LIBRARY Of CONGRESS. 
 
 Chap. ^ C(tpyr^hOo.. 
 
 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 
 
Parson Ralph Riley. 
 
Twenty- Five Years a Parson 
 IN THE Wild West . 
 
 BEING THE EXPERIENCE OF 
 
 PARSON RALPH RILEY 
 
 BY 
 
 REV. JOHN BROWN 
 
 Ex-Member of the Massachusetts Legislature 
 
 -i. ^x 
 
 \<\'^r '1 
 
 FALL RIYER, MASS. 
 PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR. 
 
 1896. 
 
 mmxi 
 
•Bg'] 
 
 Copyright, 1896, 
 
 BY 
 
 Rev. John Brown 
 
 All rights reserved. 
 
 
 ?IfOEXEf> 
 
DeMcatcb 
 
 TO MY MANY FRIENDS 
 IN THE CITY OF FALL RIVER. 
 
LIFE IS A MINGLED YARN. 
 
 THE LAWYER KNOWS PEOPLE AS THEY SEEM TO BE. 
 
 THE DOCTOR KNOWS THEM AS THEY ARE. 
 
 THE PARSON KNOWS THEM AS THEY WOULD LIKE TO BE. 
 
 THE FATHER IN HEAVEN KNOWS THE LAWYER, THE DOCTOR, THE 
 PARSON, AND THE PEOPLE AT THEIR REAL VALUE. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 MARK TWAIN and other humorists have described 
 to us the great half-civihzed frontier of the 
 West, but no one has ever before attempted to do so 
 from the same standpoint our author does. To our 
 mind this book throws much new Hght on life in the 
 wild West as few other books do, for it tells the whole 
 story honestly and in a most natural way, without giving 
 it any religious coloring. It is full of fun and humor, 
 because the parson saw much to laugh at. Like other 
 frontier parsons, he no doubt saw much also to weep 
 over, but this does not come within the province of the 
 present volume. 
 
 The author's record on the Western missionary field 
 is well and honorably known to the Presbyterian Board 
 of Home Missions. To young ministers contemplating 
 work on our great Western borders, to the tens of thou- 
 sands who are contributors to the extension of religion 
 and civilization all over this land from sea to sea, to 
 those who have near relatives roughing it on the frontier, 
 as well as to those who have, or are likely to have, financial 
 interests in our new States and Territories, this artless 
 
 5 
 
 
 
6 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Story will be read with more than passing interest. 
 There are too many among us here in the East who find 
 Hfe dull and aimless, and because of this a sort of 
 mental and moral miasma has taken hold of their vitals, 
 who if they would but read what Parson Riley has to 
 tell them, they would be stirred by the hfe-giving breezes 
 which blow from the Rocky Mountains, the Sierra Nevada, 
 the wide plains of Texas, and the South Atlantic Ocean. 
 It will give information and amusement to all, and that 
 too in language which is charming in its simplicity. 
 
 P. M. MACDONALD, 
 
 Pastor St. Andrew's Church, 
 
 Boston, Mass. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER I. PAGE 
 
 The Preparation 9 
 
 CHAPTER H. 
 The Start ^7 
 
 CHAPTER HI. 
 The Work 28 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 The Indians 3^ 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 The Hotels 3^ 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 The Blundering • • 45 
 
 CHAPTER VH. 
 The Gambler 5^ 
 
 CHAPTER VHI. 
 The Miner 57 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 The Stage Robber 72 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 The Queer Preacher 75 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 The Church Member 83 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 The Church Row 9^ 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 "Indian Joe" • • 95 
 
8 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. PAGE 
 
 The Mormon loo 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 Texas 119 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 The Cowboy 123 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 Tricky Fellows . . . . . . .129 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 Dangerous Fellows 140 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 Train and Land Robbers . . . . .148 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 Lonely Traveling i55 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 The Changed Scene . . . . . -159 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 The Unlucky Ranch 166 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 The Struggle 176 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 The Victory i79 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 The Busy East 185 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 The Eastern Woman 19^ 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 The Marriage « . 204 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 The Kyles of Bute . . . . • .211 
 
TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE PREPARATION. 
 
 TDOSTON is a busy city where every one 
 ^^ is on the rush after the golden ox, 
 knocking you right and left as you attempt 
 to walk the streets. I therefore left the 
 jostling crowd one day recently and retired 
 to the Common, that is, the city park, and 
 there for a while, beside a little lake, I sat 
 looking at the chirping sparrows, playing 
 children, and budding trees, when a man who 
 was evidently a preacher joined me on the 
 seat. His talk was so interesting in spots 
 that I requested him to give me an outline 
 of his life for publication, for I perceived 
 that it might be instructive and interesting 
 to the growing generations here in the East, 
 seeing that the times and manners of life he 
 referred to are fast passing away. 
 
 9 
 
lO . TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 After considering the matter a little, he 
 agreed to do so, and this is what he said : 
 
 Perhaps before complying with your re- 
 quest I had better tell you the fate of all 
 papers which have published what I gave 
 them. Out in Nevada, nearly thirty years 
 ago, an editor there asked me to contribute 
 weekly articles for Sunday reading, as I was 
 a little behind with my subscription and had 
 neither wood nor watermelons to bring him. 
 That editor left town the following week. 
 My first article appeared on Saturday, and 
 on Monday he quietly folded his tent and 
 stole away, Arab-like. Down in Texas, some 
 twenty years ago, an editor requested me to 
 give him some religious articles for the edifi- 
 cation of his readers, and I had only given 
 him two or three when his only cow jumped 
 over a bluff and broke her neck, his wife 
 went crazy, the poor man skipped between 
 two suns, and the last seen of him he was 
 heading for the North Pole. 
 
 In Washington city another of the brother- 
 hood asked me to help fill up his columns 
 with my best thoughts on the moral and 
 
THE PREPARATION. I I 
 
 political aspects of the country at large, and 
 his poor Bird of Freedom expired in great 
 agony after swallowing my first article, and 
 the sheriff took the carcass when the spirit 
 fled. In Fall River, here in Massachusetts, 
 the Tribune got to publishing my sermons 
 on Labor and Capital every Monday morn- 
 ing, and the electricity went out of it, and 
 the people are without their Tribune till this 
 day. If you publish therefore what I tell 
 you, you will please caution the editor before- 
 hand, for I do not wish any one any harm. 
 
 If I am to tell you anything in a connected 
 form, I may as well begin at the beginning. 
 Each mortal life is a distinct unit, and you 
 cannot understand it unless you begin at the 
 start. 
 
 The day of the week, the month of the 
 year, or the year of our Lord in which I came 
 to this mundane sphere, I do not recollect. 
 I remember, however, that there was a great 
 hubbub outside and inside the parental home 
 on the occasion. Outside the dogs barked 
 and the neighbors shouted to each other, 
 "Did you hear the news?" Inside there 
 were general congratulations. I observed 
 
12 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 certain old women present who must have 
 followed the business of prophesying, for 
 they told all sorts of things that would 
 happen to me on the journey just started. 
 Some of them, too, were so advanced in 
 their profession as to tell what sort of a man 
 I would be. One benevolent old granny 
 said, " He '11 be a good man ! " Another 
 said, "I'll wager you he'll be a soldier; 
 look at his fists ! " And another said, " He '11 
 cross the seas and have many ups and downs 
 in life ; his friends will be much attached to 
 him, and his enemies will be as malicious as 
 old Nick." One old visitor took a peep at me, 
 who seemed wiser than the rest, and shook 
 her head, saying as she did so, *' I '11 bet you 
 a penny he '11 be a mixed sort of a beaver ! " 
 Thus they discoursed in their knowing way, 
 and I wondered much at their talk. 
 
 A brother, who had just learned to wag his 
 tongue, asked one of the old ladies present, 
 "Where do babies come from?" "Hush, 
 child," she replied, " but since you have asked 
 it, I will tell you. They come down from 
 heaven." That question being satisfactorily 
 answered, another was propounded by the 
 
THE PREPARATION. 1 3 
 
 same inquisitive relation : '* Why do babies 
 have red faces?" The question seemed to 
 stagger the old lady for a moment, but she 
 was equal to the occasion and replied : *' My 
 little man must not ask such questions, but 
 I will answer you just once more. Babies 
 have red faces because they get awfully 
 scorched when passing down by the blazing 
 sun. Now run out and play, that 's a good 
 boy." 
 
 After a few weeks my parents took me to 
 church, and, holding me up before a man I 
 had never seen before, water was poured 
 upon my face. I was a meek and submissive 
 child up to this point, but I thought it now 
 high time to assert myself, and I kicked and 
 screamed, so much so, indeed, that all pres- 
 ent were glad when I was taken outside. 
 I did not know then what it all meant, but I 
 have learned since, and I am glad they did 
 this thing to me, otherwise I would have 
 grown up a heathen. The good man in the 
 pulpit called me '' Ralph." Had I been born 
 in France they would have called me '' De 
 Ralph," or in Wales, " Ralphwzmlpp," but 
 I am glad that I was born in a Christian 
 
14 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 country. As I grew up I was sent to school, 
 and the teacher used to dust my coat quite 
 often. I did not complain of this, for a 
 healthy boy needs a healthy dusting once in 
 a while, and I was healthy. But one day the 
 teacher, who was a great big fellow, whipped 
 a little girl that I had a sort of fondness for, 
 and I struck him. More than my coat was 
 dusted that day, and when my father exam- 
 ined my back at night he saw ridges like the 
 Blue Ridge of Virginia all over my back. I 
 never went to that school again. 
 
 Some years after I wanted to be a preacher, 
 but it was a daring thing for a poor boy at 
 four dollars a week to think of going to 
 college. Dukes and lords might send their 
 sons there, but who was I or my generation 
 that I should seek such exaltation ? The 
 sons of the nobility in my native land were 
 at that time usually divided into three classes ; 
 the brave ones went into the army, the lazy 
 ones into the navy, and the fools into the 
 church. 
 
 I, however, entered college, for I seemed, 
 to myself at least, to have beautifully com- 
 bined in me all of the three different ele- 
 
THE PREPARATION. 1 5 
 
 ments that went, with a few others, to make 
 up the greatest nation on earth. Well, the 
 first thing- they required of me there was to 
 get a cap with a square board on top of it ; 
 that was to show my classmates that my head 
 was level ; also a red gown that was to show 
 the rabble on the street that I belonged 
 to the noble army of orators who made the 
 Roman Forum ring with their eloquence in 
 days of old. 
 
 Many years of weary work followed. 
 Young men preparing themselves for the 
 gospel ministry in this country know but 
 little of the privations of a poor student 
 where I came from, for here there is so 
 much done for them by their parents and 
 by the charitably rich. I had to pay my 
 way through college, without a cent from 
 any outside source whatever. To accom- 
 plish this I worked in a store till nine o'clook 
 at night, and then studied till two in the 
 morning. 
 
 But the struggle was more than I could 
 endure through the theological course, and 
 I came across the ocean to this country at 
 the close of the war, believing that, after 
 
1 6 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 the terrible number of people killed, there 
 would be room somewhere here for a fellow 
 like me. 
 
 I went to work on a farm in New Jersey, 
 and good, kind people there promised me 
 aid if I continued my studies, which I did, 
 and so in course of time I was made a 
 reverend, and ever since they call me 
 " Parson Ralph Riley." 
 
 , I am very glad now of my hard preparation 
 for the ministry, in view of my twenty-five 
 years in the wild West. I am glad of it also 
 because I am now fast reaching that period 
 in life when I am not wanted. In my native 
 land ministers, like wine, improve with age, 
 but somehow the churches do not think so 
 in this country. But while I am blessed with 
 good health I can go back to the farm or the 
 store again, and so I am independent as a 
 king. The most helpless, most hopeless, and 
 most useless of men livinpf is the minister 
 who, in his declining years, is not wanted by 
 the churches, and who, in the days of his 
 youth, has failed to acquire something more 
 than mere book learning. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE START. 
 
 " I "HE wise men who put a prefix to my 
 -^ name had an affix to their own as well 
 as a prefix ; but they did not give me that, 
 they kept it for themselves. When I asked 
 for it they said it meant a great deal after 
 their name, but it would mean nothing after 
 mine. Therefore, thankfully taking what I 
 got, I went out from their presence and got 
 for myself a good dinner, — the first in ten 
 years, — for I felt that to begin preaching 
 aright a good dinner was of more real value 
 than all the ecclesiastical titles imaginable 
 fore and aft to my name. Dr. Talmage was 
 right when he said: "Give your preacher 
 beefsteak through the week, and he will give 
 you beefsteak on Sunday ! " So was the old 
 darky who thus prayed for his new minister : 
 " O Lord, feed him with the heavenly 
 manna, and we will feed him on chicken, 
 hog, and hominy ! " 
 
1 8 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 Dinner over, I took my old Hebrew, 
 Greek, and Latin lexicons and all their kin 
 to a second-hand bookstore and sold them 
 for money, having found them to be very 
 full of contrarieties when we roosted together 
 in garrets. Still, I could not help dropping 
 a tear as I handed them over the counter, 
 saying as I did so : — 
 
 " Fare thee well ! and if forever, 
 Still forever fare thee well." 
 
 With the money I got for my old books I 
 went to a tailor and arrayed myself for the 
 first time in clerical garments. Oh, the in- 
 toxication of that supreme hour ! When I 
 looked at myself in the mirror I felt that I 
 was indeed a *' son of thunder," and would 
 surely turn the world upside down if I got a 
 good chance at it. Will that day never come 
 back again ? Will the bright visions of suc- 
 cess now return no more ? Is all the bliss- of 
 yon hour clean gone forever ? Alas ! what 
 dreams we are made of. 
 
 But the whistle blows, and the sailors shout, 
 " All on board ! " and I am on a big steamer 
 going to the Isthmus of Panama. The pas- 
 sengers on board were a mixed multitude 
 
THE START. 1 9 
 
 from all parts, and were going- to all parts of 
 the world. When we got fairly out on the 
 great sea a furious storm sprung up. A 
 storm at sea is a sublime thing. I do not 
 know of anything in nature's wide realm so 
 grand. The waves roaring like thunder, and 
 the winds howling the chorus, make music 
 between them that is inspiring ; that is, if 
 you are ready to die. For a day or so things 
 looked shaky for us, and we were all made to 
 stay below. An infidel was present, and he 
 did not like the idea of going into the other 
 world by water, and he confessed to me, for 
 we were both in the same stateroom, that if 
 the good Lord only gave him another chance 
 on dry land he would become a Christian and 
 teach in Sunday-school. If the recording 
 angel took note of all the good things condi- 
 tionally promised in that storm, it must be 
 interesting reading. 
 
 By giving the sailors a pull at the ropes, 
 and perhaps a plug of tobacco on occasion, 
 we got to be on very gracious terms with 
 them, and they would tell us sea yarns by 
 the hour. 
 
 One day while sailing along the coast of 
 
20 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 Cuba, the sea was smooth and nothing spe- 
 cially doing, some of us thought it might be a 
 good thing to put Jack's truthfulness to the 
 test, and asked him to relate to us the most 
 wonderful thing he ever witnessed at sea. 
 A pause for a while followed and a feeling 
 around in memory's storehouse for the right 
 goods. 
 
