History of Dane County, Wisconsin, Part 58

Author: Butterfield, Consul Willshire, 1824-1899; Western Historical Co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Chicago : Western Historical Company
Number of Pages: 1304

USA > Wisconsin > Dane County > History of Dane County, Wisconsin > Part 58

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The day at length becoming cold and rainy, our musical propensities became dormant, and we went silently on, anticipating the evening encampment and its comfortable fires, when we dis- covered that we had not exclusive possession of the country, a small canoe heaving in sight from below. On coming up with it we found it contained an old-looking Indian, his squaw and two young children ; . the squaw had some clothes on, but the man and the children were quite naked. They looked uncomfortable enough, to be sure, but Indians are so accustomed to suffer in this manner that they never complain. They are only really unhappy when they cannot procure food. I gave this poor family a few biscuits, and the woman seemed grateful.

At 4 P. M., we passed a picturesque-looking mass of horizontal sandstone, extending with some interruptions for about a mile, distant probably about forty miles from the portage ; and at half-past five, observing a comfortable place, near to an ancient abandoned Indian village [now

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Prairie du Sac, in Sauk County ], I made, to the great joy of the men, the signal for landing. Whilst they were pitching my tent, I attempted to walk to an elevated ridge that appeared not very far from us, to get a look at the country, but I found it excessively fatiguing ; the distance was greater than I supposed ; the wild grass was wet, and often up to my chin ; night was coming on. I was alone and unarmed, and when I reached the foot of the ridge, and looked at the ascent, I began to think the wisest thing I could do was to return without delay, and I did return, but bedraggled in a most extraordinary manner. After regaling myself with dry clothes, a comfortable repast and a lounge at the cheerful fire, I shut myself in the tent for the night.

My rest was a good deal disturbed by the mosquitoes, which had taken possession of the tent ; and, although I was up early, we could not start for a dense fog that was upon the river. I therefore amused myself with looking at the deserted wigwams near us. They were formed with nine poles, about twelve feet high, fixed into the ground in a circle, about two feet apart from each other, and their tops bent to a point and fastened together! These poles were strengthened with others interwoven round them, and the whole covered with birch bark. An Indian house of this kind costs but very little labor, and with a small fire in the middle is comfortable in the coldest weather, the smoke escaping through a hole where the poles meet. The fog began to clear away at 7 A. M., and we resumed our voyage .*

II .- BY ALEXANDER F. PRATT.

[In the month of February, 1837, the writer of the following, in company with Augustus Story, started on a tour to the mining regions. Passing through Prairie Village, now Waukesha, they proceeded by the way of Fort Atkinson to the Yahara River, near the present site of Dun- kirk. Here they encamped, building a fire, which they kept up till morning, on account of the wolves, which watched them closely. The next morning they proceeded up the stream, knowing that it would lead them to the Fourth Lake, as it was then called, where there were several wig- wams, and where they could obtain something to eat, even if it were not of the choicest kind.]

At about noon we reached the First Lake [Kegonsa, ] and, seeing moccasin tracks in the snow, we followed them for a short distance to a wigwam, but found it tenantless. After search- ing it from top to bottom, we found a few cold roasted potatoes, which we (after having fasted for twenty-four hours) relished well. We remained in this wigwam an hour or two, and then passed on to the point where Madison is now located. At that time, neither the ax nor " the shovel and the hoe " had been hung up or laid down in that vicinity. It was nearly sundown when we crossed the Third Lake [Monona]. After traveling over the first eminence-where the State House now stands-we struck a ravine (between Capitol Square and the present site of the Uni- versity), where we made a halt, struck up a fire, and encamped for the night, without even making any inquiry about supper. The cold potatoes which we ate at noon supplied the place of breakfast, dinner and supper. The weather had moderated a little, which, together with the hardships of the journey and our extreme fatigue, caused us to sleep quite comfortably during the night. The next morning we crossed Fourth Lake [Mendota], a distance of about four miles, where we saw a small log cabin, whichi was the first building of the kind we had seen since leaving Fort Atkinson. We knocked at the door, but all was silent. We were both cold and hungry, and the sight of a cabin was some relief. We did not wait for ceremony, but bolted in, where we found a squaw and some four or five papooses. We spoke to her in the Pottawat- omie language, but she made no reply. We were soon satisfied that she did not understand us. We then made all the signs that our Indian education or ingenuity would admit of, to show her that we were hungry ; but all in vain. We expected that her husband would soon come in and kick us out of doors, without waiting for an explanation, and were at a loss what to do. A white man [St. Cyr], however, soon came in, spoke to us in good English, and seemed glad to see us. He informed us that he was a Canadian, that the squaw was his wife, and that the children were

*From " A Canoe Voyage up the Minnay Sotor." By Q. W. Featherstonhaugh. Vol. I., pp. 193-196.

