h twelve
oxen, are standing on their way to a distant part. Everything suggests
a beyond.

[7] The discovery of gold in the Black Hills has lately given it a
great impetus, and as it is the chief point of departure for the
diggings it is increasing in population and importance. (July, 1879)

September 9.

I have found at the post office here a circular letter of
recommendation from ex-Governor Hunt, procured by Miss Kingsley's
kindness, and another equally valuable one of "authentication" and
recommendation from Mr. Bowles, of the Springfield Republican, whose
name is a household word in all the West. Armed with these, I shall
plunge boldly into Colorado. I am suffering from giddiness and nausea
produced by the bad smells. A "help" here says that there have been
fifty-six deaths from cholera during the last twenty days. Is common
humanity lacking, I wonder, in this region of hard greed? Can it not
be bought by dollars here, like every other commodity, votes included?
Last night I made the acquaintance of a shadowy gentleman from
Wisconsin, far gone in consumption, with a spirited wife and young
baby. He had been ordered to the Plains as a last resource, but was
much worse. Early this morning he crawled to my door, scarcely able to
speak from debility and bleeding from the lungs, begging me to go to
his wife, who, the doctor said was ill of cholera. The child had been
ill all night, and not for love or money could he get any one to do
anything for them, not even to go for the medicine. The lady was blue,
and in great pain from cramp, and the poor unweaned infant was roaring
for the nourishment which had failed. I vainly tried to get hot water
and mustard for a poultice, and though I offered a Negro a dollar to go
for the medicine, he looked at it superciliously, hummed a tune, and
said he must wait for the Pacific train, which was not due for an hour.
Equally in vain I hunted through Cheyenne for a feeding bottle. Not a
maternal heart softened to the helpless mother and starving child, and
my last resource was to dip a piece of sponge in some milk and water,
and try to pacify the creature. I applied Rigollot's leaves, went for
the medicine, saw the popular host--a bachelor--who mentioned a girl
who, after much difficulty, consented to take charge of the baby for
two dollars a day and attend to the mother, and having remained till
she began to amend, I took the cars for Greeley, a settlement on the
Pla