 Then was told this, in all seriousness : 
 " Many years ago I was on board the Dora 
 of Boston, on a homeward voyage from the 
 West Indies. One calm Sunday evening, 
 when off the coast of New Jersey and we 
 were about to retire for prayers, we saw a 
 great black cloud approaching us from the 
 shore. The skipper was in a perfect stew 
 over it, for he could not make out what it 
 was. It could not be a balloon, for it was too 
 large for that ; it could not be a thunder- 
 cloud, for the barometer did not indicate any 
 change of weather. Some of the supersti- 
 tious thought there was something super- 
 natural about it. But on and on came the 
 black monster, and when we were all beside 
 ourselves with terror, it struck us a few feet 
 above deck and carried away every stitch of 
 
THE START. 2 1 
 
 canvas from the masts. And what do you 
 think it was ? Why, a cloud of New Jersey 
 mosquitoes ! " A vote being taken, it was 
 unanimously agreed not to believe the story 
 unless it was corroborated by some one else. 
 This was soon forthcoming from a brother tar, 
 and here it is : ''I remember that mosquito 
 cloud very well. I was on board the ship 
 Ocean Wave, and on that Sunday night was 
 about twenty miles northeast from where the 
 Dora was, and as sure as I am telling it, if 
 that terrible cloud did not pass over us and 
 every mosquito in it had on canvas pants." 
 That settled it. But when we talked over 
 the matter by ourselves we expressed our 
 concern for the spiritual and moral condition 
 of our sailor boys. One lady said that they 
 were the biggest liars she had ever met. 
 '' It is just awful," said she, '' to think of it, 
 that our lives are intrusted to such a crew." 
 Another lady wondered if there was n't a 
 minister on board who would talk to them. 
 It was now my turn to speak. Up to this 
 point I told no one who I was, but I felt 
 now that I must unbosom myself. To keep 
 my light under a bushel in the midst of such 
 
2 2 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 darkness was cowardly. That was not all ; I 
 had never preached a sermon before, and 
 now was my chance to practise a little to see 
 how it would go. My audience could not 
 criticise me very much, for they would be 
 getting what I had to give for nothing, at 
 any rate. If I blundered or broke down 
 altogether, we would soon scatter and for- 
 get all about it. So I stepped out, and with 
 a bow said: "Ladies, I am the man you wish 
 for ; I am the Reverend Ralph Riley, going 
 to preach to the heathen Californians ; but 
 it strikes me that I might begin the good 
 work right here." This made everybody 
 glad, but one lady began to reproach me 
 for not comforting them during the storm. 
 "Ah, madam!" said I, "I needed all the 
 comfort I could spare for myself." 
 
 This was on Saturday, and arrangements 
 were made for my holding forth on the mor- 
 row. Just a little before the hour of service 
 a lady was seen running up and down the 
 cabin saloon wringing her hands and crying, 
 " Oh, my jewels and my money ! Somebody 
 stole my valise. I am a ruined woman, and 
 far from home among strangers ! Oh, my 
 
THE START. 23 
 
 jewels and my money ! " Every one expressed 
 the greatest sympathy for her, of course, and 
 promised to help hunt up the thief. When 
 about to begin worship, the distressed woman 
 came up close to me and whispered, '' Preach 
 on stealing." ''All right, madam," I replied, 
 and began loading my gun for the bird 
 wanted. I had for an audience before me 
 sailors, stewards, steerage and cabin passen- 
 gers. It was a mixed lot I had to preach to, 
 and I took for my theme the place that liars 
 and thieves go to when they leave this world. 
 I described the terrible region in the most 
 awful colors imaginable, and the more realis- 
 tic I got the more pleased my lady friend 
 seemed to be, and I could hear her say now 
 and then, "That's it, give it to him! Bless 
 the Lord ! " I had the impression that one of 
 the black stewards stole the lost jewels and 
 money, and I pictured how Satan would roast 
 the faithless, thieving servant who would steal 
 from helpless passengers their property. 
 
 Perhaps my gun was not of polished steel, 
 but it brought down the game I was after. 
 The story-telling sailors whispered as they 
 passed out that the mosquito yarn was not 
 
24 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 true, and the black thief went to the lady's 
 stateroom that night and handed her the lost 
 valise, saying as he did so, " Pardon me, 
 madam, and for God's sake don't tell the 
 captain ! " 
 
 On crossing the isthmus our one-horse 
 railroad broke down, and for four mortal 
 hours we had to endure the. horrors of thirst 
 under a broiling sun. There was not a 
 breath of air stirring, and there in the jungle 
 we were stewed till we were all as dry as a 
 cork. We all felt that if the valley we were in 
 was not the valley of Tophet, we were not far 
 from it. It was not a pleasant experience, 
 I assure you, when not a drop of water could 
 be got for love or money. At last, when we 
 felt that water must be procured or we would 
 all go crazy, a band of young men started 
 in search of the precious liquid, regardless 
 of savage-looking natives, wild beasts, or 
 crocodiles. What will a man not risk when 
 the throat is parched and the blood on fire ! 
 Water, blessed water, '* it cooleth the lip, it 
 cooleth the brain." 
 
 After an hour's search our daring youths 
 returned with a bucketful of the much- 
 
THE START. 25 
 
 desired liquid, and as diey approached the 
 train cheer after cheer rang out from one car 
 after another, but, oh, the dismay caused at 
 the sight of the stuff in the bucket ! Both 
 flavor and appearance were simply disgust- 
 ing. Some of the ladies tried to weep, but 
 there was not moisture enough in their 
 bodies to form even one little tear. Could 
 nothing be done to help the situation ? 
 Yes ; I had something in my satchel — a 
 bottle of French brandy — which I was ad- 
 vised to take for just such an emergency ; 
 but could I produce it in the presence of my 
 fellow-passengers ? Up to now I did not 
 require to do any mixing in rotten water, but 
 surely if the law and the gospel allowed such 
 a thing, now was the time to do it. I was in 
 a quandary for a little. Impulse said, " Give 
 it to them ; pour it in the bucket." Prudence 
 said, " Don't you do it. They will say you 
 are a tippling preacher. 
 
 " ' Aye free off han' your story tell, 
 When wi' a bosom crony, 
 But still keep something to yoursel' 
 Ye scarcely tell to ony.' " 
 
 The internal struggle prevailed in favor 
 
26 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 of mixing, and I rose up in my seat and 
 said: '' Fellow-travelers, we are in a dry and 
 parched condition, and there is no telling 
 when this thing is going to end. The un- 
 holy looking stuff in the bucket may be good 
 enough for the heathen natives of this 
 godless country, but for us, who are from the 
 States and accustomed to drink from the 
 springs that run among the hills, or from 
 the old wooden buckets that sit by the wells 
 of the fathers, it is not safe unless we put 
 something in it." 
 
 ''Amen, the parson is right!" shouted a 
 brother at the end of the car. "That he is, 
 indeed," chimed in an old chap just in front 
 of me, whose eyes were sparkling with 
 expectation." 
 
 " In my satchel," I continued, " ladies and 
 gentlemen, there is a bottle of brandy. It is 
 reported good for bad water and snake bites, 
 I am disposed, however, to risk the water 
 and the snakes of California and to mix it 
 in this loathsome stuff, if you are willing to 
 drink it afterwards." Three cheers for the 
 parson followed, and the brandy was poured 
 in the bucket and stirred with a stick. Then 
 
THE START. 27 
 
 addressing my fellow-travelers again, I said : 
 " You know that heathen male bodies drink 
 and eat first, and if there is anything left 
 over, the female bodies get it. But we will 
 show a better example of good manners to 
 the heathen hereabouts by giving the ladies 
 to drink first. So take the bucket to the 
 first car on the train and keep on to the last, 
 and what the ladies do not drink we will." 
 
 Alas ! there 's many a slip between the 
 cup and the lip. When the ladies had all 
 sipped there was not a drop left to moisten 
 the masculine lip or to cheer the masculine 
 heart. It was a woeful disappointment, and 
 some of those men would come to me 
 and say, " Parson Riley, have n't you got 
 another ? " 
 
 No ; I had only one, and I am now 
 glad that I gave it away as I did, for through 
 all my wanderings since on this continent I 
 have never yet come to a place where I could 
 not get plenty of good water that needed 
 no mixing, and as for the snakes they have 
 never given me the least trouble. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE WORK. 
 
 /^N arriving at San Francisco I entered 
 ^^ into the work of the ministry with no 
 small enthusiasm. I was given, however, a 
 very hard field to work in ; that is, I was 
 given a church building perched on the side 
 of a rocky hill about a mile beyond the 
 suburbs of the city and about half a mile 
 from the nearest dwelling. Talmage himself 
 could n't draw a baker s dozen in such a 
 place. I soon saw through the motives of 
 the builders. It was not the spirit of the 
 gospel, but the spirit of real-estate specula- 
 tion that erected yon beautiful church. I 
 have often since wondered if the city has yet 
 reached out to my old church on the portrero 
 where I used to practise oratory six days in 
 the week, and ring the bell on Sundays just 
 to scare the rabbits. The spirit of specu- 
 lation was rampant on the coast in those 
 days, and if it could have reached up high 
 
 28 
 
THE WORK. 29 
 
 enough it would have scooped in the New 
 Jerusalem 
 
 Religion was *' mighty scattering " in the 
 city by the Golden Gate when I was there, 
 and I attributed this, to some extent at least, 
 to the fleas of the place. Go where you 
 would, in millionaire's palace or the hut of 
 the lowly toiler, the lively flea was there by 
 the bushel, and very persistent in his atten- 
 tions to your anatomy. I have seen the 
 housewife, while in conversation, reach for 
 her broom and sweep the little pests by the 
 million dancing to the street. It is very sin- 
 gular, but true, nevertheless, that where the 
 fleas are plentiful religion is scarce. Go to 
 Palestine, for instance. 
 
 I attributed also the lack of religion on 
 the Pacific Coast to the fact that all the peo- 
 ple there went to get gold, and when they 
 got It they lost their religion, and when they 
 did not it was all the same. But I suppose 
 in this respect most newly settled countries 
 are alike. There the restraints of religion 
 and refined society are cast to the winds, and 
 as a man feels within so he acts without. 
 
 The best place in all the world to study 
 
30 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 human nature is on the frontier. A minister 
 of the gospel has special advantages, too, for 
 this. It is said that the doctor knows people 
 as they are, but the parson as they would 
 like to be. On the frontiers of civilization, 
 however, the parson, too, knows them as 
 they are, for there as a man thinketh in his 
 heart so is he. The doctor may know the 
 anatomy of a man, but the parson generally 
 finds out the nobility and meanness, the 
 worth and the worthlessness, of those with 
 whom he associates ; therefore he sees much 
 to laugh at and also much to weep at. 
 
 For a young preacher the frontier is the 
 place for him. As a rule, when he starts out 
 to preach he thinks himself very wise and 
 able to do mighty things against Satan. He 
 finds out after a time that the " race is not to 
 the swift, nor the battle to the strong." The 
 hardened, wicked world is a stern reality, and 
 strutting about like a peacock in the sunshine, 
 and talking wisely to people who know as 
 much as you do about mysteries, is disap- 
 pointing. I was a fair sample of the young 
 preacher myself when I started out in the 
 clerical life, but the frontier soon took the 
 conceit out of me. It will do it every time. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE INDIANS. 
 
 T YING between the Rocky Mountains 
 ^-^ and the Sierra Nevada range, which 
 skirts the eastern boundary of California, 
 is the great American Desert. In about the 
 centre of that desert I went and fixed my 
 headquarters along the newly opened rail- 
 way, built a church and hung a bell in the 
 tower of it. 
 
 That was the country of the Shoshone In- 
 dians, whom Joaquin Miller speaks of as 
 " the true Bedouins of the American desert," 
 the " roving and treacherous tribe of perfect 
 savages, . . . having no real habitation, or 
 any regard for the habitation of others." 
 O Joaquin, poet of the Sierras, how can you 
 say so ? I know the Shoshones well. I have 
 eaten in their camps, fished in the Humboldt 
 with them, and danced at their moon and 
 spring dances. We have sung and laughed 
 together. When they first heard the music 
 
32 'RVENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 of my bell, the first to waken the echoes of 
 the great and dreary desert, they came to me 
 and inquired what it was and why it was, and 
 when I told them it was to call the palefaces 
 to the worship of the Great Spirit, they asked 
 in wonder if the palefaces did so ; and when 
 I told them they did, they were glad. Happy 
 children of the desert, I love to think of you ! 
 True and faithful ye were to me when I was 
 sick. Ye had no medicine from the apothe- 
 cary's, but ye brought me fish from the river 
 and wild fowl from the hills. How I love to 
 go back to you on memory's wing, and to 
 hear you relate to me over again the brave 
 deeds of your tribe in the days of long ago 
 when the red man roamed at will, his horse 
 drank clear water, and his dog fed on deer 
 and buffalo. Oh, how you laughed when I 
 told you of the deeds of my fathers away 
 over the great waters where the mountains 
 are black and wild, and where the ancient 
 warriors went forth to battle, cheered by the 
 stirring strains of the pibroch ! 
 
 Ah ! Joaquin Miller, your Shasta Indians 
 may be altogether lovely in your eyes, but 
 you did not know the Shoshones. 
 
THE INDIANS. 33 
 
 But Eastern people, too, imagine that these 
 uncivilized Indians are a barbarous lot. I did 
 not find them so. They had some good 
 points, and a wonderful faith in the Great 
 Spirit. Sitting around their blazing fires at 
 night they would tell with the artlessness of 
 a child how the Great Spirit made the world 
 and the living creatures on it ; only one 
 speaking at a time. '* Paleface no under- 
 stand," they would say. " Paleface, he not 
 know Great Spirit." Then with babelike 
 simplicity they would relate how all came 
 about. '' Great Spirit make hole in the blue 
 sky. Threw down earth and great stones. 
 Heap earth and stone reach up to the clouds. 
 Great Spirit no pleased. He put his foot 
 on it and spread it out. Then he planted 
 trees and flowers and grass. He no pleased 
 how trees, flowers, grass grow. He say, ' I 
 will rain water.' Then the rivers and the 
 lakes came, and the deer and the birds and 
 the buffalo. He no pleased and say, ' No 
 man to hunt buffalo, no man to dance and 
 sing.' Then Great Spirit make red man 
 and red woman, papooses grow, walk over 
 the great mountains, meet grizzly bear, meet 
 
34 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 panther, meet wild sea waves, papooses turn 
 palefaces." 
 
 Spoil their simple story by mine ? No, I 
 could not. Well, there was in the village a 
 large, brave, noble-looking Indian, who had 
 long served the troops on the plains as a 
 scout. Man-with-the-eagle-wing was a kind, 
 good-hearted fellow, and as tender to his 
 wife and only little daughter as any white 
 man ever lived. Their little tent of skins 
 was just big enough for themselves — three. 
 It was no palace, but peace and mutual love 
 were there. Little Prairie Flower would some- 
 times go down to the river bank to gather 
 berries or wild blossoms from the overhang- 
 ing trees ; then her father, Man-with-the- 
 eagle-wing, would watch her with his eagle 
 eye from his tent door above. Wherever she 
 went she was the apple of his eye and the 
 joy of his heart. But her head burned hot 
 one day in his arms, and her spirit went away 
 suddenly as when the morning sun looks 
 down on the dewdrop in the flower's cup. 
 The heartrending grief of those red parents 
 of the forest I shall never forget. Their 
 tears, their wild wailings in their own Ian- 
 
THE INDIANS. 35 
 
 guage, their upward looks to heaven, were 
 the very incarnation of sorrow. The mother 
 pined away and died within a month. Man- 
 with-the-eagle-wing was a sad, broken-hearted 
 creature now. He would eat nothing, but 
 weep ; he would utter no word, but between 
 sobs. Finally he left his tent and village and 
 lived all by himself without food and almost 
 naked, for he decorated the graves of his 
 loved ones with his own clothing, about three 
 miles away up along the river under the thick 
 shadows of the woods there. After a whole 
 week in this condition he made his way to 
 my house, a few miles farther up the Hum- 
 boldt, and when I looked on him I did not 
 know him. Despair was stamped deep, deep 
 upon his face. When I clothed, fed, and 
 comforted him I sent him home to his own 
 village, and in about a week called down to 
 see him, and meeting Rain-in-the-face I 
 asked him how was Man-with-the-eagle-wing. 
 He simply pointed up and westward. 
 