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also his. The squaw belonged to the Winnebago tribe, and spoke a different language from the other Indians in the vicinity.

He had been an Indian trader there for years. The lands which he had cultivated had been sold [entered] without his knowledge; for, in fact, he took no interest in anything except trading in furs, etc. His wife, on being made acquainted with our wants, flew around and prepared for us a supper. It was a kind of pot-pie, which we relished very well. After finishing our meal we in- quired what kind of meat we had eaten, and were informed that it was musk-rat. We remained there till morning, and then left for the Blue Mounds.

III .- BY G. W. FEATHERSTONHAUGH.

May 28, 1837. - Having finished our investigations in the course of the day, I began to pack up my fossils and minerals, preparatory to an excursion to Tycoberah [the Four Lakes]. A more melancholy and dreary place than this Mineral Point I never expect to see again. We had not tasted a morsel of fresh meat, or fish, or vegetables, since we had been here. There was not a vestige of a garden in the place, and the population seemed quietly to have resigned itself to an everlasting and unvarying diet of coffee, rice, treacle and bread and salt butter, morning, noon and night, without any other variety than that of occasionally getting a different cup and saucer.

May 29 .- Having engaged a wagon, we took our places in it very early, and I turned my back, not unreluctantly, upon our late quarters, leaving my luggage to keep company with the asafoetida until my return. We were now bound to Tycoberah, and to those prairies and lakes whose beanty had been so much extolled to me. Madison City, too, was an attraction before us ; in truth, we had been so wretchedly off at our apothecary's that we were convinced any change would be much for the better, and were ardently longing to see new faces in the shape of potatoes, fresh fish and meat. As to architectural expectations, I was cautious enough, in consequence of my late experience, not to entertain any very exalted ones, and therefore limited my anticipations to the larder of the best tavern of the metropolis of the Territory, where it was clear there must be something better than treacle and asafoetida. About five miles from Mineral Point we called upon the Governor, Gen. Dodge, at a quiet cabin he had built for himself in a small, secluded valley, tolerably well wooded, and spent half an hour with him. This gentleman, at that time the chief magistrate of the Territory, was said to be a perfect West- ern character. I had seen him on horseback in the streets of Mineral Point, and was struck with the appearance of his accouterments, having, although dressed in plain clothes, immense horse-pistols staring out of his holsters. He had been brought up on the frontiers, and since his manhood had been rather notorious for his desperate feuds with various individuals, many of whom still surviving, he always went armed, the invariable practice of bloods of his caliber being to fire immediately at any hostile approach.

On taking our leave of His Excellency, we passed some "diggings," with a few miserable huts erected near them, dignified with the name of Dodgeville. From hence we pursued our way across a rolling prairie, covered with charming wild flowers, and then came to some woodland, where the country became somewhat hilly. Here, at noon, we were met by my acquaintance, Mr. Messersmith, who was on the lookout for us, and who conducted us to his farm-house, situ- ated at the bottom of a little wooded dell, near a copious spring of delicious, clear water. We were received in the kindest manner by his family, and, after partaking of a homely repast, served to us with unceasing kindness, we set out on a long ramble to visit his diggings, which appeared to be very productive. On our return to the farm we were surprised by a hurricane and a heavy storm, accompanied with torrents of rain, in which we had to walk about four miles, drenched through and through. We were glad to get back to our host's cabin and repair our misfortune as well as we could at a rousing wood fire. Mrs. Messersmith then gave us a cup of coffee, and we lay down whilst our clothes were taken care of by the good lady.

