Frum, _dit_ Manaigre, so that when the new house was fairly commenced we
planned it and hurried it forward entirely on our own account.

It was not very magnificent, it is true, consisting of but a parlor and
two bedrooms on the ground-floor, and two low chambers under the roof,
with a kitchen in the rear; but compared with the rambling old
stable-like building we now inhabited, it seemed quite a palace.

Before it was completed, Mr. Kinzie was notified that the money for the
annual Indian payment was awaiting his arrival in Detroit to take it in
charge and superintend its transportation to the Portage; and he was
obliged to set off at once to fulfil this part of his duty.

The workmen who had been brought from the Mississippi to erect the main
building, were fully competent to carry on their work without an
overseer; but the kitchen was to be the task of the Frenchmen, and the
question was, how could it be executed in the absence of the
_bourgeois_?

"You will have to content yourselves in the old quarters until my
return," said my husband, "and then we will soon have things in order."
His journey was to be a long and tedious one, for the operations of
Government were not carried on by railroad and telegraph in those days.

After his departure I said to the men, "Come, you have all your logs cut
and hauled--the squaws have brought the bark for the roof--what is to
prevent our finishing the house and getting all moved and settled to
surprise Monsieur John on his return?"

"Ah! to be sure, Madame John," said Plante, who was always the
spokesman, "provided the one who plants a green bough on the chimney-top
is to have a treat."

"Certainly. All hands fall to work, and see who will win the treat."

Upon the strength of such an inducement to the one who should put the
finishing stroke to the building, Plante, Pillon, and Manaigre, whom the
waggish Plante persisted in calling "mon negre," whenever he felt
himself out of the reach of the other's arm, all went vigorously to
work.

Building a log house is a somewhat curious process. First, as will be
conceived, the logs are laid one upon another and jointed at the
corners, until the walls have reached the required height. The chimney
is formed by four poles of the proper length, interlaced with a
wicker-work of small branches. A hole or pit is dug, near at hand, and,
with a mixture of clay and water, a sort of mortar is formed. Large
wisps of hay are filled with thi