 Man-with-the-eagle-wing had winged his 
 way upward and westward to the region of 
 the setting sun, where his darling wife and 
 child had gone before him. He died of a 
 
36 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 broken heart. Who dare say that these sim- 
 ple children of the desert shall not be in the 
 great multitude around the throne on high, 
 redeemed from all nations and tribes of earth ? 
 
 Those red-skinned people, too, were 
 charming singers. I have heard some of the 
 most famous singers, black and white, but I 
 have never listened to such melodious music 
 from the lips of any other mortals as I have 
 from the lips of Indian maidens. Far down 
 the Allawana I strayed one hot day to preach 
 to a small settlement of whites. I was over- 
 come by the heat and lay down under the 
 shade of a cedar tree for a quiet nap. 
 
 Just as I was about to close my eyes an 
 Indian girl, a sweet, round-faced creature 
 about sixteen, clothed in skins and her black, 
 long hair streaming down behind her back, 
 began to sing pathetically on the other side of 
 the softly flowing Allawana. She gathered 
 berries, too, as she sung, and put them into a 
 little basket made from the tall, slender reeds 
 which grew on the banks of the river. As 
 she sung and picked, she looked at me over 
 the water, and her great black eyes were like 
 Autumn weeping at the departure of Sum- 
 
THE INDIANS. 37 
 
 mer. She picked and she sung while she 
 looked at me over the flowing river as if she 
 loved me or pitied me. I did not know what 
 she sung about, but the music of her voice 
 was like the bursting of a sigh into a song. 
 Perhaps it was the outward expression of an 
 inward feeling of sorrow for the wrongs of 
 the white man against her people ; perhaps it 
 was only a heart whisper that she sent to a 
 lover in the dark shade behind her in meas- 
 ured accents. At any rate, it was a native 
 song that she sung. I do not know how the 
 angels look or sing in heaven, but it seemed 
 to me as if this little red-skinned maiden of 
 the desert was an angel, and I was overcome 
 by a great and peculiar feeling in my heart 
 such as I never before experienced, or since. 
 In Nevada, Texas, and elsewhere I have 
 always found the Indians generous and thor- 
 oughly reliable, if you treated them right. 
 Right treatment, however, is something, 
 which, as a rule, they were strangers to, 
 both at the hands of the invaders of their 
 territory, the pioneers, and the government 
 officials. The Father of all men will yet 
 judge this nation for its treatment of the 
 Indians. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE HOTELS. 
 
 ON going from California to Nevada I first 
 realized the discomforts of a frontier 
 hotel. The hotels of San Francisco, even 
 thirty years ago, outrivaled those of New 
 York. Going from one of them to a 
 Nevada hotel was like leaving a Pullman 
 palace car for a donkey cart. I shall long 
 remember my experience in one among the 
 Sierra Mountains. It was in the centre of 
 a mining village, and was one of those hotels 
 that might honestly have the sign '' Board- 
 ers " over the door, for it was all boards 
 together. The sides, the roof, the floor, and 
 the partitions were made of boards. Some 
 of the boards, too, were two or three inches 
 apart. No doubt this was not to economize 
 in lumber, but to let in to us — the boarders 
 — the balmy air that came floating up from 
 the valleys of California, fragrant with the 
 perfume of roses as that of Arabia the blest. 
 
 38 
 
THE HOTELS. 39 
 
 The bedsteads were made of boards too, 
 and the mattresses were very near it ; that 
 is, they were made of corn husks. I lay me 
 down on one of these one night and tried 
 hard to sleep, but could not There were 
 corn cobs among the husks as large as those 
 which grow in Kansas, and my rest was 
 broken. Rising up I procured a pick and 
 grubbed awhile, just as you see a farmer 
 do when he is adding to his fields from the 
 woodland. When I grubbed mv patch and 
 evened it out, I laid down on it again to 
 sleep. But just as I was about to tumble 
 over into the arms of Morpheus, a man and 
 a woman came in below, as I could see and 
 hear through the openings between the 
 board floor. Bidding the woman good night 
 and wishing her many happy dreams in the 
 Sierras, the man came upstairs and went to 
 bed beside his wife in the next room to 
 mine. There was nothing said for an hour 
 or so, but the spouse was nursing her wrath 
 to keep it warm for him. Then in a hard, 
 determined voice she said : ** Say, John, did 
 you think I did not hear you downstairs ? 
 Who was that woman you came in with ? " 
 
40 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 '' My dear," said John, " that was Miss 
 Swan, the great Nova Scotia giantess, who 
 is going to exhibit here to-morrow night. 
 She's just in with the train, and, O Jane, I 
 wish you could see her ! She is ten feet 
 high, and O Jerusalem ! such face and 
 arms as she has got ! Why, Jane, her face 
 is like the full moon and as beautiful as the 
 snow on Mount Shasta ; and as for her arms, 
 they are as thick and as big as the trees of 
 Yosemite ! O Jane, there 's glory in our 
 town to-night ! " 
 
 " Shut up, you fool ! " said Jane. John 
 was a mild man, and he shut up. He 
 clerked in a store, and on occasions acted 
 as a local Methodist preacher. Then there 
 was another long silence, when the same 
 dry, feminine voice again broke the stillness 
 of the night, asking, "John, why did the 
 landlady say to you yesterday, ' Don't 
 squeeze my hand so,' and why did you 
 say, ' Beg your pardon, dear ; we are all 
 human ' ? Tell me that, if you can. Did 
 you think I did n't hear you ? " 
 
 Somewhat hesitatingly John replied : ''Jane, 
 don't get angry. When she told me that she 
 
THE HOTELS. 4 1 
 
 would score out the old bill against us, I was 
 so overjoyed that I grasped her hand and 
 shook it, and when she said, ' Don't run up 
 another, pay as you go,' I said, ' We are all 
 human ' (that is, me and you), ' and liable to 
 fall behind again.' " 
 
 - Was that all ? " 
 
 '' Yes, that was all." 
 
 Another long pause, and the same voice, 
 questioning John, said, " Who was that you 
 went home with on your arm Thursday night 
 from prayer-meeting ? " 
 
 " Go to sleep, you long-eared, lynx-eyed 
 triangle and don't bother me," said John. 
 
 Then burst upon the boards and boarders 
 of that board hotel a high old time. It was 
 fast and furious, and kept up till morning, 
 when she took the early train to Frisco and 
 John the first east-bound to Colorado. 
 
 " O wad some power the giftie gie us 
 To see oursels as ithers see us ! 
 It wad frae mony a blunder free us, 
 And foolish notion." 
 
 On the frontier of Texas the hotels were, 
 if anything, even worse than in Nevada, and 
 were generally run by a class of people that 
 
42 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 neither feared God nor man. Many a weary 
 night I slept in them when I wished myself 
 on the highest peak of the Rockies. 
 
 Going to one of the Northwestern coun- 
 tries far out on the frontier when I went into 
 that State from Washington city, I reached 
 my destination wearied and dusty. It was 
 late at night and I entered a hotel kept by 
 an old man and woman that knew nothing of 
 the corrupting ways of civilization. They 
 were just lovely to behold, the one smoking 
 an old cob pipe, and the other dipping snuff. 
 On signing my name and where I came from 
 in an old book, the landlady peered at me for 
 a while and said, " Wall, stranger, I 've seed 
 folks as comes here stuck to thar name, D.D., 
 M.D., and LL.D., but what in the name of 
 blue blazes does D.C. mean ? " I explained 
 to her that it stood for the District of Colum- 
 bia, where Washington city was, up North. 
 " I guess that 's whar Andrew Jackson used 
 to be President," she replied. I said, '' Yes." 
 '' And what did you do up North that you 
 come down here ? " was her next pointed ques- 
 tion. " Did you steal something?" ''No." 
 ''Did you burst a bank .^ " "No." "Did 
 
THE HOTELS. 43 
 
 you kill somebody ? " " No." " Perhaps 
 you 're missloner then." '' Now you have it, 
 old lady." ''Then pay your bill and go up- 
 sta'rs." I paid and went upstairs and to bed. 
 I did not sleep, however, for a long time, 
 wondering whether I had better preach or 
 herd sheep in Texas. Next morning, on 
 coming down, I asked her why she demanded 
 my bill so snappishly, seeing that I had bag- 
 gage enough to secure her interest in me. 
 ''Wall, stranger," said she, "you see that old 
 man of mine out thar with a face on him as 
 red as a beet ? " I said, " Yes." " Wall, he 's 
 an old possum, he is. He 's mighty religious 
 when he 's a-fishing for a drunk, and he always 
 gets drunk when a missioner comes about, 
 for he gits the money out of him afore I git 
 it. I don't like missioners about, for my old 
 man gits religion from them, an' the money 
 for their board, an' then he gits drunk. 
 Three things that roils me mightily. I tried 
 onced to send him over the river to Peter ; 
 I failed. I went to Fort Worth and bought a 
 barrel of chain-lightning whiskey that would 
 burn the heart out o' a hundred-year-old 
 alligator, an' I says to him, ' Thar, drink that 
 
44 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 and go to h — ,' and he sot down beside that 
 barrel for weeks and weeks until he drank it 
 dry, and upon my soul if he did n't fatten on 
 it like a hog eatin' yeller corn. He did, the 
 old coon ! and I wish that I could get rid of 
 him somehow. He axes me to go to Fort 
 Worth agin, but I guess I won't. Say, 
 missioner, don't you give him ony money, or 
 religion either, for he '11 take 'em both to the 
 saloon." 
 
 The frontier hotels have much to do in the 
 making of reckless wild men. All the envi- 
 ronments are bad. The beds, the food, and 
 the guests, to say nothing of the proprietors, 
 are of a class to make a man sigh for " home, 
 sweet home." 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE BLUNDERING. 
 
 \17HEN I began preaching in Nevada I 
 ^ ^ used to preach very learnedly on the 
 various duties and doctrines, and I would be 
 told that it was veal I gave them for solid 
 meat, and I think so now myself, for they did 
 not seem to fatten on what I gave them, 
 speaking figuratively. I doubt if it was 
 even decent veal. I think it was but grass, 
 and so green that were the cows to get hold 
 of some of my sermons I fear they would 
 eat them by mistake. 
 
 Blundering, too, was a failing of mine, and 
 my people out yonder were not slow to tell 
 me of it. 
 
 Shortly after I put on my clerical harness, 
 I was asked to marry a young couple. Before 
 going to tie the knot I practised on my land- 
 lady and her husband till I thought I had the 
 thing down fine. Then going to the house 
 where the wedding was to take place with 
 
46 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 swelling thoughts of my official importance, 
 I returned from it wishing that I could creep 
 into'the smallest rat hole in creation. I made 
 a terrible fool of myself. It was my first 
 effort at the business of making two one, 
 and I don't know to this day what I made of 
 them at all. I forgot all that I should have 
 said, and said everything that I should not. 
 I made the young people, too, feel very bad, 
 I am sure, for they seemed as if they were 
 on hot irons while I was making them prom- 
 ise each other all sorts of things that were 
 neither of heaven nor earth, law nor gospel. 
 Then, to crown all, the bridegroom handed 
 me a ring to be given in proper form, and, 
 goose that I was, did n't I go and put it on 
 the bride's finger myself, saying as I did so, 
 "With this ring I thee wed; with all my 
 worldly goods I thee endow," thinking of 
 course that the brideo^room would follow me ? 
 but he did n't, because I put the ring on 
 instead of himself. No wonder he looked 
 daggers at me and did n't pay me anything 
 for my trouble either. 
 
 Some laughed, and I don't blame them ; 
 and when I got outside the house there was 
 
THE BLUNDERING. 47 
 
 an explosion of merriment at my expense, 
 and I don't wonder at it. I sought comfort 
 from my landlady, but she said, " Oh, you 
 dunce! you married the girl to yourself in- 
 stead of to the other fellow ! " 
 
 Widow Black lived on a farm, and I made 
 her mad as a roaring Niagara with my first 
 funeral sermon. I was called to her house 
 to preach the funeral sermon of her dead son. 
 I never saw either before, for they did not 
 belong to my church, and as she was heavily 
 veiled in mourning I could not see her face. 
 I imagined she was an old woman about 
 seventy, and in my sympathy for her I prayed 
 to the good Lord to be a husband to the 
 aged widow according to his promise, and 
 give her comfort to bear up under her sore 
 affliction, and that in her declining years she 
 might be comforted from on high. I went 
 the day after to see her at her home, and she 
 slammed the door in my face, calling me 
 a fool of a preacher. On my way home, 
 wondering what I had done, I met Deacon 
 Willoughby, and he said : " Parson, you missed 
 the right trail yesterday. Widow Black says 
 you run her stock down fifty per cent, by 
 
48 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 praying for her the way you did, as a decHn- 
 ing old woman. Parson, you must have more 
 horse sense ; that is the buxomest young 
 widow on this 'ere coast, and all the bucks 
 round are breaking their necks after her, for 
 she has a mighty nice pile, she has." 
 
 Blundering again, yes, blundering again, 
 and at a funeral too, and almost got shot for 
 it. They did not give me time to prepare the 
 right thing, and they did not tell me properly 
 who the dead man was. He committed sui- 
 cide the night before, and they came to me to 
 preach his funeral sermon, telling me to give 
 their pard a grand send-off to the upper 
 hunting grounds, for he was a royal fellow 
 and no tenderfoot in the sagebrush of 
 Nevada. He was a gambler, and when he 
 lost all, he passed in his checks and gave the 
 game up for good. He threw dirt from the 
 last ditch, and now they wished him put away 
 with Christian honors so as to please the old 
 folks back East. From another source they 
 gave me a very black record of the man 
 whom I thought was in the coffin before me, 
 and when I began to speak I got hold of 
 the wrong sinner and preached his funeral 
 
THE BLUNDERING. 49 
 
 sermon. He — the sinner — was present, 
 too, and that made it dangerous. My refer- 
 ences were so personal that everybody knew 
 that I was on '' back of the wrong mule, on 
 the wrong trail, and shooting at the wrong 
 coon," as they said. If I had given my 
 supposed suicide a good send-off, he would 
 likely have taken it all right, but as I de- 
 nounced gambling as a curse, and my sup- 
 posed dead friend as the worst specimen 
 of his class, his wrath boiled over and he 
 sprung to his feet, pointing his revolver at 
 me and shouting, " Don't shake me over 
 hell that way, pard. Don't you do it, or I 
 will blow your cabbage head into the next 
 century ! " 
 
 He then left his seat and went out, declar- 
 ing as he did so that he would put daylight 
 through my upper story when I put his chum 
 away. 
 
