a canoe or by
fording. I remember one occasion in the very early spring, when the
river was scarcely free from ice, and was badly swollen, filling its
banks, five or six of us, neighbors, started for Shelbyville on foot to
get our mail, and to hear the postmaster read the news from the weekly
St. Paul paper which came to him, there being at that time, I think, no
newspaper taken west of the river. We reached the river. The ice had
gone out, and the boat was on the other side. We agreed to draw cuts and
decide who should swim the river and get the boat. The lot fell upon
Jonah, and I have had chills ever since. I am not quite certain that the
cuts were fairly held.

Father's claim was not a very desirable one. Soon after he had taken it
a man named Sam Tait came into the country and "jumped" a claim which
adjoined ours upon the east, and was the making of a much more desirable
farm than ours. He succeeded in holding the claim. A few days after our
arrival a prairie fire came from the west and with a brisk wind swept
the whole country with a very besom of destruction. We came near losing
everything we had. Sam was a loser, quite a quantity of his hay was
destroyed. Very shortly after the fire he made us an informal call and
in language not the most polite but very emphatic, declared his
intention to leave the country at once and offered to sell us his claim.
We bought it, one hundred and sixty acres of land, three acres broken, a
small stock of hay not burned, his sod stable and board shanty. For the
purchase price we gave him a shot gun and hauled two loads of his goods
to Mankato.

This was my first visit to Mankato. We removed our shanty to our new
purchase at once. Two years ago my brother and I sold the farm for
$9600, and it was well worth it.

It seemed at first in those early days impossible to have social
relations with anyone. Neighbors as we had known them, we had none. The
nearest settlers were a mile distant from us, and there were but four or
five families nearer than two or three miles distant. But we soon
learned that we had neighbors even though the distance was considerable.
First one neighbor and then another would extend to every family in the
vicinity an invitation to spend an afternoon or an evening. Someone
would hitch his oxen to his wagon or sled, and going from house to
house, gather up a full load well rounded up and then at the usual gait
for such conveyances, we rode and visited and sang un