old would listen with concentrated attention,
while the negro servant recapitulated to him the delicacies of
the supper-table, in order that he might make his choice with due
consideration. "Beef-steak," the embryo four-year old senator would
lisp, "and stewed potato, and buttered toast, and corn cake, and
coffee,--and--and--and--; mother, mind you get me the pickles."
St. Paul enjoys the double privilege of being the commercial and
political capital of Minnesota. The same is the case with Boston in
Massachusetts, but I do not remember another instance in which it is
so. It is built on the eastern bank of the Mississippi, though the
bulk of the State lies to the west of the river. It is noticeable as
the spot up to which the river is navigable. Immediately above St.
Paul there are narrow rapids up which no boat can pass. North of
this, continuous navigation does not go; but from St. Paul down
to New Orleans, and the Gulf of Mexico, it is uninterrupted. The
distance to St. Louis in Missouri, a town built below the confluence
of the three rivers, Mississippi, Missouri, and Illinois, is 900
miles; and then the navigable waters down to the gulf wash a southern
country of still greater extent. No river on the face of the globe
forms a highway for the produce of so wide an extent of agricultural
land. The Mississippi with its tributaries carried to market, before
the war, the produce of Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois,
Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas,
Mississippi, and Louisiana. This country is larger than England,
Ireland, Scotland, Holland, Belgium, France, Germany and Spain
together, and is undoubtedly composed of much more fertile land. The
States named comprise the great centre valley of the continent, and
are the farming lands and garden grounds of the western world. He who
has not seen corn on the ground in Illinois or Minnesota, does not
know to what extent the fertility of land may go, or how great may be
the weight of cereal crops. And for all this the Mississippi was the
high road to market. When the crop of 1861 was garnered this high
road was stopped by the war. What suffering this entailed on the
South, I will not here stop to say, but on the West the effect was
terrible. Corn was in such plenty, Indian corn that is, or maize,
that it was not worth the farmer's while to prepare it for market.
When I was in Illinois the second quality of Indian corn when shelled
was not worth more than from eight to ten cents a bushel. But the
shelling and preparation are laborious, and in some instances it was
found better to burn it for fuel than to sell it. Respecting the
export of corn from the West, I must say a further word or two in
the next chapter; but it seemed to be indispensable that I should
point out here how great to the United States is the need of the
Mississippi. Nor is it for corn and wheat only that its waters are
needed. Timber, lead, iron, coal, pork, all find, or should find,
their exit to the world at large by this road. There are towns on it,
and on its tributaries, already holding more than one hundred and
fifty thousand inhabitants. The number of Cincinnati exceeds that, as
also does the number of St. Louis. Under these circumstances it is
not wonderful that the States should wish to keep in their own hands
the navigation of this river.
It is not wonderful. But it will not, I think, be admitted by the
politicians of the world, that the navigation of the Mississippi need
be closed against the West, even though the southern States should
succeed in raising themselves to the power and dignity of a separate
nationality. If the waters of the Danube be not open to Austria, it
is through the fault of Austria. That the subject will be one of
trouble no man can doubt; and of course it would be well for the
North to avoid that, or any other trouble. In the meantime the
importance of this right of way must be admitted; and it must be
admitted also that whatever may be the ultimate resolve of the North,
it will be very difficult to reconcile the West to a divided dominion
of the Mississippi.
St. Paul contains about fourteen thousand inhabitants, and, like all
other American towns, is spread over a surface of ground adapted to
the accommodation of a very extended population. As it is belted on
one side by the river, and on the other by the bluffs which accompany
the course of the river, the site is pretty, and almost romantic.
Here also we found a great hotel,--a huge square building, such as
we in England might perhaps place near to a railway terminus, in such
a city as Glasgow or Manchester; but on which no living Englishman
would expend his money in a town even five times as big again as
St. Paul. Everything was sufficiently good, and much more than
sufficiently plentiful. The whole thing went on exactly as hotels do
down in Massachusetts, or the State of New York. Look at the map, and
see where St. Paul is. Its distance from all known civilization,--all
civilization that has succeeded in obtaining acquaintance with the
world at large, is very great. Even American travellers do not go up
there in great numbers, excepting those who intend to settle there.
