ey that had been thrown
them, give their Indian war-whoops and yells, then fall back to form the
semi-circle and dance up again. This was an exciting scene with the side
and back scenery made up of hundreds of live and almost naked redskins.

I saw one scalp-dance by the Sioux. They had a fresh scalp, said to be
off a Chippewa chief. It was stretched on a sort of hoop, formed by a
green twig, or limb. It was all very weird. This was in '54.

The Indians enjoyed frightening the white women. They often found them
alone in their homes. They were always hungry, would demand something to
eat, and would take anything that pleased their fancy. My mother, Mrs.
Sherrard, was very much afraid of the Indians. Once one of the braves
shook his tomahawk at her through a window.

I have seen a dog train in St. Paul, loaded with furs from the Hudson
Bay Fur Company.

WENONAH CHAPTER

Winona

JEANETTE THOMPSON MAXWELL

(Mrs. Guy Maxwell)

Mr. H. L. Buck--1854.

In the spring of '54 Cornelius F. Buck and his young wife, located a
claim and built a log cabin on the present highway just before it enters
the village of Homer in Winona County. Homer at that time seemed a much
more promising place than Winona. The few incidents I give are those I
heard from my mother's and father's lips during my childhood. The
country had been opened for settlement a year or two before, but few
settlers had arrived at this time and everything that went to make a
frontier was present, even to native Indians. They were peaceable enough
but inclined to be curious and somewhat of a nuisance. One spring
morning shortly after the cabin had been built, my mother was dressing,
when, without warning of any kind, the door was opened and in stalked a
great Indian brave. My father had already gone out and my mother was
greatly frightened, but her indignation at having her privacy thus
disturbed exceeded her fright and she proceeded to scold that Indian and
tell him what she thought of such conduct, finally "shooing" him out. He
took the matter good naturedly, grinning in a sheepish sort of way, but
my mother had evidently impressed him as being pretty fierce, for among
all the Indians of the neighborhood she became known as the "Little
Hornet."

The second spring my father and another settler securing some brass
kettles, went to a maple grove a mile below their homes on the river
bank and commenced gathering sap for sugar. During the night their
ke