fell from their chairs to the floor, where they
sprawled unconscious. When they awoke they left quietly and without
trouble of any kind. They seemed a strangely subdued and chastened band;
probably they were wretchedly ill after their debauch on the adulterated
whisky the traders had given them.

That autumn the Ottawa tribe had a great corn celebration, to which we
and the other settlers were invited. James and my older sisters attended
it, and I went with them, by my own urgent invitation. It seemed to me
that as I was sharing the work and the perils of our new environment,
I might as well share its joys; and I finally succeeded in making
my family see the logic of this position. The central feature of the
festivity was a huge kettle, many feet in circumference, into which the
Indians dropped the most extraordinary variety of food we had ever seen
combined. Deer heads went into it whole, as well as every kind of meat
and vegetable the members of the tribe could procure. We all ate some of
this agreeable mixture, and later, with one another, and even with
the Indians, we danced gaily to the music of a tom-tom and a drum. The
affair was extremely interesting until the whisky entered and did its
unpleasant work. When our hosts began to fall over in the dance and
slumber where they lay, and when the squaws began to show the same ill
effects of their refreshments, we unostentatiously slipped away.

During the winter life offered us few diversions and many hardships. Our
creek froze over, and the water problem became a serious one, which
we met with increasing difficulty as the temperature steadily fell. We
melted snow and ice, and existed through the frozen months, but with
an amount of discomfort which made us unwilling to repeat at least that
special phase of our experience. In the spring, therefore, I made a
well. Long before this, James had gone, and Harry and I were now the
only outdoor members of our working-force. Harry was still too small to
help with the well; but a young man, who had formed the neighborly habit
of riding eighteen miles to call on us, gave me much friendly aid. We
located the well with a switch, and when we had dug as far as we could
reach with our spades, my assistant descended into the hole and threw
the earth up to the edge, from which I in turn removed it. As the well
grew deeper we made a half-way shelf, on which I stood, he throwing the
earth on the shelf, and I shoveling it up from that poi