 When I got my breath, I made a few 
 general remarks about the uncertainties of 
 life and finished. Then at the grave I per- 
 formed the remaining rites as softly as pos- 
 sible, and went home with a brother Mason 
 for a week or so till his rage blew over. 
 
50 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 What a blunder ! I preached the wrong 
 man's funeral sermon. 
 
 Shortly after I ventured out and was on 
 my way to the postoffice when I spied the 
 man whose bad reputation I proclaimed over 
 the corpse of another, coming directly to- 
 wards me. I confess that I thought of my 
 own funeral and wondered who would preach 
 the sermon. A cold sweat ran down my 
 back, and my lips mechanically whistled a 
 little tune ("The Campbells are coming") 
 which I was wont to whistle when a boy to 
 keep up my courage while passing along a 
 lonely road at night where it was said un- 
 canny things were seen and heard. When 
 we met, he reached out his hand and said : 
 " Parson, I apologize for my rudeness in 
 your church, and I am glad now that I did 
 not kill you ; but take my advice, young 
 man, and never preach a funeral sermon 
 like yon again. You fellows of the cloth 
 imagine that all of our profession are going 
 to the devil when we die, but perhaps we 
 will stand as good a show as yourselves. 
 At any rate', be wise as a serpent and harm- 
 less as a dove when you preach our funeral 
 sermons in Nevada." 
 
Y 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE GAMBLER. 
 
 T HAVE never seen such another place for 
 ^ gamblers as Nevada was when I went 
 there. They would have their gambling- 
 tables even on the streets of its cities, and 
 solicit the passers-by to take a hand. 
 
 In one of those cities along the Central 
 Pacific Railroad, about halfway between the 
 Rockies and the Sierras, I built a church, 
 the first erected from Omaha to Sacra- 
 mento after the opening of the overland 
 road. I received a bell for it from the 
 Presbyterian church, Montclair, N. J., and 
 when it began to ring the first Sabbath after 
 it was placed in the steeple, a crowd of 
 gamblers were just about to begin playing 
 at their table on the street. The peals of 
 the bell were too much for them. They 
 could not stand it and took to their tent ; 
 when the play was finished, according to 
 an agreement made when they entered the 
 
52 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 tent, whoever won he was to go to church 
 and put the stake in my collection box. So 
 when in the middle of my sermon a dozen 
 or so of the fraternity came in and sat down 
 before me, I supposed that they were coming 
 after me for another funeral sermon. But 
 no, the winner had to give the stake money, 
 which was quite large, and his chums came 
 along to see that he did it. When the box 
 went round a small sackful of gold and silver 
 was emptied into it, and ever after there was 
 no Sunday gambling on the street. 
 
 Sometimes you would find a deal of native 
 kindness among those professional players, 
 and they were generous to a fault when you 
 came upon the sunny side of their nature. 
 Sitting with one of them one day at the 
 church door, he got to telling me his life, and 
 one incident in it I remember was this, which 
 shows that he could be at times touched by 
 a noble sentiment. It was when he was 
 living among the gold diggers of the Sierras. 
 Prowling about among the cabins of the 
 miners one day, while they were at work, he 
 stumbled on a pile of gold dust in one of 
 them — almost half a bushel of it — and he 
 
THE GAMBLER. 53 
 
 Stole it. On reaching his gambling den he 
 looked around for a safe place to hide it in. 
 Standing on his table and reaching up to the 
 loft to clear a place for it among his old traps, 
 books, and papers, he grasped a book which 
 he had not seen for many years, and had in 
 fact forgotten all about it, but it went among 
 his other books with him from place to place 
 in his ramblings among the mountains of the 
 Pacific Coast. 
 
 He opened it, and on the fly leaf was 
 written, " From mother to her darling boy. 
 May he be good and meet her in heaven ! " 
 It was a Bible and a birthday present from 
 his mother, who lived back in New England, 
 but the hand was now cold in death that 
 wrote the inscription. The light of other 
 days now returned to him, and for the first 
 time in twenty years he bent the knee in 
 prayer and wept like a child over his sinful 
 life. The stolen dust was returned to its 
 place with a letter accompanying, telling 
 about the theft and requesting that it be hid 
 away in a safe place, lest he should steal 
 again and skip. He could not, however, 
 give up his profession, though he tried hard. 
 
54 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 There were some cunning rogues, too, 
 among those Nevada gamblers. I remem- 
 ber how nicely one of them got ten dollars 
 from me. It was on a Sunday morning and 
 after I had finished service in church. Com- 
 ing out I found him sitting on the steps and 
 crying very bitterly, with his face between 
 his hands. '' You seem to be in great sor- 
 row, my friend," I said to him. '' Oh, yes," 
 he sobbed out, " my beautiful wife, my dearly 
 beloved wife, has just died, and I have not 
 a dollar to buy a coffin for her. I am a total 
 stranger here and don't know what to do." 
 " Ah," said I, " be comforted, the rose on 
 the bush is beautiful, but the crushed rose 
 in the hand is more fragrant. May this 
 affliction make you to know the joyful sound 
 of the gospel ! Take this ten-dollar bill and 
 go about among our people, and tell them to 
 add to it ten times or more." 
 
 He left profusely thanking me, and in ten 
 minutes after he was gambling with it, and 
 never was married at all. 
 
 It is exceedingly hard to lead a gambler 
 away from his evil life, especially on the 
 frontier where elevating and counteracting 
 
THE GAMBLER. 55 
 
 influences are few and far between. There 
 the passion for gambling easily gains the 
 complete mastery over the mind, and when 
 once this happens the gambler's associates 
 are of a sort to make his enslavement per- 
 petual. A striking instance of this came 
 under my observation while assisting at a 
 Methodist camp meeting in Northwestern 
 Texas. I was preaching on the willingness 
 of God to forgive sinners, and a notorious 
 gambler of the place was moved to come 
 forward and kneel at the mourners' bench. 
 A thrill of joy seemed to pass through the 
 audience when this hardened sinner was ap- 
 parently about to change his life. Indeed, 
 some of the more demonstrative Christians 
 present almost lost control of themselves, so 
 great was their pleasure. The man was 
 earnestly and honestly seeking religion where 
 he believed it could be found, when one of 
 his associates crept under the platform on 
 which the preachers were seated and held a 
 pack of cards right under his face, saying as 
 he did so in my hearing, " Come, old boy, 
 and have a game." The temptation was too 
 great to be resisted. The mourner arose, 
 
56 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 wiped the tears from his eyes, and followed 
 his tempter into a quiet nook of the woods 
 where he and a band of the fraternity played 
 for money while the camp meeting lasted. 
 
 Few, indeed, are they who return from the 
 gambler's desert waste. They seem all to be 
 carried down from deep to deep, till the sad 
 story is ended in death. There is hope for 
 the drunkard, but none for the confirmed 
 gambler. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE MINER. 
 
 ^ I "HE old-time miner of the Pacific Coast 
 ^ was a rough, shaggy fellow, with hair 
 on his teeth, as you found him wandering the 
 mountains. He was from all parts of the 
 world and had no home life anywhere. He 
 never quarreled with his wife, for he had none 
 to quarrel with. It would be years some- 
 times ere he saw the face of a female, and 
 when he did, that face would not be over- 
 angelic. Anything of female attire in the 
 camp was treasured as a jewel to be ex- 
 hibited on special occasions. A lady's hat, 
 for instance, found its way into a certain 
 camp where a lady's form had never been 
 seen, and the homesick fellows used to place 
 it on a table in the centre of their camp on 
 Saturday nights and dance around it. The 
 coming of respectable women in the course 
 of time, however, was the regeneration of 
 those camps. I remember well the influence 
 
 57 
 
58 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 for good that a lady from Chicago had on 
 the rough miners of a certain place. She 
 was refined in manner and good almost be- 
 yond any I have ever met with anywhere 
 else. When that lady walked on the streets 
 every hat was lifted as she passed by, and 
 the man that would dare to speak of her but 
 in the most respectful language was treated 
 with scorn. She was a Christian woman of 
 the noblest type, and did more to elevate the 
 town by her quiet, ladylike manners than all 
 the other Christians in the State. 
 
 When the roaming miner " struck it rich," 
 he was the jolliest, most whole-souled mortal 
 you could find on earth. He w.ould treat 
 you to the best he had in his cabin, and 
 before a blazing fire at night tell you of the 
 joys that would be his when he returned 
 home to the East, or over across the seas. 
 He was always going home, but never went. 
 If he started, he generally got "busted" in 
 San Francisco. 
 
 For several years I was bishop of all I sur- 
 veyed in the Sierras and on the hot dusty 
 plains of Nevada, and my rights as such 
 there was none to dispute. Among the 
 
THE MINER. 59 
 
 roaming miners I did all the marrying, the 
 burying, and the preaching for hundreds of 
 miles around, and I never lacked for plenty 
 of money to move about with. I had to 
 travel much in stagecoaches, on mule backs, 
 etc. 
 
 Going into Eureka one day, when that 
 town was in its boyhood pants, I was given 
 the heartiest reception by its citizens, mostly 
 miners, all fighting to have me as their guest. 
 Arrangements were made at once with the 
 proprietor of the dance saloon to have me 
 preach there that night. When the hour of 
 service arrived, you could see half a dozen 
 of the ''boys" running through the streets 
 ringing dinner bells, and calling on their 
 fellows to turn out to church. Inside the 
 saloon all was put in order ; a large cloth 
 was drawn over the whiskey bottles, the 
 girls were quietly and modestly sitting by 
 themselves, and were practising hymn tunes 
 so as to lead the singing. My pulpit was 
 the counter, from behind which I preached 
 to about six hundred men, all standing up 
 during the service, and packed like herrings 
 in a barrel. 
 
60 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 Worship over, a tall, rough-looking fellow 
 shouted, " Now, boys, let us give the parson 
 a liberal collection ! Whoop 'er up, boys ; 
 throw into this hat the white and yellow 
 wheels,. and bad luck to your silver holes in 
 the mountains if you don't do it up brown ! " 
 Needless to say that the collection was a 
 large one. 
 
 On passing out, with trembling voice and 
 moistened eye an old man grasped my hand 
 and said: " Young man, when I was like you 
 I was a Christian too, but I quarreled with 
 my wife in the East and left her. That was 
 in '49, and I don't know now anything about 
 her, or any one else of my relations. I 
 would give my bottom dollar to see once 
 more those I used to love, but perhaps I will 
 meet them in heaven. I am now old and 
 must go somewhere else than here soon, but 
 I tell you, friend, this religion that I experi 
 enced when I was young will up at times, 
 that it will. I have been a hard-living man 
 among these mountains, but my mother's 
 religion is now my only comfort. Ah ! yes 
 it will up ; " and so saying he went out into 
 the darkness wiping his eyes. 
 
THE MINER. 6 1 
 
 Coming in from Hamilton city on my 
 mule, through that dreary desert which lies 
 between the White Pine range and the Cen- 
 tral Pacific Railroad, I caught up on an old 
 man who was tramping it back to California. 
 He had on his shoulder a pick and a spade, 
 at the end of which was a little bundle of 
 food and clothing. He was dusty, sad, and 
 weary. His long, white hair, his deeply 
 furrowed face, and slowly measured step 
 there all alone in the sagebrush made him 
 the very picture of despair. And yet on 
 closer inspection you could see that he was 
 once a strikingly handsome man. I felt sorry 
 for him and asked him to exchange places 
 with me, but he would not. I urged him, 
 but he positively refused, saying, " Not a 
 step will I ride in stagecoach or on back of 
 mule. I will teach this old kangaroo to go 
 again to White Pine." White Pine had at 
 the time a great silver boom and of course 
 thousands flocked there, as they always do 
 to such places, only to be disappointed. 
 Here was one of the disappointed ones pun- 
 ishing himself by walking back hundreds of 
 miles to where he came from. Thinks I, 
 
62 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 here Is a man worth knowing, and jumping 
 off my mule, I walked beside him for a 
 while to learn the history of his life. About 
 noon we came to a little water hole, and I 
 proposed that we should rest awhile and 
 make coffee. He consented, and while we 
 were partaking of the cheerful cup together 
 and speaking of the hardships of frontier 
 life, he gradually went over his own checkered 
 career. Said he : "I am an Englishman and 
 belonged at home to an aristocratic family in 
 Kent. In boyhood I went to Eton and 
 Cambridge and prepared myself for high 
 social standing. I married a rich and beau- 
 tiful lady, but she was, like myself, fond of 
 fast horses and gambling, and so we burned 
 the candle at both ends, and it soon went out 
 in smoke. To retrieve our ruined fortune, we 
 went to Australia, and my wife got employ- 
 ment as governess in a rich family and I 
 went to the gold diggings. I had good luck, 
 and after a few years I was worth thirty 
 thousand pounds. I then returned to Mel- 
 bourne and set up an establishment, living 
 with my wife again in great style. Indeed, 
 neither of us could bear the idea of any one 
 
THE MINER. 63 
 
 else being ahead of us in extravagant dis- 
 play. The old passion for gambling came 
 back to us, and we lived a fast life. Again 
 our riches took wings and fled, and my wife 
 fled with them to the arms of another who 
 could keep the show a-going. I went back 
 again to the diggings, but made nothing, and 
 then to cattle running and sheep herding. 
 This was a dog's life, and I left it and re- 
 turned to the city. 
 
 " I did such odd jobs as I could get to do 
 for a living. One day I was sweeping the 
 pavement for a storekeeper in front of his 
 store, when who should happen to come 
 along but my faithless wife, dressed in great 
 style, on the arm of her lover. She stopped 
 and began to cry when she saw my condition, 
 and angry words passed between husband 
 number one and number two. The cad made 
 an insulting remark and I shot him dead be- 
 fore I knew what I was about. My wife 
 screamed, and I had to flee for my life. I 
 took to the bush and there lived awhile more 
 like a savage than anything else. When I 
 thought it safe to do so, I ventured to the 
 coast and left Australia as a sailor, going to 
 
64 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 Java. From there I worked my way to San 
 Francisco. That was many years ago, and 
 though I feel quite safe now from arrest, yet 
 my Hfe in CaHfornia has been a hard one. 
 I came near getting hung in the city by the 
 Golden Gate during the vigilants. They gave 
 me one hour in which to leave the city for- 
 ever when some of my chums were strung 
 up, and I took to the mountains without 
 delay, and I have been roughing it ever 
 since. I don't know what became of my 
 wife, and my friends in England don't know 
 anything of my whereabouts, and I suppose 
 they don't care, now that I have the brand of 
 Cain upon me. 
 
 '' My life is a lost one, whereas it might 
 have been both happy and honorable. Ex- 
 travagance did it, and now 
 
 *My days are in the yellow leaf, 
 
 The flowers and fruits of love are gone, 
 The worm, the canker, and the grief 
 Are mine alone.' 
 
 " I have tried in many ways to forget the 
 past, but I cannot, and with Byron I can 
 truly say : — 
 
THE MINER. 65 
 
 ' I fly like a bird of the air, 
 
 In search of a home and a rest, 
 A balm for the sickness of care, 
 
 A bliss for a bosom unblessed. 
 I wander, it matters not where. 
 
