r a word. His face was turned to the westward, where
the sunlight was fading behind the hills of the far-off frontier of
the Promised Land.

[Illustration: OSCAR WAS PUT UP HIGH ON THE STUMP OF A TREE, AND, VIOLIN
IN HAND, "RAISED THE TUNE."]

The general opinion gathered that day was that they who wanted to
fight for freedom might better go to Lawrence, or to Topeka. Those who
were bent on finding homes for themselves and little ones should press
on further to the west, where there was land in plenty to be had for
the asking, or, rather, for the pre-empting. So, when Monday morning
came, wet, murky, and depressing, Bryant surrendered to the counsels
of his brother-in-law and the unspoken wish of the boys, and agreed to
go on to the newly-surveyed lands on the tributaries of the Kaw. They
had heard good reports of the region lying westward of Manhattan and
Fort Riley. The town that had changed its name was laid out at the
confluence of the Kaw and the Big Blue. Fort Riley was some eighteen
or twenty miles to the westward, near the junction of the streams that
form the Kaw, known as Smoky Hill Fork and the Republican Fork. On one
or the other of these forks, the valleys of which were said to be
fertile and beautiful beyond description, the emigrants would find a
home. So, braced and inspired by the consciousness of having a
definite and settled plan, the Dixon party set forth on Monday
morning, through the rain and mist, with faces to the westward.

CHAPTER VI.

WESTWARD HO!

The following two or three days were wet and uncomfortable. Rain fell
in torrents at times, and when it did not rain the ground was steamy,
and the emigrants had a hard time to find spots dry enough on which to
make up their beds at night. This was no holiday journey, and the
boys, too proud to murmur, exchanged significant nods and winks when
they found themselves overtaken by the discomforts of camping and
travelling in the storm. For the most part, they kept in camp during
the heaviest of the rain. They found that the yokes of the oxen chafed
the poor animals' necks when wet.

And then the mud! Nobody had ever seen such mud, they thought, not
even on the black and greasy fat lands of an Illinois prairie.
Sometimes the wagon sunk in the road, cut up by innumerable wheels, so
that the hubs of their wheels were almost even with the surface, and
it was with the greatest difficulty that their four yoke of oxen
dragged the wagon from it