A stray sportsman or two, American or English, as the case may be,
makes his way into Minnesota for the sake of shooting, and pushes on
up through St. Paul to the Red River. Some few adventurous spirits
visit the Indian settlements, and pass over into the unsettled
regions of Dacotah and Washington territory. But there is no throng
of travelling. Nevertheless, an hotel has been built there capable
of holding three hundred guests, and other hotels exist in the
neighbourhood, one of which is even larger than that at St. Paul.
Who can come to them, and create even a hope that such an enterprise
may be remunerative? In America it is seldom more than hope, for one
always hears that such enterprises fail.
When I was there the war was in hand, and it was hardly to be
expected that any hotel should succeed. The landlord told me that he
held it at the present time for a very low rent, and that he could
just manage to keep it open without loss. The war which hindered
people from travelling, and in that way injured the innkeepers, also
hindered people from housekeeping, and reduced them to the necessity
of boarding out,--by which the innkeepers were, of course, benefited.
At St. Paul I found that the majority of the guests were inhabitants
of the town, boarding at the hotel, and thus dispensing with the
cares of a separate establishment. I do not know what was charged for
such accommodation at St. Paul, but I have come across large houses
at which a single man could get all that he required for a dollar a
day. Now Americans are great consumers, especially at hotels, and all
that a man requires includes three hot meals with a choice from about
two dozen dishes at each.
From St. Paul there are two waterfalls to be seen, which we, of
course, visited. We crossed the river at Fort Snelling, a ricketty,
ill-conditioned building, standing at the confluence of the Minnesota
and Mississippi rivers, built there to repress the Indians. It is,
I take it, very necessary, especially at the present moment, as
the Indians seem to require repressing. They have learned that the
attention of the federal government has been called to the war, and
have become bold in consequence. When I was at St. Paul I heard of a
party of Englishmen who had been robbed of everything they possessed,
and was informed that the farmers in the distant parts of the State
were by no means secure. The Indians are more to be pitied than the
farmers. They are turning against enemies who will neither forgive
nor forget any injuries done. When the war is over they will be
improved, and polished, and annexed, till no Indian will hold an acre
of land in Minnesota. At present Fort Snelling is the nucleus of a
recruiting camp. On the point between the bluffs of the two rivers
there is a plain, immediately in front of the fort, and there we
saw the newly-joined Minnesota recruits going through their first
military exercises. They were in detachments of twenties, and were
rude enough at their goose step. The matter which struck me most in
looking at them was the difference of condition which I observed in
the men. There were the country lads, fresh from the farms, such as
we see following the recruiting sergeant through English towns; but
there were also men in black coats and black trousers, with thin
boots, and trimmed beards,--beards which had been trimmed till very
lately; and some of them with beards which showed that they were
no longer young. It was inexpressibly melancholy to see such men
as these twisting and turning about at the corporal's word, each
handling some stick in his hand in lieu of weapon. Of course they
were more awkward than the boys, even though they were twice more
assiduous in their efforts. Of course they were sad, and wretched.
I saw men there that were very wretched,--all but heart-broken, if
one might judge from their faces. They should not have been there
handling sticks, and moving their unaccustomed legs in cramped paces.
They were as razors, for which no better purpose could be found than
the cutting of blocks. When such attempts are made the block is not
cut, but the razor is spoilt. Most unfit for the commencement of
a soldier's life were some that I saw there, but I do not doubt
that they had been attracted to the work by the one idea of doing
something for their country in its trouble.