 No clime can restore me my peace 
 Or snatch from the frown of despair 
 
 A cheering, a fleeting release. 
 But homeless and heartless I roam, 
 
 My bosom all bared to the wind, 
 The victim of pride and of love ; 
 
 I seek, — but, ah ! where can I find? ' " 
 
 riis, indeed, was a sad story of conjugal 
 failure, financial ruin, remorse of conscience, 
 and misery without a single ray of hope. 
 I tried to inspire him with new courage, but 
 it was no good. He lost faith in himself, in 
 manhood and womanhood, and he hoped 
 when he died that they might bury him be- 
 side a dog, for he believed there was more 
 faithfulness to the dog than to man. 
 
 The miner's life was full of romance and 
 adventure during those early days in Cali- 
 fornia and Nevada. The old "forty-niners" 
 now living delight to relate, when they are 
 in the right mood for it, their first experiences 
 on the coast. I have spent at their fireside 
 
66 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 some of the most enjoyable hours of my 
 Hfe Hstening to their stories so full of almost 
 incredible things. 
 
 Visiting in Virginia City an old friend 
 whose acquaintance I had made in Elko, he 
 told me at my request a bit of his history 
 after w^e had partaken of supper. 
 
 " When the rush for California was on, in 
 '49," said he, " I and my wife and chil- 
 dren left our farm in Ohio, accompanied 
 by the wife's brother. We started overland 
 to California. We had two covered wagons 
 drawn by four yoke of oxen, in which we 
 lived on the journey. We had a very hard 
 time of it between Indians, swollen rivers, 
 and bad roads. 
 
 ''After getting through the American 
 Desert, where we had some trouble with the 
 Indians, we arrived at a point where the road 
 forked, one branch going considerably north 
 of the other into California. There we re- 
 mained for a week, wrangling as to which we 
 should take. My wife sided with her brother 
 in favor of the northern route. Neither of 
 us would yield a peg, and finally we divided 
 the children, the oxen, and all that we had ; 
 
THE MINER. 67 
 
 she and her brother going their way, and I 
 going mine. We did not expect to meet 
 again, at least I did not, nor wished to either, 
 for I was sick of her and all her relatives. 
 She always sided with them and against me, 
 and I put up with her as long as I did be- 
 cause of the children. I ceased to love her 
 and despised all her kin. Well, we parted, 
 and women being scarce on the coast in 
 those days, she got married to a fellow who 
 had luck. He took her to San Francisco 
 and they lived in big style. I had many ' ups ' 
 and 'downs,' and being one day without a 
 dollar in the same city, I went about looking 
 for work. A rich swell hired me to chop a 
 cord of wood in his back yard. At noon I 
 sat down on the wood to eat a few crusts I 
 had in my pocket when, on looking up, whom 
 did I see but my old wife dressed to kill, 
 just as if she had come from Paris, and look- 
 ing down on me from her window. ' Halloa ! 
 is that you up there so grand ? ' I said. 
 ' Yes,' said she, ' and you better come in 
 and get a decent dinner.' I went, for I was 
 pretty lank at the time, and a good dinner 
 was not to be despised. While I was eating 
 
68 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 she asked after the children I had and told 
 me about her new married life. I did not 
 stay long inside, for my employer, who was 
 down town, might come in, and finding me 
 there instead of in his back yard, raise 
 a row. When I got through, she paid me a 
 few dollars more than I agreed to do the job 
 for and I left. Before going, however, I 
 made a few remarks on the folly of our 
 quarreling, when, tossing her head, she said, 
 * It was a good thing for me, at any rate. 
 You are now suffering for not doing as 
 brother wanted you to.' I kept plodding on, 
 and by and by I struck it rich in the Sacra- 
 mento valley and was on the board of alder- 
 men of Sacramento City, when one day a 
 poor, haggard, miserable-looking woman ap- 
 plied to us for relief, I knew her well, but 
 did not let on that I did. She knew me also, 
 but acted as if she did not want to be recog- 
 nized. She got the relief she wanted, and 
 procuring her address, I called and took the 
 children from her. I learned afterwards that 
 she died in the poorhouse. 
 
 ** I am now married, as you see, to another 
 wife, who is not so headstrong as the other 
 
THE MINER. 69 
 
 was. Had my first been like this one the 
 forks of the road would not have parted us. 
 But bygones are bygones." 
 
 I observed on almost all occasions, even 
 when the story-teller was in the best of 
 spirits, that there was an undertone of sad- 
 ness in the voice. Strange and romantic 
 things happened in the days of long ago ; 
 yes, and sad, sorrowful things too, the bare 
 remembrance of which brought moisture to 
 the eye and a lump to the throat. 
 
 Rough and rude as frontiersmen may be 
 to each other, they never fail to be polite and 
 chivalrous to women, and courteous to minis- 
 ters of the gospel. In all my experience in 
 the wild West I never saw but politeness to 
 good women, and I never had a single insult 
 offered myself by any one, except by a post- 
 master in Elko, Nevada, and he was a miser- 
 able foreign infidel who had once been a 
 miner. It was the custom of this man, 
 invariably, when I entered, especially if the 
 postofftce was full of men waiting for their 
 mail, to sneer at religion, the Bible, and 
 preachers. I endured his taunts for a long 
 time, until endurance ceased to be a virtue, 
 
70 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 and then I felt it my duty to buckle on the 
 armor, speaking figuratively, and give the 
 unbelieving scamp a thrashing. One day 
 when I was standing in the crowd waiting 
 for my mail, he remarked in the hearing 
 of all, for my benefit, " What simple fools 
 these preachers are, coming out here to tell 
 us that Jesus was the Son of God, or even 
 that there is a God at all ! " I replied with 
 warmth : " You vile-mouthed infidel ! it is 
 your place to attend to the business of your 
 office, and properly represent the President 
 who appointed you ; but seeing that you 
 keep insulting me and the Master whom I 
 represent, and that reason and argument are 
 only like casting pearls before swine in your 
 case, I ask you to come out here from behind 
 that counter, and if I don't put religion into 
 you, I will at least give you the whipping 
 you deserve." 
 
 This came as a surprise to him. He 
 looked at me dumfounded and speechless, 
 wondering, perhaps, if I could do it, or if 
 President Grant would remove him if he had 
 a fight In the of^ce and was reported. At 
 any rate, he stood as if he were struck dumb, 
 
THE MINER. 7 1 
 
 while the laughing crowd cheered the parson 
 and demanded that he should come out from 
 his desk and receive his whipping like a man, 
 there and then, English fashion. But he 
 declined, remarking that the rules of his 
 office did not allow him to fight while on 
 duty. "Then," shouted the excited crowd, 
 " you are a miserable coward, for you used 
 your office' to insult a man who was attend- 
 ing to his own business ! " Never, during the 
 years I was there, did that man open his 
 mouth to me against religion again, and we 
 became quite friendly afterwards. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE STAGE ROBBER. 
 
 OTAGE robbing in those early days of 
 ^ Nevada was a common occurrence, and 
 more than once I came home minlis my col- 
 lections and everything else of value. It 
 seemed to be a paying industry, for a large 
 number of able-bodied men were engaged in 
 it. I only succeeded once in cheating those 
 bold rascals. Coming from one of the most 
 flourishing mining towns of the State with a 
 silver brick in my pocket, presented me by 
 the governor, a band of daring wretches, 
 standing on the road in front of us, saluted 
 our driver with a shot of blank cartridge. 
 We all knew what that meant, and those of 
 us who had valuables on our persons were 
 put to our wits how to save them. I grieved 
 to lose my beautiful brick, when a bright 
 thought possessed me ; it was to cut a hole in 
 the cushion of my seat and there hide it. 
 When the coach stopped we were required 
 
THE STAGE ROBBER. 73 
 
 to turn out, take off our boots, and stand in a 
 row while the robbers searched our pockets. 
 This was the usual method of relieving us of 
 whatever was worth taking. Then a hurried 
 glance at the inside of the coach and all was 
 over. On the occasion referred to, my much- 
 prized brick was not discovered. I shook 
 hands with the gentlemen of the road on 
 parting, and invited them to come to my 
 church when they came to Elko. 
 
 Sometimes I have known inexperienced 
 young men from the East to try their hand 
 at the business, but they generally made a 
 mess of it. They got either caught or killed. 
 I felt exceedingly sorry for one of those mis- 
 guided youths whom I met in one of our 
 hospitals. With two of his chums he started 
 ahead of the coach going to Idaho from 
 Elko, one night in winter ; and a snowstorm 
 coming on, which covered the stage road, 
 they got lost. One was frozen to death, one 
 had to have both feet taken off, an operation 
 in which I took part, and the other got well 
 as by the skin of his teeth. The one that 
 got his feet taken off used to come to my 
 study, which was near the hospital, on his 
 
74 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 hands and knees and have me write letters to 
 his parents in New York State. I have one 
 of those letters still, and here it is : — 
 
 My dear Parents, — Your bad, disobedient boy has 
 met with a cold reception in this wicked country, so cold 
 indeed that he has lost both his feet. 
 
 Others did so well at stage robbing that Bill Wilson, 
 Dick Dyer, and I thought we would try our hand at it, 
 but we made a miserable failure. A terrible snowstorm 
 came on us in the mountains and poor Wilson was frozen 
 to death. Dick got through it all right, but my feet 
 were so badly frozen that they had to be cut off. It is 
 awful to think of it, that I must go the rest of my days 
 on crutches. The other fellows that came with us West 
 robbed a coach one night and got so much gold and 
 silver that they were overloaded and so got caught by 
 the sheriff; they are now serving a term of ten years in 
 prison. 
 
 Dick has skipped to California, and the sheriff is 
 threatening to send me there also if I don't get money 
 to take me home. For God's sake, try and send me 
 some immediately and I will promise never to leave 
 home again. Your affectionate son, 
 
 Joseph Saunders. 
 
 Stage robbing was usually the outcome of 
 gambling, and both the gambler and the rob- 
 ber ended their wicked course in the same 
 place — either the penitentiary or the grave. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE QUEER PREACHER. 
 
 QUEER customers of every sort used to 
 visit us in those Nevada towns after 
 the opening of the railroad. Temperance 
 lecturers would come, hold meetings abusing 
 the use of liquor, and then finish up by 
 going on a big drunk. Preachers, too, with 
 a shady record would visit us, and for a time 
 you would imagine that they were the salt of 
 the earth, but after a bit the salt would lose 
 its savor. Theatricals would come demand- 
 ing the use of the churches for their plays, 
 and when they didn't get them they would 
 call all belonging to them hypocrites. I 
 foolishly once consented to let one such 
 party play in my church, as the acting was in 
 the interest of temperance, and when they 
 got through they stole my pulpit Bible, which 
 cost ten dollars. 
 
 A queer-looking preacher once came to 
 Elko to convert to his faith — which was of a 
 
 75 
 
76 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 sort as queer as himself — all the people of the 
 place. Because I would not step aside and 
 give him my pulpit he went about town tell- 
 ing that I was an escaped convict from over 
 the water. 
 
 The sheriff of the county being a friend of 
 mine, I requested him to write to a similar 
 official in my native land in order to find out 
 the falsity of the charge. '* No," said he, " I 
 will have him come and preach to my pris- 
 oners in jail to-morrow, and if he escapes 
 with his life he may be thankful." So the 
 sheriff informed him that the prisoners de- 
 sired to have him preach to them the gospel, 
 for they were penitent. He went and was 
 locked in with a dozen as hardened sinners 
 as preacher ever spoke to. After he began 
 his worship a bucketful of dirty slops was 
 poured over him. Then began a scene that 
 I suppose he has never forgotten. They 
 took him by the neck and feet and pitched 
 him from side to side of their cell ; they beat 
 him and pounded him till his body was 
 covered with bruises. The yells of him for 
 mercy, and shouting to the sheriff, could be 
 heard a block or two away. When he was 
 
THE QUEER PREACHER. "^^ 
 
 more dead than alive they let him out, and 
 he rushed to my study for refuge and cleans- 
 ing. This I objected to, but volunteered to 
 take him down to the river and souse him in, 
 which I did. He left town with the first 
 train. 
 
 One day as I stood by my tent door I saw 
 a great crowd on the main street listening to 
 somebody preaching, for they had nothing 
 else to do, it being the Sabbath. Curious 
 to hear some one else preach, I joined the 
 crowd. The preacher was a little withered, 
 wizened creature about forty, and weighed, 
 perhaps, one hundred and thirty pounds. 
 He had a slanting forehead, long hair hang- 
 ing down behind, and a thin voice with a 
 sanctimonious drawl to it. His appearance 
 was decidedly against him, and what he said 
 was even more so. He was a Mormon 
 preacher once, he said, over in Utah, but he 
 would rather live by the sweat of his brow 
 among the mountains of Nevada than by the 
 sweat of his jaw proclaiming the false doc- 
 trines of Mormondom. Well, his sermon 
 was a queer mixture of things sacred and 
 divine, and there is no telling how it would 
 
78 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 have ended had not his wife put a stop to it, 
 for it was getting worse and worse as he 
 went on. Here is a sample : " My dearly 
 beloved pilgrims in this howling desert of a 
 wicked world, ah, yes, I am come to help 
 you to Zion, beautiful Zion. Yes, ah, yes, 
 verily, for I am guided by a great light ; yes, 
 verily, greater than it would be were you to 
 sweep the sun, moon, and stars into a great 
 heap big as yon mountain. I saw this light 
 in Utah, and I heard a voice from heaven, 
 too, saying unto me, * Ebenezer, Ebenezer, go 
 over the mountains and speak to the children 
 of men in Nevada. They have no light there 
 but the light of the saloon and the dance 
 hall. Their God is their gold, and their 
 Saviour is their silver, and there is no health 
 in them.' Ah, yes, and the mothers in Israel 
 wept sore when I preached my farewell ser- 
 mon, and the maidens cried, ' Shall we never 
 behold his face again ? ' And they gave me on 
 parting, corn and wine, oil and honey. Ah, 
 yes, verily, and I came over the mountains, 
 and ever since the valleys and the rivers and 
 lakes have been saying unto me, 'Arise up, 
 Ebenezer, and speak — speak of the new 
 
THE QUEER PREACHER. 79 
 
 light of Zion.' Yes, verily, verily; and the 
 little minnows in the brooks, the fish in the 
 rivers, and the trees of the valleys ; ah, yes, 
 and the goats on a thousand hills, too, have 
 cried out to me, ' Arise, Ebenezer, arise and 
 proclaim the new light of Zion.' Ah, yes, 
 verily ; and as I came up here from my little 
 farm yonder, all things, living and dead, 
 clapped their hands and shouted, ' Blessed 
 is Ebenezer that cometh in the name of 
 the Lord.'" 
 
