cumseh, where they would be
due in a day or two if they continued on this road, an election for
county officers was to be held soon, and the Missourians were bound to
get in there and carry the election. Clark thought they had better not
go straight forward into danger. They could turn off, and go west by
way of Topeka.

"Why, that would be worse than going to Tecumseh," interjected
Charlie, who had modestly kept out of the discussion. "Topeka is the
free-State capital, and they say that there is sure to be a big battle
there, sooner or later."

But Mr. Bryant resolved that he would go west by the way of Tecumseh,
no matter if fifty thousand Borderers were encamped there. He asked
the stranger if he had in view any definite point; to which Clark
replied that he had been thinking of going up the Little Blue; he had
heard that there was plenty of good vacant land there, and the land
office would open soon. He had intended, he said, to go to Manhattan,
and start from there; but since they had been so cowardly as to change
the name of the place, he had "rather soured on it."

"Manhattan?" exclaimed Charlie, eagerly. "Where is that place? We have
asked a good many people, but nobody can tell us."

"Good reason why; they've gone and changed the name. It used to be
Boston, but the settlers around there were largely from Missouri. The
company were Eastern men, and when they settled on the name of Boston,
it got around that they were all abolitionists; and so they changed it
to Manhattan. Why they didn't call it New York, and be done with it,
is more than I can tell. But it was Boston, and it is Manhattan; and
that's all I want to know about _that_ place."

Mr. Bryant was equally sure that he did not want to have anything to
do with a place that had changed its name through fear of anybody or
anything.

Next day there was a general changing of minds, however. It was
Sunday, and the emigrants, a God-fearing and reverent lot of people,
did not move out of camp. Others had come in during the night, for
this was a famous camping-place, well known throughout all the region.
Here were wood, water, and grass, the three requisites for campers, as
they had already found. The country was undulating, interlaced with
creeks; and groves of black-jack, oak, and cottonwood were here and
there broken by open glades that would be smiling fields some day, but
were now wild native grasses.

There was a preacher in the camp, a good man fro