The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1894-09-09

"Then came the first great event in
my life, my first trip to the west to
visit some relatives down here in Hi
nois. 1 thank the Lord for that trip.
was only Is years of age, ana L was
plunged right into the richness Of these
prairies in the fifties. You can mag
inc what the prairies were then. l know
the prairies as you do, the whole of
them, birds, snakes. flowers; but the big
game was just little west. Oh, used
to plot and scheme to get out there! And
the sad part was / had to go back to
New York city in winter. But the work
was done-I had taste of wild life.
From that time / lived only. to get back
west. I marked off every day on the
calendar and said, One day nearer hap
piness again. After that visit people
couldn't hurt me in the city. When
they ran against me or struck me
wasn't there. l was dreaming Of the
west. That was the beginning of the
whole campaign
1 felt that 1 was getting at the most
secret springs Of his action.
1T seems strange you should have
had those longings for the wilderness.
man born in the west could feel their
significance more intensely
"All l saw in the west seemed native
to me, as / had returned to it from a
strange land. And then the prairies
were full of all beauty then. But that
was only part of it. | wanted to get
further west; the plants called me, but
before I could get to them the war
broke out and 1 went in.
You must have been a mere boy?"
seventeen. / served in the infantry
IN the Peninsula campaign till L fell
sick of fever and was discharged. 1
went in again later as second lieuten-
ant and got to be first lieutenant and
.oya tps11 80 h. TT,,;& SEo+ al
ored artillery. Great daysr' He out
lined it with rapid phrase. Great days
hunting guerillas with blood hounds
camp at night hearing the negroes sing
thunder Of guns-battlefields thick
with dead Johnnies, staring up at the
moon" he broke off with gesture of
verbal weakness. Hard life for a
youngster, but all working round to-
ward something worth while"
We'll, didn't this war break in on
your artistic places?"
/ didn't have any places of any sort
except to get out west. just as soon
as the war closed I started for Illinois
again, and went to farming with nv
relations near the central part of the
state'
He depressed to describe barley
field in July, and to assure me that he
knew all about the scenes of my
stories, threshing, binding grain-all
OF it. Those were restless days, he
said. His people considered him a fail
ure,- He lacked snap and push"
He did little but dream and hunt.
At this point his mysticism came out
again. His whole expression changed.
his voice became low and very grave
This voice is very flexible and follows
every minute change in his emotion)
About this time l felt a great
change coming" he explained with SOL
emn infection. "All this time I had
been restless and unsatisfied I longed
to do something, 1 didn't know what.
| couldn't content myself much longer
dreaming and hunting
He felt my sympathy and he uttered
his fatalism without apology. His alb
rdpt direct language made it all the
more marvellous. He accepted it as a
fact, whatever other explanation of it
might be. 1T was like a voice speak
ing to me- he said. 'It came at night
at first. I'd start awake suddenly as if
had heard voice saying, You
haven't done your work. You've
missed it Sometimes it said, What
are you doing here At last these
voices or thoughts came in the day
time and then I'd be plunged in gloom
for days. I remember once l took
some horses to town to be shod, and
while waiting l went out and lay
down against an old wheel near the
shop and fell asleep q saw the very
place the other day, and the voice