May 30 .- At the dawn of day I rose, and, finding my clothes comfortably dried, dressed, and went to the beautiful spring, where having made my ablutions, I took a stroll before

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breakfast, and, having taken our cup of coffee and thanked our friends for their very hospitable reception, we again got into our wagon and drove sixteen miles over the prairie to the Blue Mounds, two considerable elevations of rock, consisting of a silicious hornstone, resembling that which I had seen in 1834, in the lead district of Missouri. The Galena procured in this neigh- borhood is so very white and brittle, and contains such a superabundance of sulphur, that, upon breaking many of the cubes, I generally found crystals of pure sulphur within. We here found an old bachelor, named [Ebenezer] Brigham, living in a log hut at this solitary place, following, as everybody does in this Territory, the occupation of a miner. He gave us a couple of hard- boiled eggs and some stale bread, and charged us about ten times what they were worth for them.

Pursuing our journey at 1 P. M., we passed the military road leading to Fort Winnebago and Navarino [Green Bay], and soon afterward got into one of the most exquisitely beautiful regions I have ever seen in any part of the world. The prairie, that had hitherto been distin- guished by a regular rolling surface, here changed its character and took the form of ridges, somewhat elevated, which frequently resolved themselves into masses of gracefully rounded hills, separated by gentle depressions, that occasionally become deepened valleys. In these, some of the heads of a stream called Sugar River, a tributary of Rock River, took their rise. In whatever direc- tion our eyes were turned, the most pleasing irregularities of surface presented themselves. But that which crowned the perfection of the view, and imparted an indescribable charm to the whole scene from the knoll where we stood to the most distant point where the alternate hills and vales blended with the horizon, was the inimitable grace with which the picturesque clumps of trees that sometimes enlarged themselves into woods, embellished this rural landscape from the hand of nature.

Here a thick grove hanging upon the slope of a hill, distinguished by its symmetry from its numerous companions impended over the amenity of the valley beneath; whilst further on, a more robust line of dense foliage betrayed the ample volume of some pellucid stream whence it was nourished. Turn where we would, every object within the ample range concurred to cherish and to establish more indelibly the pleasing impression caused by the whole; whilst the soft- ness of these attractions contrasted here and there so strikingly with the noble rock escarpments peering out from the bluffs, that nature might be said to speak to you in a voice that must be listened to, and to tell you that she had here surpassed the most polished efforts of English park scenery, the most difficult of all her achievements. America will justly boast of this unrivaled spectacle when it becomes known, for certainly it is formed of elements that no magic could enable all Europe to bring together upon so great a scale.

The aspect of this lovely country at once accounted for so great a population flocking to the lakes, on whose enchanting banks those cities were founded of which we had heard so much, and to which we were now advancing. Four noble lakes; in the center of a region of such unrivaled beauty, must constitute perfection itself. Our expectations were exceedingly raised. Every moment produced a new excitement : the occasional glimpse of the shy deer, with their ele- gant fawns, and the more frequent flushing of the prairie-hen from her nest, gave animation to the still beauty around us. Enraptured with all I saw, I could not but occasionally reflect on the oddity of seven large cities, each capable of containing a population of half a million of peo- ple, having congregated so close together. There was Madison City, which was the metropolis ; adjacent to this was the City of the Four Lakes; a short distance beyond this was the city of North Madison. Close upon this again was the city of East Madison. Then there was the city of West Madison, the city of South Madison, and finally the City of the First Lake. Of each of these I had a beautifully engraved plan, with all its squares, streets, institutions and temples.

Having stopped to make a sketch of some ancient earthworks, the first of the kind I had ever seen, we hastened on, as the day was drawing to a close, and we had yet some distance to go to Madison City. For some time, I had kept a good lookout for some of the enterprising farmers, who must have come from great distances to this fertile country, and was rather sur- prised that we should hitherto have met with no one. We had not passed a single farm, and con- cluded that, being an Indian country, the settlers had clustered round the great city we were

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bound to, and had established themselves near that lake, where the best fish abounded. Fresh fish ! prodigious varieties ! cat-fish, pike, pickerel, salmon, trout, buffalo, perch ! What antici- pations for men who had for so many days been bolting pieces of tough fat bacon, cured 1,000 miles off ! At length we came to a belt of open trees, and, passing through it, we reached the flat, marshy shores of the largest of the four lakes ; we could see almost entirely around it, and much did we look ; but, alas ! no vestige of human dwelling was in sight.

