St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1883-02-09
In Kansas with John Brown.
BY ALEX. G. HALVES.


| Kansas, in the wear lS56-still a ter
ritOry of the United States, with a
scattered population of few thousand
presented to the eye of the traveller
quite a different picture from that
which now greets his gaze. Nearly a
million of industrious and happy peo-
| pie now cultivate those fertile prairies,
which then showed an almost unbrOken
expanse of waving wild grass, variegat-
ed along the frequent streams by the
darker fringe of sycamore and willow,
and walnut, and cotton wOod-a virgin
land, beautiful in its maiden lOveliness,
great in its promise of future power
| Never was so tempting prize held up
before the longing eye of Gladiator or
Olympian wrestler, as greeted the Wis
ion of the men of the north and the
men of the south, when they !journeyed
over the rolling prairies, and the black,
rich, fat bottom land. And with what
different sentiments they regarded this
fair expanse, the one filed with the
determination of planting there the
institution of slavery, the other equally
determined its soil should be c0nsecrat-
ed to freedom.
| AIMING lUt lllt NIlbtI lldu bnt
fortune to be. From earliest child
hOOd-lOng before the clarion voice of
Wendell Phillips, the earnest pleas of
Gerritt Smith, the logic of William
| Lloyd Garrison, the songs of Quaker
Whittier, or the phillippics of Greeley,
had awakened the slumbering moral
sense of the nation while yet the dy-
ing moan of the martyred LovejOy was
resounding through the land - had
echoed through the chambers of mem
Ory, the prayers of father who, morn
ing and evening, never forgot to in
clude this among his petitions
"Remember, in mercy, the poor, Op-
pressed slave and o, God strike off
the shackles from his limbs, and the
chains from his hands"
Was it strange that when an oppOr-
tunity presented itself to do something
toward accomplishing this purpose he
should have been found on the plairs
of Kansas
1t was thus that after having been
present at the invasion of Lawrence,
and having been engaged in some
slight though exciting adventures, one
evening in July, of the year before
mentioned, while seated at supper,
Gathering hOOfs announced a messen-
ger in haste. In those troubled times
the ear was quick, the action prompt,
at the lonely settlers cabin. A minute
sufficed to assure the two stalwart sons
of the settler, as well as myself, that a
friend was coming. That friend proved
to be Mayor HOyt, an enthusiastic free
state man, who, but few weeks af-
terward, was waylaid and basely muir
dered by our treacherOus enemy. A
few words hurriedly spoken, announced
that we were wanted that Captain
Brown had had fight had captured
IA number of prisoners that they were
} encamped but few miles distant
! that his men were worn out that
more business might be ahead and
that we must join him at once, with
horse and rifle. The three recruits
were not long in preparing, and were
soon spurred, armed, mounted, and on
their way to the place where "The
Captain" as he was then designated
was reported to be encamped, some
ten miles away. But it was near night
when the start was made, and dark.
ness came on with double rapidity, by
reason of thunder shower which wa,
D impending.
0 Did you ever experience, on the fal
0 western prairie, regular old-fashioneC
0 thunderstorm If not, no description
0 | may attempt will furnish an adequat,
idea of it, especially to denizen o
0 California, land which has been de
MED by nature this manifestation o
; her sublimity. A thunderstorm il
4 the mountains is terrific, grand, i'm
n pressive. The thunder rolls and re
verberates from each mountain side t,
2 its neighbOr, tumbling and echOing til
' the ear is benumbed by the continuOu
; roar, broken in upon, ever and anon
T by new peals, which seem to add t,
the volume, till all nature resound
e again. The air is aglow with ever re
d newed light, and the sounds and tn
o sights fill one with sense of grandeu
It and awe, which makes man appear
even to himself, the puny. insignifican
: creature which he really is in tn
e presence of the great forces of tn
! :, universe. But a storm on the plains
y different. There the thunder onl
echoes among the clouds, forming
- deep diapason to the livelier musi,
a The cracking, sparkling, vicious Snd
Of of the electric discharge, sometime
of comes with a crash like the breakin
/; of a million shelves of crockery, all a
Of once then deafening one by shar
explosion which threatens to split til
- tympanum f; while, under all, runs til
deep bass drone of the cloud
atiOns and echoes. The air is on fir,
1t glows. One flash laps into anothe
~ Nature runs riot in the exuberance
effervescence, as the flames leap, an
sparkle and crackle. If the mountai
storm is impressive, that on the plai
is appalling in its intensity.
1t was this kind of storm we Ina
that night.
After weary wandering tramp "
Y realized that we were lost on the pra
rie; and finally our little party di
mounted and sat down on our saddle
We could not lie down upon the soakt
ground. There was nothing for us b
to wait for the dawn, which, when
came, disclosed the fact that we we
within a mile of the camp we we
seeking.
A tall, slender, quick eyed, irOn-gra
erect, close-shaven, intense-lOokil
man, with that peculiar shaped face v
call lantern -jawed, and nasal intOn
tiOn from time immemOrial associat'
is with puritanism, greeted the quartet
f | of recruits.