 Just then an ox team, hauling a load of 
 cedar poles, came slowly along to the outer 
 edge of Ebenezer's congregation, driven by 
 a large woman of middle age, and per- 
 haps weighing about two hundred and fifty 
 pounds. ''Wo-0-00, thar," from the mas- 
 culine voice of the woman brought the 
 oxen to a stand. The preacher's back was 
 towards her and her presence was unknown 
 to him. I was near enough to both to hear 
 what each said, and it was after this manner 
 in a singsong by Ebenezer, and in a harsh 
 undertone by the woman. He : " I am come 
 now that you may have my light too, to lead 
 you to Zion. Your corn and your wine, your 
 
8o TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 milk and your honey, your gold and your 
 silver, I do not ask, for, like the preachers 
 which be of the world, for myself, ah, no, 
 verily." She: ''Oh, you barking Cayote 
 you ! " He : "You may give me these, how- 
 ever, for the use of my family if you wish to, 
 but I need them not for myself, as it is my 
 food and drink to do my Father's will." She : 
 " You big-mouthed jackass you ! " He : " Ah, 
 yes, verily, and the laborer is worthy of his 
 hire while he toils in the vineyard of his 
 Lord." She : " You lazy, white-livered loafer ! 
 I never knew you to do an honest day's work 
 since I got you." He: "Woe is me if I 
 dwell in Nevada and not preach in the town 
 of Elko ! Ah, yes, v'erily." She : " Woe is 
 you if you don't sell this wood and get 
 supper for the children to-night, you good- 
 for-nothing wolf in sheep's clothing you." 
 He : " And woe, woe to the tents of Elko if 
 my new light of Zion does not shine in 
 them." She: " You bottomless pit of dark- 
 ness you, your light is not even that of a 
 penny candle, and you want to flicker with 
 it in the tents of Elko, do you?" "He: 
 " Ah, yes, verily, the days of our years are 
 
THE QUEER PREACHER. 8 1 
 
 threescore and ten, and then the wicked 
 cease from troubUng and the weary are at 
 rest." She : '' You brainless yellow dog! you 
 have had more rest from me and the fleas 
 than you deserved." He : '' But, my dearly 
 beloved, my light shows me a great city ; ah, 
 yes, verily, it is a glorious city, and I will 
 walk on the golden streets of that city some 
 day with a sweet-faced angel by my side, 
 and " — She, at the top of her voice : " You 
 will, will you ? you roving prodigal son of 
 Sodom and Gomorrah ! " and with that she 
 made a bound from the wagon and caught 
 him by the collar of his coat, pulling him to 
 the ground, and rained upon his prostrated 
 body blows from the thick end of her whip. 
 The roaring, laughing crowd applauded, 
 shouting, "Give it to him," "That's it," 
 " Good for the old woman," " Hit 'im again," 
 " W'ack it to 'im," " Chuck him in the river," 
 etc. When she exhausted the strength of 
 her arm on him, she gave him a kick with 
 her foot, saying as she did so, " Go sell that 
 wood that me an' the children get something 
 to eat for supper ; we be starving at home, 
 an' you know it." 
 
82 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 " A woman moved is like a fountain troubled, 
 Muddy, ill-seeming, bereft of beauty." 
 
 Rising- up and shtiking himself, Ebenezer 
 pathetically said, ** Well, boys, you may 
 laugh at this, but I am accustomed to it." 
 
X 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE CHURCH MEMBER. 
 
 A S members of our churches, too, we 
 ^^ used to have some queer timbers. 
 Generally I got along with the men very 
 well, especially if I did n't rebuke too severely 
 their besetting sins, but the class of women 
 which followed the new railroad were hard to 
 manage in church or anywhere else. There 
 was Mrs. Rogers, whose tongue went like a 
 bell clapper from morning till night. She 
 was a terrible scandal to our church at 
 Lebanon. Perhaps I had better let one of 
 my elders describe her as he did shortly after 
 in the local paper of his Eastern home : — 
 
 " Out here in Nevada they have made me 
 an elder in a Presbyterian church at Lebanon. 
 We have a young preacher just from Union 
 Seminary, New York. We have strange 
 people here composing our churches. They 
 come from all parts of the world in search of 
 wealth, and some of them claim to be reli- 
 83 
 
84 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 gious, though such are few and far between. 
 But if we are to have churches at all, we 
 must take such timbers as the country affords. 
 We have one or two in our church that 
 I wish sometimes we could hand over, 
 like Brigham Young, to the buffetings of 
 Satan. 
 
 " There is Mrs. Rogers and her husband ; 
 they are the stormy petrels of our town and 
 church. If you cross them in any way or 
 rebuke them for their slanderous speaking, 
 there is at once an opening of the temple 
 doors of Jupiter, and before you know it 
 there is a scattering of forked lightning and 
 a thunder burst. 
 
 " He is a red-headed mule driver, and she 
 is a black-haired boarding-house keeper with 
 a dash of Mexican blood in her. The black- 
 guardism that goes on continually between 
 them, and never ceases in church or elsewhere, 
 is the scandal of the country. The preacher 
 prays earnestly in his study to the Lord to 
 change the ' lion into a lamb and the hyena 
 into a turtle dove,' if it is possible for him 
 to do so, for the good of the place ; but this 
 is as far as he will venture near them. One 
 
THE CHURCH MEMBER. 85 
 
 day recently I called on him and said, ' This 
 thing must stop. Our church is being 
 ruined ; the people are leaving us and join- 
 ing the Methodists. We will have no church 
 at all soon if we don't put Mr. and Mrs. 
 Rogers out.' The preacher thought we had 
 better go slow and first gently caution them 
 against their unruly temper to see how it would 
 work. So we resolved to visit them, and 
 having braced up our courage for the risky 
 ordeal, we went forth and entered their house 
 and sat down in the parlor. Presently Mrs. 
 Rogers came in and took a chair opposite us. 
 After a few commonplace remarks about the 
 weather and the prospects of the growing 
 crops and the mining industry, the parson, 
 meek as Moses, began to expatiate on the 
 evils resulting from ungovernable passions 
 and the unruly member that sometimes 
 needed bit and bridle. 
 
 '' While he talked with fear and trembling, 
 Mrs. Rogers, gazing at him, moved sideways, 
 then backwards and forward, like a huge 
 giant in the bowels of a mountain and trying 
 to throw it into the sea, and a wild frown 
 began to gather on her brow, like the thunder 
 
86 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 clouds that sometimes loom up over the 
 Rockies and deluge the rugged peaks with 
 rain. Her large, dark eyes began to flash 
 fire like lightning in the tropics during the 
 wet season ; and then, fast as a meteor 
 athwart the heavens, she ran through the 
 long passage of her boarding-house, scream- 
 ing, shrieking, ' Rogers ! Rogers, come here ! 
 He is insulting your wife ! ' Rogers was 
 cutting firewood in the back yard, and he 
 came in, rushing like a buffalo and bellow- 
 ing like a bull of Bashon. ' Who ? Who ? 
 Where is he ? ' with the axe high uplifted in 
 air. I hid in the dining-room, but while Mrs. 
 Rogers was pounding me with a rolling-pin, 
 the preacher bolted through the frout door 
 and down the street so fast that you could 
 have played cards on his coat-tails, and Rogers 
 after him. The idle dogs joined in the chase. 
 It was a sight for gods and men. The 
 women rushed out to their doors, the dancers 
 and gamblers in the saloons rushed to the 
 streets, everybody asking, ' What is it ? 
 What is the matter?' The two men ran like 
 race horses on the track. Now Rogers 
 seemed to be catching up, and now the 
 
THE CHURCH MEMBER. 87 
 
 parson seemed to be the swiftest runner. It 
 was almost neck and neck between them, 
 however. The man of peace had serious 
 business on his hands and for his legs, and he 
 knew it, therefore strained every nerve and 
 muscle. Yes, for if the man of war had 
 caught up, he would have split him in two. 
 Fortunately for the young minister, he was a 
 Freemason, and he took refuge in a car- 
 penter's shop where all were brothers, and, 
 giving the grand hailing sign of distress, was 
 quickly surrounded by men who kept Roger 
 at bay. Then the furious bull went home 
 and asked his wife what it was all about." 
 More shipwrecked lives, more beggars 
 who were but yesterday millionaires, and 
 more millionaires who were but yesterday 
 beggars, it would be hard to find in any other 
 country under the sun, than was to be found 
 on the Pacific slope during the last genera- 
 tion. How often my heart bled for the poor, 
 unfortunate outcasts of society, especially 
 when called in to administer consolation in 
 the dying hour, or to read the burial service 
 over them in death ! The tale of woe which 
 some of them would relate was often sad in 
 
88 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 the extreme. In one of the mining towns 
 of the Sierras, I was sent for to one of the 
 hotels of the place, to comfort a wretched 
 creature who was fast nearing the end of her 
 course in despair. She was once a church 
 member. 
 
 On entering her room, I found her crying 
 piteously and in great agony. I tried to 
 calm her mind by showing her that the path 
 of life for all of us was rugged and full of 
 sorrows, but that there was a happier life await- 
 ing the soul who was washed in the fountain for 
 sin and uncleanness. It was but little I could 
 comfort, for she seemed, as she said, ''to be 
 perishing without hope." The tale of her 
 life was a sad one. She was the only child 
 of fashionable parents who were continually 
 at war with each other. When she was 
 about fifteen her father left home, taking her 
 with him, and after living a few months in 
 another State, procured a divorce from her 
 mother. He then married again, and her 
 stepmother was bad to her and she ran away 
 with a sporting fellow who promised to marry 
 her in Chicago, but he did n't. Then he took 
 her out to San Francisco, and after a year of 
 
THE CHURCH MEMBER. 89 
 
 ill treatment, left her ; and as she had neither 
 parents nor character, she abandoned forever 
 the path of purity, and sunk lower and lower 
 in vice till she had now come to the end of 
 her course, hating the living and fearing to 
 die. Coming back the next day, I brought 
 with me this prayer, which I had written out 
 for the purpose of reading to her, for she 
 told me that she preferred read prayers. 
 '' O Lord of heaven and earth, hear the 
 wailing cry of this poor lost sheep that has 
 wandered away from the shepherd's fold to 
 these mountains of vanity here, which are 
 now become to her bleak and cold ! She is 
 here alone among rough, cruel men, far from 
 mother's and father s love, and she fears, be- 
 yond the reach of divine mercy. Have com- 
 passion upon this child of thine own creation, 
 O Father in heaven, and guide her safely 
 through the dark valley of death. Hear, oh, 
 hear the qry of her soul for cleansing from 
 the pollutions of Sodom and Gomorrah, for 
 she was once pure as the snow, in a mother's 
 arms. To that mother's arms she now can- 
 not go to nestle again her head in the bosom 
 of human love, and she weeps the weeping 
 
90 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 that knows no consolation till encircled with 
 the arms of divine love. Have pity, Lord of 
 life and death, and save from the raging 
 waves of a degraded life while the waters of 
 death are coming up over the soul. The 
 jewel in the mire is jewel still, and, O Jesus, 
 Son of Mary, take this precious stone and 
 polish it for a place in the Temple not made 
 with hands in thy kingdom." When I ap- 
 proached her bed, I saw that she was fast 
 dying ; and as she was too weak to speak I 
 knelt and read my prayer. What good it 
 did her I cannot tell, for when I rose up from 
 her bedside the weeping spirit had fled and 
 the hands were folded in death. A few 
 rough neighbors gathered in, and we took 
 her up tenderly and dug a hole in the side 
 of the mountain, and there, as gently as ever 
 mother laid her child to sleep in its cradle 
 bed, we laid her away till the coming of the 
 Angel of the Resurrection. 
 
 In a room adjoining the one in which this 
 woman died was a lady from St. Louis, who 
 was a church member from her youth in one 
 of the most fashionable churches of that city. 
 Up to this time she did not deign to attend 
 
THE CHURCH MEMBER. 9I 
 
 any of our Sunday services. The preacher, 
 the audience, and the surroundings were all 
 too far beneath her notice to do that. The 
 partition wall between the two rooms, like 
 those of most frontier hotels, was rather thin, 
 and the reading of the prayer could be easily 
 heard by our uppish, self-righteous friend 
 from St. Louis. She did hear it, and it went 
 home to the right place, too. It was not 
 meant for her, but it was under God the 
 means of her conversion, and the making of 
 her one of the noblest of Christian workers. 
 The unruly church member, the fallen 
 church member, or the mere churchly church 
 member, is bad enough in civilized communi- 
 ties, but when you find such in the wild West 
 they are worse than useless. There it is 
 either belief or infidelity, Christianity or 
 heathenism. It is for the East to say what 
 the West will be. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE CHURCH ROW. 
 
 T WITNESSED a church row on a grand 
 ^ scale once in Nevada. You talk of 
 church rows here in the East, why, they are 
 no more like what we used to have out there 
 than a hurdy-gurdy and monkey show is like 
 a Barnum circus. Out yonder they were 
 grand with the grandeur of the Rocky 
 Mountains and Sierras. We had none of 
 your little quarrels you have hereabouts with 
 small Christians in them saying mean things 
 against each other in the dark. No, when a 
 sister in Nevada buckled on the armor to do 
 battle against the Midianites she was a 
 Deborah, when a brother drew his sword he 
 was a Gideon, or a Samson mowing down 
 the Philistines with the jawbone of an ass. 
 I attended such a row one Sunday afternoon 
 at a church service under a spreading oak by 
 the Truckee River, on the eastern slope of 
 the Sierras. The congregation was made up 
 of silver miners, gamblers, lumbermen, and 
 
THE CHURCH ROW. 93 
 
 gold hunters from California. Some of them 
 were Welshmen with their 'wives, with a 
 dozen or so Indians standing on the outer 
 edge of the congregation. 
 
 When the preacher got through his sermon 
 he asked them to name the next place of 
 meeting. "Pine Nob" Morgan suggested 
 that we meet at Sister Ferguson's place in 
 Roaring Canon. Mrs. Morgan jumped up and 
 said : " Not if I know it, by gosh ! " Pine 
 Nob told her to shut her mouth or he would 
 put a spur of the Sierras in it. California 
 Jack from Cedar Gulch told Pine Nob that 
 he was no gentleman, and didn't know how 
 to behave himself in church. Mrs. Brown 
 screamed that Pine Nob was seen going too 
 often up to Roaring Canon. Andy Jackson 
 asked her what sort of a boarding-house she 
 kept when Brown was in the mountains ? 
 One of the boarders got up and said he 
 would make mince-meat of Andy and feed 
 him to the dogs. Jemima Ferguson asked 
 where was last Sunday's collection ? '' It was 
 drunk at the Red Gulch saloon ! " shouted 
 a half-dozen angry voices. The preacher 
 raised his arm to pronounce the benediction, 
 
94 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 but they must have supposed that he was 
 waving them on to deeds of valor, for every 
 man and woman of them sprung to their feet 
 and at each other Hke fury. Then you would 
 see their eyes glare like Carnegie's furnaces, 
 their fists rising into the upper air like a 
 peak of the Rockies, and the sound of their 
 screaming and shouting was like the roaring 
 of the Atlantic when a " sou'wester " is blow- 
 ing. Red Dog, one of the Indians present, 
 gave a war whoop and leaped up from the 
 ground four feet, and then ran around yelp- 
 ing, as he used to when after scalps. 
 
 I tell you they don't know how to get up 
 church rows back here in the East, and when 
 they try it they don't succeed any better than 
 Balaam's ass did, or Jonah when he went into 
 the gourd plantation business. Usually, too, 
 they do it with a pious twang, and a stranger 
 might suppose that they were Hezekiahs or 
 men of that stamp. 
 
 I like first-class church rows with first-class 
 Christians in them. Then the air smells like 
 the atmosphere of Nevada and the music 
 enters your soul like '' Scots wha hae wi' 
 Wallace bled." 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 "INDIAN JOE." 
 