From Fort Snelling we went on to the Falls of Minnehaha. Minnehaha,
laughing water. Such I believe is the interpretation. The name in
this case is more imposing than the fall. It is a pretty little
cascade, and might do for a picnic in fine weather, but it is not a
waterfall of which a man can make much when found so far away from
home. Going on from Minnehaha we came to Minneapolis, at which place
there is a fine suspension bridge across the river, just above the
falls of St. Anthony and leading to the town of that name. Till I got
there I could hardly believe that in these days there should be a
living village called Minneapolis by living men. I presume I should
describe it as a town, for it has a municipality, and a post-office,
and, of course, a large hotel. The interest of the place however is
in the saw-mills. On the opposite side of the water, at St. Anthony,
is another very large hotel,--and also a smaller one. The smaller
one may be about the size of the first-class hotels at Cheltenham or
Leamington. They were both closed, and there seemed to be but little
prospect that either would be opened till the war should be over. The
saw-mills, however, were at full work, and to my eyes were extremely
picturesque. I had been told that the beauty of the falls had been
destroyed by the mills. Indeed all who had spoken to me about St.
Anthony had said so. But I did not agree with them. Here, as at
Ottawa, the charm in fact consists, not in an uninterrupted shoot
of water, but in a succession of rapids over a bed of broken rocks.
Among these rocks logs of loose timber are caught, which have escaped
from their proper courses, and here they lie, heaped up in some
places, and constructing themselves into bridges in others, till
the freshets of the spring carry them off. The timber is generally
brought down in logs to St. Anthony, is sawn there, and then sent
down the Mississippi in large rafts. These rafts on other rivers are
I think generally made of unsawn timber. Such logs as have escaped in
the manner above described are recognized on their passage down the
river by their marks, and are made up separately, the original owners
receiving the value,--or not receiving it as the case may be. "There
is quite a trade going on with the loose lumber," my informant told
me. And from his tone I was led to suppose that he regarded the trade
as sufficiently lucrative if not peculiarly honest.
There is very much in the mode of life adopted by the settlers
in these regions which creates admiration. The people are all
intelligent. They are energetic and speculative, conceiving grand
ideas, and carrying them out almost with the rapidity of magic.
A suspension bridge half a mile long is erected, while in England
we should be fastening together a few planks for a foot passage.
Progress, mental as well as material, is the demand of the people
generally. Everybody understands everything, and everybody intends
sooner or later to do everything. All this is very grand;--but
then there is a terrible drawback. One hears on every side of
intelligence, but one hears also on every side of dishonesty. Talk
to whom you will, of whom you will, and you will hear some tale of
successful or unsuccessful swindling. It seems to be the recognized
rule of commerce in the Far West that men shall go into the world's
markets prepared to cheat and to be cheated. It may be said that as
long as this is acknowledged and understood on all sides, no harm
will be done. It is equally fair for all. When I was a child there
used to be certain games at which it was agreed in beginning either
that there should be cheating or that there should not. It may be
said that out there in the western States, men agree to play the
cheating game; and that the cheating game has more of interest in it
than the other. Unfortunately, however, they who agree to play this
game on a large scale, do not keep outsiders altogether out of the
play-ground. Indeed outsiders become very welcome to them;--and then
it is not pleasant to hear the tone in which such outsiders speak of
the peculiarities of the sport to which they have been introduced.
When a beginner in trade finds himself furnished with a barrel of
wooden nutmegs, the joke is not so good to him as to the experienced
merchant who supplies him. This dealing in wooden nutmegs, this
selling of things which do not exist, and buying of goods for which
no price is ever to be given, is an institution which is much
honoured in the West. We call it swindling;--and so do they. But it
seemed to me that in the western States the word hardly seemed to
leave the same impress on the mind that it does elsewhere.
On our return down the river we passed La Crosse, at which we had
embarked, and went down as far as Dubuque in Iowa. On our way down we
came to grief and broke one of our paddle-wheels to pieces. We had
no special accident. We struck against nothing above or below water.
But the wheel went to pieces, and we lay-to on the river side for the
greater part of a day while the necessary repairs were being made.
Delay in travelling is usually an annoyance, because it causes the
unsettlement of a settled purpose. But the loss of the day did us no
harm, and our accident had happened at a very pretty spot. I climbed
up to the top of the nearest bluff, and walked back till I came to
the open country, and also went up and down the river banks, visiting
the cabins of two settlers who live there by supplying wood to the
river steamers. One of these was close to the spot at which we were
lying; and yet though most of our passengers came on shore, I was
the only one who spoke to the inmates of the cabin. These people
must live there almost in desolation from one year's end to another.