This considerably changed the current of our thoughts and materially impaired the beauty of the prospect. Not being disposed to express all we felt, we reluctantly took to the woods again, along the margin of the lake, in the hope to stumble on some one or other. Night was gradually drawing her vail over everything, and it became rather doubtful whether we should not have-in the language of backwoodsmen-to camp out. Keeping, therefore, all my visions of fried fish in the background for awhile, I felt for my box of matches, and, finding it safe, turned my attention-as old Indian travelers always do-to the next best thing, a rousing fire to lie down by. Black clouds were forming in the horizon ; we had been drenched thoroughly the day before, and it became pretty certain there would be another storm. Groping our way, and occasionally jolting over the fallen trees, we, at the end of an hour and a half, got to the shore of the Third Lake, having somehow or other missed the Second Lake, where Madison City was supposed to be. We now changed our course again, and, keeping to the northwest, and meandering, and wondering and shouting for my companion, who had got out of the wagon to follow a small trail he thought he had discovered, I at length gave up the attempt to proceed any further, and, selecting a dry tree as a proper place to bivouac near, had already stopped the wagon, when, hearing my companion's voice shouting for me in a tone that augured something new to be in the wind, I pushed on in that direction, and at length found him standing at the door of a hastily patched-up log hut, consisting of one room about twelve feet square .*

This was Madison City, and, humble as it was, it concentrated within itself all the urban importance of the seven cities we had come so far to admire, and to which, according to our engraved plans, Nineveh of old, Thebes, with its hundred gates, and Persepolis, were but baby- houses. Not another dwelling was there in the whole country, and this wretched contrivance had only been put up within the last four weeks. Having secured our horses, we entered the grand and principal entrance to the city, against the top of which my head got a severet blow, it not being more than five feet high from the ground. The room was lumbered up with barrels, boxes and all manner of things. Amongst other things was a bustling little woman, about as high as the door, with an astounding high cap on, called Mrs. [Rosaline] Peck. No male Peck was on the ground.}

My first inquiry was, whether she had any fresh fish in the house. The answer was " No !" Inflexible and unwelcome word. No fresh fish ! no large, delicious catfish, of twenty pounds' weight, to be fried with pork, and placed before the voracious traveler in quantities sufficient to calm those apprehensions that so often arise in Indian lands, of there not being enough for him to eat until he falls fast asleep. "Why, then," exclaimed my alarmed companion, "what's to be done ?" " I calculate I've got some salt pork,"§ rejoined our little hostess. " Then, madam, you must fry it without the fish," I replied. So to the old business we went, of bolting square pieces of fat pork, an amusement I had so often indulged in, that I sometimes felt as if I ought to be ashamed to look a live pig in the face. Our landlady, however, was a very active and obliging person ; she said she would make us as comfortable as it was possible for her to do, and "she guessed " she had a little coffee. and would make us a cup of it. Whether it was acorns, or what it was, puzzled me not a little ; it certainly deserved to be thought tincture of myrrh,

*The building (that part that was then being used, the other two not yet completed) was 18x24 .- W. H. C.

Twenty-four feet long and eighteen or twenty wide, wherein we used to dance cotilione, three sets at the same time .- ROSALINE PECK.

+A door of common height and well constructed .- W. H. C.

Why, at that time, A. A. Bird, tall as he wae, needed only to make a very polite bow when crossing our threshold, to call for the wherewith to renew the inner man. But, recollect, this was one of the kitchen doors, opening afterward iuto a dining-room ; there were three other outside doors to the buildings. - R. P.

¿My hueband and little son were both present. I cannot be mistaken ; as we had hut two arrivals previous, I well recollect every par- ticular .- R. P.