 TNDIAN JOE" was an old-timer in 
 ^ Nevada. He used to hunt bad Indians 
 for the government, and he boasted when 
 I knew him that he could put as clean a bullet 
 through a bad Indian, or anything else bad, 
 as any man that ever came to Nevada. 
 When you saw him walking in the sage- 
 brush, you imagined that you saw an Indian, 
 for his movements were so similar. " Indian 
 Joe " made bricks and laid them in the wall 
 when he got the chance. There was nothing 
 small about Joe, and when I was about to 
 build a church he came to me and said : 
 " Parson Riley, I will build you the founda- 
 tion if you allow me to preach a sermon and 
 take the collection when the church is 
 finished, for I used to giv^e the boys a word 
 in season myself before you parsons began 
 to come to Nevada." When the Sunday 
 arrived that Joe was to preach, he entered 
 
96 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 the pulpit arrayed in moccasins and other 
 Indian toggery, and gave a wild, rambling 
 harangue on the laborer being worthy of his 
 hire. It was a genuine old-timer. When he 
 got through, he ordered the collection box 
 sent round, but when it returned to him his 
 countenance fell and there was blood in his 
 eye. "You Ishmaelites of the desert!" he 
 said, " do you think that I am going to lay 
 church foundations for the fun of it? Do 
 you think that I am going to set up for you 
 a ladder to climb to heaven with and take for 
 myself a willow pole ? Do you think that I 
 am going to give you bricks, bread of life, 
 and eggs for your stones and your serpents ? " 
 Having put these three searching questions 
 to his hearers, he made a leap from the plat- 
 form, locked the door, and nailed down the 
 windows before any one could realize what he 
 was doing. Then leaping back on the plat- 
 form like an Indian mounting his horse, he 
 shouted, " I am a roaring rhinoceros, I am! 
 Am a lion bereft of its pup, I am ! Am a 
 grizzly bear, I am ! Come away with the 
 shining dust or you will see to-morrow before 
 you see the outside of this church ! The 
 
'* INDIAN JOE. 97 
 
 box was again sent round, and came back full 
 and running over. Joe glanced at it and 
 said, " That 's the sort of Christians I want 
 you to be in Nevada." 
 
 '' Parson Riley, pronounce the benediction 
 and open the door." 
 
 The wily fox came to me shortly after and 
 said: "These people out here have no re- 
 spect for a man unless he appears rich. If 
 you can tell them that you own a silver mine 
 out in the mountains, they will drive be- 
 fore you like lambs on the straight and nar- 
 row path. Now, brother, I have a mine out 
 in Silver Mountain. It is called the Square 
 Dimond. There 's millions in it. Were I to 
 publish it in New York, you would see some 
 of the big millionaires coming after it. But 
 the brickyard will keep the old man going 
 the rest of his days. Let us go out and see 
 it. I would rather sell it to you than any one 
 else in Nevada, for it would increase your 
 influence mightily with the boys if you could 
 tell them that you had a stake in the coun- 
 try." Out we went, and sure enough, there 
 was the mine about five feet deep, and every 
 inch of it covered with sparkling silver ore. 
 
98 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 There was nothing small about Joe, and he 
 said: "I tell you, pard, there's millions in 
 that 'ere hole, and I could get hundreds of 
 thousands for it back East, but if you wish 
 to be a powerful preacher here in Nevada, 
 you want that mine. I will give it to you for 
 five hundred dollars — one hundred dollars 
 cash, and the balance next year. Buy it, 
 parson, and you can rebuke the wicked with 
 boldness." Of course I bought, paid down 
 one hundred dollars, and gave my note for 
 the remainder. 
 
 A truthful man told me that he saw Indian 
 Joe removing the blocks of ore which he put 
 in for the purpose. On the day following 
 the sale, I went out to see if it were so, and 
 the round hole was there just where I left it, 
 but the millions. were gone. No matter, that 
 hole was the making of me. I owned the 
 Square Dimond, and I preached so boldly 
 and fearlessly against the wicked that the 
 Nevadians used to say that I run the devil 
 out of the State and over into Utah. Even 
 yet people say that I preach too boldly for a 
 poor preacher ; but they don't know that I 
 own a mine in Silver Mountain, Nevada. 
 
'' INDIAN JOE. 99 
 
 Your mill property and your railroad stocks 
 may vanish, leaving you as poor as a church 
 mouse, but yonder hole will remain forever. 
 When I want to feel rich as Vanderbilt, I go 
 back to it in thought and look down once 
 again on it as I saw it first. Then I am 
 happy because I am, mentally at least, inde- 
 pendently rich. 
 
 There, were others as well as " Indian Joe," 
 however, who cheated after this fashion, and 
 scooped in many millions from here and 
 Europe — the owners of the Emma mine, 
 for instance. I was located not far from that 
 famous mine and knew from the workmen 
 how the fraud was perpetrated, and on going 
 to Scotland went to Sir Donald Cameron, 
 editor of the Glasgow Mail, and told him of 
 it. He did not credit me at first, as the Eng- 
 lish deputation had published a glowing 
 report of what they saw. I put a flea in his 
 ear, however, which led to a secret investiga- 
 tion and the bubble burst, but not, I am sorry 
 to say, till thousands of families were ruined. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE MORMON. 
 
 TN the town of Elko, and other places 
 ^ where money was plentiful in Nevada, 
 the wily Mormon, of both sexes, was wont 
 to visit sometimes on a pious mission, and 
 sometimes on a worldly errand. But be the 
 object what it might, the Latter Day Saint 
 was always sure, in some way or other, to 
 leave the Gentile poorer than he found 
 him. 
 
 '' Scotch Mary," for instance, w^as a Mor- 
 mon wife in Salt Lake City, or, perhaps, what 
 is nearer the truth, she was the tenth part of 
 a wife. 
 
 Mary was a knowing one. She came to 
 our town when I was there and started a 
 laundry. She went then around among us 
 young men and borrow^ed five dollars. Who 
 would not trust her ? Did we not sing of 
 Scotland, Annie Laurie, Bonnie Jane, and 
 Highland Mary? This Scotch lass, we said, 
 
THE MORMON. lOI 
 
 had been abused by her old Mormon brute 
 of a husband. Mary got our sympathy and 
 used it to her own advantage. After a week 
 or so she came round to us (and w^e were a 
 great multitude), saying she could not pay 
 back the five dollars in money, but she would 
 in washing. "That's a good, honest girl," 
 we said. "Would an American girl do 
 that ? " Coming to my room, Mary gathered 
 up everything I had in the shape of collars, 
 cuffs, shirts, etc., assurinof me that she would 
 return them on the following Saturday night 
 as I needed them for Sunday, and left my 
 hotel w^ith a great burden upon her back. 
 Saturday night came and Sunday, too, but 
 Mary did not. She skipped back to Utah, 
 taking my washing and that of about tw^o 
 dozen other youngsters with her. The most 
 trying thing about it was that I had to an- 
 nounce that on the following Sunday I would 
 be absent, as I had to go to Corinne in Utah, 
 to assist in the dedication of a church. 
 When I made the announcement my congre- 
 gation laughed in my face, and I could 
 hear them whisper, " He 's going after his 
 washing." 
 
I02 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 After worship the young men would come 
 to me and say: ''Riley, look out for mine; 
 my name is on it." When the train moved 
 out from the station, they cheered and 
 shouted, " Success to the parson and his 
 linen mission ! " It made me feel provoked 
 at them, and I wished in my soul that I had 
 not told them that Mary had got me, too, 
 in the same boat they were in. When I 
 come to think of it, this is nothing less than 
 retributive justice for what I had done some 
 twenty years before. 
 
 When a boy of twelve or so, it was the joy 
 of my heart to go with other mischievous 
 boys to a public park of Glasgow, Scotland, 
 and there tease a certain Mormon preacher 
 while he expounded the doctrines of the 
 church of " Latter Day Saints." I remember 
 it as if it were yesterday. Said he : " You 
 Scotch are far too holy. David and Solomon, 
 and Jacob and Abraham, were holy, but they 
 had many wives. You people put yourselves 
 above these saints of God." 
 
 This was more than we boys could stand, 
 for our ministers told us that we were miser- 
 able sinners by nature, and doomed to go to 
 
THE MORMON. IO3 
 
 hell. He was an i\merican missionary, and 
 that made it all the more tempting for us to 
 punish him. Perhaps there were two hundred 
 of us, and we crowded and pushed, and we 
 finally threw his stand over and him. with it. 
 He had a nice silk hat, and when he and the 
 stand came down to earth I, a most wicked boy, 
 ran off with his hat, kicking it before me. I 
 ruined it beyond recovery, even for a Utah head. 
 
 Well, twenty-three years or so passed and 
 I entered Salt Lake City looking for a board- 
 ing-house, and keeping an eye open for Scotch 
 Mary ; and where did I stumble but into the 
 very home of this man with the long yellow 
 hair from America ! 
 
 When shown into the parlor by the servant 
 girl I recognized at once a life-sized picture 
 of him on the wall, and was about to make 
 for the door when the landlady entered. 
 Her name was Mrs. De Long. I told her I 
 was visiting in the city, but did not know 
 how long I would remain. I fumbled around 
 in my mind for an excuse for coming in, and 
 in a sort of a far-away talk asked her who 
 was that on the wall, at the same time with 
 an eye on the door. 
 
I04 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 She informed me that that was her husband, 
 who had been, a missionary to Glasgow. '' Is 
 he there yet ? " I asked. ''No," she said. 
 '' Where is he ? " said I. '' He 's dead," said 
 she. "Then, madam," said I, "I'll stay 
 with you for a week ; " and my spirits came 
 up from my boots. She told me afterwards 
 that he caught cold and died in Glasgow, 
 where he was a missionary. Who knows 
 but on that night, going home bareheaded, 
 he caught his fatal cold ? I was kind to that 
 Mormon widow and gave her a good deal more 
 than the hat was worth, but never told her that 
 I knew her husband in Glasgow twenty- three 
 years before. When we got to be on familiar 
 terms with each other she told me that when 
 a husband died Brigham Young required the 
 widows to turn over to him all the property 
 possessed, and then pensioned them with a 
 small trifle, but that she would not submit to 
 that, and he expelled her from the church 
 and handed her over to the buffetings of 
 Satan for a thousand years. She thought 
 Satan did not buffet her any more outside 
 than he did inside the Mormon church. I 
 had a tender regard and a powerful respect 
 
THE MORMON. IO5 
 
 for that widow, and although twenty-eight 
 years have passed since, I would like to see 
 her again. 
 
 I called on Brigham Young while in the 
 city and found him fixing up some old 
 wagons back of his house. I did not like to 
 approach the great man at first, and asked 
 one of his workmen if that was Brigham 
 Young there, giving directions. " Yes," said 
 he, '' that is President Young, and if you 
 wish to see him, go into the office and send 
 for him." "Beg your pardon," said I, " Presi- 
 dent Young." I went into the of^ce as 
 directed, and the secretary there told me 
 that he was away from home and I could not 
 see him. " Beg your pardon," said I, " he 's 
 out behind, fixing old wagons." " Beg your 
 pardon," said he, " I didn't know it." Pres- 
 ently the " president " was brought in, and he 
 and I talked for a while about things in 
 general, and then I asked him if he knew 
 Scotch Mary. " No," said he, " I don't know 
 Mary, but there is a large number of Scotch 
 women in the territory and they are very 
 good saints too." I told him that I thought 
 they made very good saints when they got 
 
I06 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 to heaven, but from what I had seen of them 
 in Scotland and Nevada I was not quite sure 
 as they ripened good here below. He 
 nodded his head hopefully. 
 
 I think Brigham Young was a good man 
 naturally, but terribly troubled at home and 
 abused abroad. 
 
 He was a native of Vermont, and properly 
 fed, clothed, and educated from his child- 
 hood. He was a Yankee born and raised, 
 but he could not help that. Brigham was a 
 real honest man naturally, but got mixed a 
 little over in England when he was a mission- 
 ary there. More Americans than Brigham 
 Young get mixed there, too. Like Brigham, 
 Solomon was a wise man, but if he had come 
 to England he would have got mixed up 
 worse than he was, so that in his old days he 
 would not know whether he was a saint or a 
 sinner. 
 
 Solomon in all his glory was not as good 
 a man as Brigham. Perhaps he had more 
 wives than Brigham had, but he was not tried 
 as Brigham was. Brigham had red- headed 
 Welsh women in his harem, and Solomon did 
 not. He (Solomon) had black-haired Ethio- 
 
THE MORMON. IO7 
 
 plans and Moabites and lovely Jewish maidens, 
 and that made all the difference between misery 
 and happiness. Brigham was a kind-hearted 
 man, but Uncle Sam's Camp Douglas above 
 his city prevented him from treating his wives 
 as kings do in Asia. 
 
 He and I got very gracious together over 
 a cup of tea, for it was about five o'clock 
 when I called on him. Brigham was a goodly 
 man to look upon. He was tall and straight 
 as a pine of the Sierras, and royal looking 
 as old King William of Germany. His head 
 was like a towering peak of the Rockies and 
 white as Mount Shasta in summer. After 
 we had supped our tea we took a walk in his 
 magnificent garden behind his " Beehive," 
 and there he said to me: '' Mr. Riley, you 
 know that I am very much married. You 
 know also that the opinion prevails among 
 the Gentiles, and the Mormons also, that I 
 like this sort of thing, but they are all very 
 much mistaken. You are a Scotchman, I 
 believe, and a Presbyterian minister ? Well, 
 the Scotch are good people and better than 
 their church, and I want you to do me justice 
 when I am dead ! " I assured him that I 
 
I08 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 would if I did not die myself before him. 
 "Well, you are young," he said, " and likely 
 to be around above when I am asleep below, 
 and so I will tell you the secret of my life, 
 and I wish you to publish it when I am gone. 
 When I married my first wife, I had no idea 
 of ever having any other than her. She was 
 all the world to me, and I loved her like a 
 very sister. But after I lived a few years 
 with her she became cross and cranky, and 
 I had very little pleasure in her company. 
 She thought that she could rule me. To show 
 her that she could not, I went and took 
 another wife, and told the first one that the 
 Lord told me to, and she must submit to the 
 will of the Lord. The second wife, after a 
 time, got to be like the first ; and I then told 
 them both that the Lord had told me to 
 lengthen the cords and strengthen the stakes 
 of my tent, and took a third and a fourth and 
 a fifth, and I found that they were all alike 
 I stopped awhile at the fifth, and thought 
 that was enough, but yet I had a yearning 
 for the true and the beautiful and the good 
 in womankind. I could not find these 
 heavenly qualities in them, and so whei) they 
 
THE MORMON. IO9 
 
 had me fairly on the road, I kept on going 
 in search of my ideal, taking them as they 
 came in my way, hoping that some day I 
 would come across the dear, loving creature 
 I sighed for. I wanted one that would love 
 me and keep silent when I wanted to think, 
 and that would not dun me for something I 
 had not to give. So the sad story went on 
 from year to year, and I kept adding to the 
 number of my wives, but the one I wanted 
 never turned up. The lovely creature before 
 my eye was always away off on the far moun- 
 tains, and when I came up to her she vanished 
 like a snowflake on the river — ' a moment 
 white, and then gone forever.' In a dream 
 which I had upon my pillow one night, I saw 
 a fair and lovely maiden on this side the 
 Rocky Mountains, with large, lustrous eyes ; 
 her form was perfect as a cedar of Lebanon, 
 and her countenance was like the lily of the 
 valley, and her demeanor was beautifully 
 submissive. She was a sort of an Indian 
 maiden with black hair and bare feet, and 
 she was like unto those in the Bible who 
 publish peace upon the mountains ; and I 
 said unto my people : ' Behold the land of 
 
no TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 promise beyond the Rockies ; arise, and let 
 us go hence, for the Lord thinks* well con- 
 cerning Zion.' Well, they did arise and 
 follow me, and after terrible hardships we 
 came out here ; but the maiden my soul 
 yearned for, and whom I thought I saw in 
 my dream, I have not yet met. I have wept 
 for her in solitude, but I cannot find her. 
 And so out here I have kept on marrying 
 and marrying, but mine eyes do not behold 
 her. The lovely creature my soul yearns for 
 is not on this side the mountains, and now 
 that I am old, I cannot go back to Vermont, 
 where I spent my boyhood. I don't know 
 how many I have married, but it matters 
 little, and I am getting discouraged. I tell 
 you the honest truth, Mr. Riley, it is impos- 
 sible for a man to be a good prophet, 
 preacher, or saint and be fixed as I am. 
 These women I have married are the plague 
 of my life. They keep pulling at my coat 
 tails for this and that from morning till night. 
 *' The heifers, too, weary the life out of me 
 with their small talk against each other. I 
 would be free to go about my master's busi- 
 ness, but they hinder me at every point. If I 
 
THE MORMON. I I I 
 
 show any favor to one more than another, there 
 is trouble on my hands at once. They watch 
 my movements, too, Hke birds of prey, and 
 so retard the growth of Zion. Only but 
 yesterday I was drinking- a cup of tea with 
 Amelia, and she began to upbraid me for 
 being so much in the company of Zephina, 
 whom she called an ' ugly old scratch.' 
 When I told her not to rebuke a prophet of 
 the Lord, she put her feet against her little 
 round table, threw it, with dishes and all, 
 over me, saying as she did so, ' Prophet of 
 the devil ! ' I ran out into the hallway, and 
 who was there but Zephina, listening through 
 the keyhole ; and when I looked to her for 
 comfort, she said : ' Serves you right, you 
 old fool ! What business have you calling on 
 that wild cat so often, any way ? ' So I am 
 watched and kicked by these untamed mus- 
 tangs continually. Even when I stand up in 
 the tabernacle yonder to preach the truth of 
 Zion, they are there by the score, not to listen 
 and learn, but to make faces at me." 
 