Once in a fortnight or so they go up to a market town in their small
boats, but beyond that they can have little intercourse with their
fellow-creatures. Nevertheless none of these dwellers by the river
side came out to speak to the men and women who were lounging about
from eleven in the morning till four in the afternoon; nor did one of
the passengers except myself knock at the door or enter the cabin, or
exchange a word with those who lived there.
I spoke to the master of the house, whom I met outside, and he at
once asked me to come in and sit down. I found his father there and
his mother, his wife, his brother, and two young children. The wife,
who was cooking, was a very pretty, pale young woman, who, however,
could have circulated round her stove more conveniently had her
crinoline been of less dimensions. She bade me welcome very prettily,
and went on with her cooking, talking the while, as though she were
in the habit of entertaining guests in that way daily. The old woman
sat in a corner knitting--as old women always do. The old man lounged
with a grandchild on his knee, and the master of the house threw
himself on the floor while the other child crawled over him. There
was no stiffness or uneasiness in their manners, nor was there
anything approaching to that republican roughness which so often
operates upon a poor, well-intending Englishman like a slap on the
cheek. I sat there for about an hour, and when I had discussed with
them English politics and the bearing of English politics upon the
American war, they told me of their own affairs. Food was very
plenty, but life was very hard. Take the year through, each man could
not earn above half a dollar a day by cutting wood. This, however,
they owned, did not take up all their time. Working on favourable
wood on favourable days they could each earn two dollars a day; but
these favourable circumstances did not come together very often. They
did not deal with the boats themselves, and the profits were eaten up
by the middleman. He, the middleman, had a good thing of it, because
he could cheat the captains of the boats in the measurement of the
wood. The chopper was obliged to supply a genuine cord of logs,--true
measure. But the man who took it off in the barge to the steamer
could so pack it that fifteen true cords would make twenty-two false
cords. "It cuts up into a fine trade, you see, sir," said the young
man, as he stroked back the little girl's hair from her forehead.
"But the captains of course must find it out," said I. This he
acknowledged, but argued that the captains on this account insisted
on buying the wood so much cheaper, and that the loss all came upon
the chopper. I tried to teach him that the remedy lay in his own
hands, and the three men listened to me quite patiently while I
explained to them how they should carry on their own trade. But the
young father had the last word. "I guess we don't get above the fifty
cents a day any way." He knew at least where the shoe pinched him.
He was a handsome, manly, noble-looking fellow, tall and thin, with
black hair and bright eyes. But he had the hollow look about his
jaws, and so had his wife, and so had his brother. They all owned
to fever and ague. They had a touch of it most years, and sometimes
pretty sharply. "It was a coarse place to live in," the old woman
said, "but there was no one to meddle with them, and she guessed that
it suited." They had books and newspapers, tidy delf, and clean glass
upon their shelves, and undoubtedly provisions in plenty. Whether
fever and ague yearly, and cords of wood stretched from fifteen to
twenty-two are more than a set-off for these good things, I will
leave every one to decide according to his own taste.
In another cabin I found women and children only, and one of the
children was in the last stage of illness. But nevertheless the woman
of the house seemed glad to see me, and talked cheerfully as long as
I would remain. She inquired what had happened to the vessel, but
it had never occurred to her to go out and see. Her cabin was neat
and well furnished, and there also I saw newspapers and Harper's
everlasting magazine. She said it was a coarse, desolate place for
living, but that she could raise almost anything in her garden.
I could not then understand, nor can I now understand, why none of
the numerous passengers out of the boat should have entered those
cabins except myself, and why the inmates of the cabins should not
have come out to speak to any one. Had they been surly, morose
people, made silent by the specialties of their life, it would have
been explicable; but they were delighted to talk and to listen. The
fact, I take it, is, that the people are all harsh to each other.
They do not care to go out of their way to speak to any one unless
something is to be gained. They say that two Englishmen meeting in
the desert would not speak unless they were introduced. The further I
travel, the less true do I find this of Englishmen, and the more true
of other people.