Morris tribune., 1882-10-12

and long timbers swung around perilously
near the boat as they went dashiug down the
| river. Lucy asked Charlie where they were,
| and how far they had come. Below Vane, he
told her, and they had come fifteen miles.
Fifteen miles in rocking, surging house,
| among those enormous cakes Of Iceland she
shiverea again at her rowing.
'Do yon know that piace?" asked Charlie.
Lucy looked and saw solitary house, stand
ing amid enormous cakes of ice so black
| from mud and sand covering them and con-
tanned in them that they looked more like
cakes of black lava than ice. That was like
no place she had ever SEEM
THAT is Glenn Island" said Charlie. She
looked again; she could not believe it Glenn
Island was 4 pretty little town; she and Charlie
had gone to school there, and it had churches.
| stores, schools and houses of plenty. 1t could
not be-
There is the railroad" continued Charlie,
as they got back nearer their own home, or
what had been home. Lucy could only see a
vast sea stretching out on every hand, with a
swift current in the center and blocks Of ice
and mud here and there in every direction.
Sometimes there was the roof of house or
barn, and few cattle perched on the top of
some straw stacks. or standing Ill the water
half WAY up to their backs, the ice frozen so
thlcKly about them they could not move. She
could see no signs of the railroad; if it was
where Charles pointed it was buried under
tons of ice.
do you know this farm!" asked Charlie
again
Lucy looked and saw acres of land plunging
into tie river. Dead bodies of cattle lay here
| and there, caught among the cakes of ice, and
part of a harvester wnirled by them il the
water. No, she had never seen it. she was
sure.
''rhat is 10 Aims" said Charlie.
She caught her breath and looked again. All
those broad acres and earns and horses and
cattle, that her sister had talked of so often,
gone. As she looked she caught sight of a man
wed ed in between two large cakes of ice not
far from them.
''There's a. man, Charlie" she said under
ner breath, for the sight of him had sent a
horror to he:.
"I's Jo," cited Charlie, as the boat swung
around 50 they could SEQ his face, ''and he's
dead"
Col ,mb cried out at that and begged them
not to stop, and indeed they could not in that
swift river. How terrible it all seem, d as they
went or Far off the bluff. like tho banks of
the sea, in the center of which WAS their strug-
Cling boat, on every side roofs of churches,
houses, barns, or wrecks of them al The
comfortable farms that the year before had
beeu covered with wheat, buried in water and
Ice, some half washed into the river, and many
covered with deposit of sand that had ruined
them for years at least Cattle, horses, reap
ers, mowers, everything gone, and sometime
the owners, too, like poor 10. Great trees
were tom up by the roots, or cut off clean aud
smooth some stripped of their bark, their
large trunks seeming half human as they lay
there ruined and helpless.
One still standing, aud perched in its
branches We're three women whom Ldcv rec
oynZad as her former neighbors, Mrs Ole
Oleson. Mrs. Stark Starkson and Mrs. Peter
son. Each had babe in her arms, and all
called loudly for help. The men brought the
boat as near as possible to them, and promis ed
TO send them help at once, but their boat was
full. The women begged pi;eously. They
had all got together in one house, they said,
and when that was going had climbed up into
this tree and had been there all night and were
so cold. Coiomb knew their husbands were
with Peter after wood, but she asked where
Mrs. Oleson's other chill iren were. and the
poor woman broke out sobbing and said they
were in the river. Sarah had slipped down
into the water when they tried to get up in the
tree, and Hans had dropped of in the night
when she had fallen asleep just a minute.
Farther on Charles pointed out house
standing on higher land than the Others
where he told Lucy family were up stairs,
waiting to be taken off if need be, but allow
ing others in more danger to go first and
near by man had lam in another house with
both hands and feet frozen 80 badly the doc
tors were going to amputate them. At last
they reached their destination, the great els-
vator where the owner, who had been rich
the day before, but was now a poor man, was
Portable They were soon among the other
sufferers, some worse off than themselves,
and the men who had brought them only
waited TO take little food, and then started out
again with others.
Day after day and week after week, the flood
continued. Skiffs and yawls were hastily built
and parties of rescuers were out continually
One day they brought in family who had
lived DAYS on raw chickens, the fowls having
been driven to the house by fright; and an
other day it was two old ladies who had
lived more than week in their barn.
Little children, only half-dressed and
consequently half-frozen, were brought
from all sorts of strange perches and their
rescuers had many narrow escape while try
ing to save them. Huge barricades of ice,
sometimes thirty feet high, must be crossed,
and again swift open currents and sometimes
thin ice, on which planks were laid to make it
more secure, or the boats were dragged across
to reach another open place. Day after day
they brought them in, taking sixty persons
from the roof OF one large house and picking
up others here and there all half frozen and
half starved, and wholly destitute The
owner of the elevator drew up by means of
pulleys few cattle that had been saved,
Strengthening them on one of the
upper floors and feeding the people They
had no lights, for the kerosene and even the
candles had given out everywhere the boats
could reach, but they bore that quite patiently
as long as they had some sort OF food
Peter returned with his neigh5o.s 8, but came
in boat. and their wood went on down the
river Neither he nor Colomb sal word
more against Charles love-making, though
thcv saw it progressing il the intervals he had
from his work IN the boats. and even old Gau-
there could not forget that Charlie saved hi.
lite, and if he muttered it was only to praise
him.
And Lucy and Charlie think the flood was
not altogether without its advantages.