¿He accusee me of using the term " calculate ;" that is generally need by Hoosiers, and surely I am not one .- R. P. -

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and, as we drank and grimaced, dear Mrs. Peck, in her sweetest manner, expressed her regret that she had no other sugar for our coffee, they having, "somehow or other, not brought any with them."*

Whilst we were at this repast, the thunder-storm broke over us, and a deluge of rain came down, streaming through the roof in various places. In the midst of the confusion, two other vagabonds came in ; one of them a ruffian-looking fellow, who said he was a miner, on his way across the Indian country from Milwaukee ; the other, a stupid, boorish, dirty-looking animal, said he had not tasted anything for two days, having lost his way on the prairie ; and, having been overtaken the preceding night by a very heavy rain, whilst making his way up a coulee or vale, had been afraid to lie on the ground, and had passed the whole night sitting on a fallen tree. Fortunately, there was pork enough for us all, and when our landlady had put the frying- pan to bed, she did the same to us by the act of blowing the candle out. Where she stowed herself was her own secret. Choosing a place between two barrels, I lay down, t and drew my cloak over me; of sleep there was very little to be had, for it rained in torrents almost the whole night, and, not having pitched my camp skillfully, it poured upon me from the unfinished roof as I lay stretched upon the floor, f not daring to move in the dark lest I should pull some of the articles of Mrs. Peck's museum upon me, or break some of her crockery.

May 31 .- With the first ray of light, I jumped up from my uncomfortable berth, and having procured some dry clothes from my carpet-bag, strode over the two hang-gallows-looking fellows that were snoring near me, and gained the door. The illusion was now dissipated, and I had completely awoke from my dream of the Seven Cities, wondering how I could have ever thought it possible to have so deceived inyself. Smart as I knew these Western Americans were, I had not thought them so systematically and callously fraudulent as to cause engravings to be made of cities, with all their concomitant appendages, in countries where not a human being was to be found, and where not a single tree was cut down ; and this for the purpose of robbing their own countrymen. To rob strangers might, from the predjudice of education, be considered even meritorious ; but to rob their own countrymen so remorselessly argued an absence of principle so universal and total, that I do not know where it is to be paralleled in history.

The all-absorbing passion for money, which the absence of those moral distinctions that so much protect society from it in Europe, has established in the American mind, has, with this class of men, obliterated every sense of that feeling that naturally inclines men to obey the divine injunction of " doing unto others as ye would they should do unto you." If a smart man cheats any one, no part of the disgrace of knavery falls upon him ; and if one smart man cheats another smart man, he receives the most unbounded admiration ; so that these smart fellows, having no motive whatever to be commonly honest, at last become callous and forget even the nature of justice, living only to carry out their own base and selfish maneuvers. The vender of cities, took no particular pains to conceal from me the atrocious nature of the occupations he had followed, and was hardy enough, in an argument with me, to attempt to justify his practices. " Men," said he, " that keep a bright lookout are never taken in; it is only fools that take themselves in, and they are of no account."

It is fearful to reflect what will be the condition of society here when honesty retires alto- gether from the field of action, and leaves fraud, smartly perpetrated, to be the principal feature in all transactions ; how much is to be apprehended from the future, when the generations of

*He says he did not know whether the coffee was made of acoros or tincture of myrrh, and he grimaced. I think he must have been bora with his face awry, or been very much troubled with worms or gout, or perhaps reflections continually flitted across his memory of the many nauseating remedies he had been accustomed to swallow, so that he could not avoid drawing hie face askew, and of course kept it in a continual grimace; for there was a perfect sameness on his countenance whilst he remained there, unless my memory is very treacherous. If there was any one thing I took a pride in, it was in making good coffee; and it is the first and only complaint that I ever heard of our table or Its fixtures. Ask some of the old settlers of Madison in regard to this subject. [Simeon Mille testifies to the fact that Mre. Peck did make most excellent coffee.] True, we had no cream, as our cow was left at Blue Mounds, until grass started .- R. P.

tIl a bed with over thirty pounds of freeh geese feathers, laid on a good back woode bedstead, with plenty of clean bedding, was not good enough for his majesty, then he ought to have carried his accommodations, with blanket on hie back, ae maoy a better man has done. Squire Seymour purchased the same bed when we left Madison ; if he owns it yet, I presume he will permit our Historical Society and the public generally to examine it for their own satisfaction .- R. P.

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History of Dane County, Wisconsin, Part 58

Author: Butterfield, Consul Willshire, 1824-1899; Western Historical Co., Chicago, pub Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Chicago : Western Historical Company Number of Pages: 1304

Author: Butterfield, Consul Willshire, 1824-1899; Western Historical Co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Chicago : Western Historical Company
Number of Pages: 1304