 After he delivered himself of this tale of 
 woe he invited me into the sitting-room, and 
 we were no sooner seated than a tall, lank 
 
112 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 woman with a sunburned face came in from 
 the street, saying as she entered, " How 
 are you, Mr. President ? " " Who are you ? " 
 said the president. '' Don't you remember 
 me, dear? I am one of your wives." ''When 
 did I marry you ? " was the next question 
 from Brigham. " Why, have you forgot- 
 ten? It was when we were crossing the 
 plains." Her reply did not seem satisfactory 
 and he called to his secretary to bring him 
 the record book. On looking through it for 
 a while he said sadly, in a half whisper, 
 "Well, your name is here." Then handing 
 the book back to his secretary he asked her, 
 " How have you been doing? " " Oh, fairly 
 well ; my son and I work on a farm together, 
 but I thought I would call in to see if you 
 could n't give us a little lift," was her reply. 
 To this Brigham said, " I am busy now, 
 woman ; come back again." 
 
 When she was gone, turning to me he 
 said : " That, you see, is the way they eter- 
 nally trouble me for what they call their little 
 lifts, and when I give them all the lifts they 
 want there is nothing of myself to lift. If I 
 had this thing to do over again, I would go 
 
THE MORMON. II3 
 
 to the land of the Turk and hft them as the 
 Turk does. Yes, I would silence their gab- 
 bling and their begging for lifts. Here I have 
 not the freedom that a prophet should have, 
 for your miserable Gentile government is 
 against me. A man in marrying," he went 
 on, '* should be careful. He should know 
 well the stock the wife is of, and after he 
 takes her home he should teach her to obey, 
 and never allow himself to be controlled. 
 Wealth, position, and education are nothing. 
 Blood counts for everything. Some families 
 have a streak of wolf to them, and no 
 amount of outside polishing will avail any- 
 thing. I took once a little red-headed Welsh 
 girl to be wife, and Satan himself could not 
 get along with her. A man in taking a bad- 
 tempered woman into his bosom is only tak- 
 ing the fires of hell there, and when the fires 
 die out they both fall into the bottomless pit. 
 There, too, are my sons, some of them grow- 
 ing up like wild asses of the desert. They 
 take after their mothers as they are good or 
 bad, and they are mostly bad ; yes, they are 
 all bad. But the other day one of tliem went 
 galloping up and down the street there in 
 
114 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 front of my house with brush tied to his horse's 
 tail, and raising the dust at a furious rate. I 
 ran out to stop him, asking ' if he had not 
 done yet with sowing his wild oats,' and he 
 told me ' to get out of the way, that he was 
 sweeping them in.' 
 
 ''That's how I am treated on every side, 
 and my life is a sore trial to me." 
 
 After this we strolled down the street to 
 the University and he showed me every- 
 thing there of interest. He also gave me 
 a catalogue of the University, and in look- 
 ing over it I observed that out of about 
 five hundred students there were nearly two 
 hundred Youngs there. I laughingly asked 
 him if these were all his. He replied : 
 "Well, friend, they say that most of them 
 are, but the Lord only knows. One thing I 
 do know, I am too much married, and it 's a 
 complete failure." At the gate outside he 
 told me again the secret of his polygamous 
 marriages, and, as a great favor, asked me to 
 put him right with the world when he was 
 dead, which I have now done. After warmly 
 shaking hands we parted, and we never met 
 again. The doctors said at the time of his 
 
THE MORMON. I 15 
 
 death that he died from eating too much 
 green corn, but I am almost sure that he 
 died of a broken heart. The man was 
 abused to death by his sixty or seventy tem- 
 poral wives, to say nothing of his thousands 
 of spiritual ones. History tells not the truth 
 about Brigham Young, and people imagine 
 that he was a great, coarse, sensual monster. 
 Nothing of the sort. He was only voyaging 
 around on troubled waters, looking, as he told 
 me, for the true, the beautiful, and the good 
 in womankind. That he died disappointed, 
 discouraged, and broken-hearted is the truth, 
 known to few but myself. I was to keep it 
 secret till he was under the sod, for he feared 
 what might happen if his women found it 
 out. 
 
 Let not the world abuse Brigham Young. 
 He was a good man, a warm-hearted 
 man, a generous, noble-minded man, who 
 tried hard to make marriage a success but 
 failed. 
 
 Peace be to his ashes, and may his 
 soul have a quiet nook in the happy land 
 where there is neither marrying nor quar- 
 reling ! 
 
Il6 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 It was my lot to visit other parts of Utah 
 when beyond the Rockies, and being curious 
 to see how the Mormons hved, I mingled 
 freely with them. I found that the wives of 
 the Latter Day Saints were, as a rule, very 
 obedient and submissive to their husbands. 
 We wonder sometimes East how a man can 
 support so many wives, but the truth is, the 
 more wives a man has the better he is off. 
 These women are not like ours ; when told to 
 go out and work in the fields they go without 
 a murmur. I think Brigham's wives were 
 trying to put on many airs ; they were 
 not fair specimens. I saw in one of the 
 southern valleys of Utah one day ten 
 women harrowing, and they did it nicely. 
 With five poles, one at each end, they pulled 
 the harrows quite easily. The husband of 
 these women had wealth in them, for they 
 saved him buying horses. Their children 
 too, about two dozen of them, were follow- 
 ing after, gathering stones. The more wives 
 a good Mormon has the more prosperous he 
 is here, and the more blest he is hereafter, for 
 they all go with him to heaven. 
 
 You must not suppose, however, from 
 
THE MORMON. I I 7 
 
 what I have said that I beHeve in the institu- 
 tion of polygamy. One man one woman 
 marriage is the divine ideal, and any system 
 that interferes with this is wrong and degrad- 
 ing to all concerned. 
 
 The Mormon system is an abomination 
 which should not have been allowed to exist 
 in this country for a single day. 
 
 The Mormon idea of woman is borrowed 
 from the Orient and should have no footing, 
 not for a moment, in the Occident. It is 
 based solely on the requirements of mere 
 animal pleasures, and the outcome is slavery, 
 hatred, and mental death. No true love or 
 family life can exist where it predominates. 
 From the Oriental marriage comes the bar- 
 barian, from the Occidental comes the gentle- 
 man ; two individuals separated in instinct 
 by the poles of the universe, for the one 
 by nature knows how to hate, therefore learns 
 to kill as easily as to breathe ; the other 
 knows how to love, therefore readily learns 
 to suffer and through suffering leads the race 
 to glory. Man cannot lower woman without 
 falling himself into degradation ; he cannot 
 elevate her without being himself made 
 
Il8 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 better. He must either be a beast in her 
 arms, or an angel at her feet. The Mormon 
 feeds his horses, Hke the tyrant of old, on 
 human flesh, and is himself devoured by 
 them. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 TEXAS. 
 
 T EAVING for a time the frontier, I took 
 ^-^ hold in Uncle Sam's official city, on the 
 banks of the Potomac, where I freed a small 
 church from a big debt, built another over the 
 river, and taught theology in Howard Uni- 
 versity. But the desire for the front again 
 grew on me so strong that I could not resist 
 it and I therefore started for Texas. 
 
 On reaching the Lone Star State, I went 
 straight to the front, nearly seven hundred 
 miles west, from the eastern line, where the 
 soldiers, the cowboys, and the buffalo hunt- 
 ers mingled together, sometimes like wild 
 beasts of the forest. A frontier town in 
 Texas was a lively place to live in then ; you 
 were never lonesome there, for the music of 
 the saloon and the revolver reached you even 
 in bed at night ; and in the morning when you 
 arose and went out, you could wile away an 
 hour or so looking up dead bodies for burial. 
 
I20 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON- 
 
 I remember how delighted an old Nevada 
 miner was next morning after his arrival. 
 On seeing a dead body on the street which 
 had been killed the night before, he gave a 
 yell like a Comanche and said, " Golly! I'll 
 stay here I This reminds rfie of Nevada." 
 
 Texas is as large as seven of the largest 
 States in the Union. It has had a wild and 
 romantic history from its earliest settlement. 
 The native Texan has much reason to be 
 proud of his State, and as a rule he is. It 
 is a grand State in many respects. In recent 
 years it has developed with wonderful ra- 
 pidity. 
 
 In this great State of nearly a thousand 
 miles square, I have had even more than in 
 Nevada of frontier life, and some of it was 
 quite exciting. Shortly after my arrival I 
 came pretty near getting shot. I was on my 
 way to Presbytery on horseback and had 
 about three hundred miles to travel. 
 
 One day I came to a river overflowing and 
 red as paint with the red soil of the country. 
 There was no bridge, and I had to swim it. 
 So in order to keep my sermons dry I 
 stripped, and tying them up in my clothing, 
 
TEXAS. 12 1 
 
 I tied the bundle behind my neck, jumped 
 into the saddle and plunged in. On reach- 
 ing the other side, my horse could not 
 scramble upon the bank and I swam it down 
 a half a mile, looking for an easy landing 
 place. Just as I was about to reach such a 
 spot, I saw a man and woman in a field near 
 by, she running to the house and he running 
 with his gun towards me. He fired, and I 
 threw up my hands, shouting for dear life not 
 to kill me. He then came down to the river 
 bank and helped my horse and his rider out 
 of the water. The water of the river being 
 red, my skin was red also, and the honest 
 farmer took me for a Comanche, for he never 
 before heard of or saw a white man strip 
 to swim a river. I told him I was a preacher 
 going to Presbytery and stripped to keep my 
 sermons dry. He laughed heartily and pro- 
 posed that I remain overnight, and he would 
 gather in the neighbors to see if my sermons 
 were wet or dry. I remained over and 
 preached, and at the close of the service he 
 got up and said that my sermons were not 
 dry at all, and of course were not fit to be 
 carried in my saddlebags ; that I had better 
 
122 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 wait over a few days till they got dry. But 
 I had to go, for there were other rivers to 
 cross and many miles before mxe. Those 
 people so far out on the frontier were an in- 
 telligent and kindly people. They were from 
 the old Southern States mostly, and a sermon 
 once in a while from a passing preacher was 
 to them like an oasis in the desert. 
 
 As a rule, the early Texas settler was 
 strong in the faith. Uncle Joe Harrison was 
 a veteran Mexican soldier, a fair specimen of 
 a frontier Christian, and a good Methodist, 
 but he went a-roving one day and fell from 
 grace, and they excommunicated him. Com- 
 ing into my church- on the following Sunday, 
 he stood up and, pointing to heaven, shouted, 
 " They may put the old man out of the church 
 below, but his name is written up yonder ! " 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE COWBOY. 
 
 T^HE old-time Texas cowboy, like the old 
 -■■ miners of the Pacific Coast, is passing 
 away. The Texas cowboy of to-day is a 
 spoiled man, like the sailor of to-day. The 
 one is still at home in the saddle, and the 
 other on the deck, but the wire fence has 
 ruined Dick, and the steam engine has done 
 the same to Jack. 
 
 The real Texas cowboy was not, as a rule, 
 a native. He came there because he was 
 wanted somewhere else. Sometimes you 
 would find him well educated and a graduate 
 of some of our Northern colleges or those of 
 England. Generally speaking, he was reck- 
 less, would ride his horse into a saloon and 
 pop away at the bottles and mirrors, or per- 
 haps paint a town red in the night. He 
 dearly loved to wear leather breeches, wide- 
 brimmed hats, and carry a revolver in his 
 
 belt. 
 
 123 
 
124 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 When sober he was a good-natured fellow 
 and very companionable on the prairie, but 
 when drunk you had better put as much 
 prairie between you and him as possible. 
 When he got religion he got it on a large 
 scale. There, for instance, was Jerry Simpson. 
 When Jerry got religion he claimed that he was 
 as good as any man mentioned in the Bible. 
 His fellow cowboys maintained that he was 
 not, for they could not believe that he was as 
 good as Jesus. Jerry maintained that he 
 was, and would prove it if they put him to the 
 test. So they put a rope around his neck 
 and led him to a place of trial, spitting on 
 him, cuffing him and calling him all sorts of 
 vile names. They put a crown of prickly 
 pears on his brow and mocked him. But 
 Jerry was meek and lowly, blessing those who 
 cursed him, and forgiving those who smote 
 him. At last they made a large cross, tied it 
 on his back, and led him up the side of a hill 
 to crucify him. He was still like a lamb 
 being led to the slaughter, as he said, but 
 one of the boys, who was more wicked than 
 his companions, struck him in the face with a 
 rotten egg. Jerry stood still, wiped slowly 
 
THE COWBOY. I 25 
 
 the egg from his face and said, '' Boys, this 
 Jesus business is over. Take off the cross." 
 They did so, and then there was a stampede 
 of those boys, such as only cowboys know, 
 when a herd of cattle take fright. The 
 swearing and tearing of Jerry after those 
 unbelievers that day were long remembered 
 in the neighborhood. 
 
 There were cunning rogues among those 
 Texas cowboys too, just as among the Nevada 
 miners. The Texas bird was very fond of a 
 good horse, and he envied any who might 
 possess one. 
 
 Sam Johnson, of Scrub Oak Valley, came 
 to me one day and said : '* Parson Riley, we 
 be mighty bad sinners out in our valley, that 
 we be. We need prayin' for powerfully bad, 
 that we do. We needs the gospel out thar as 
 bad as we need rain for our crops and grass 
 for our critters, an' there is no one to give it 
 to us but Sister Henson, an' she's a shoutin' 
 Methodist. We will all o-q to hell but Sister 
 Henson if we don't get the gospel. W^e 
 likes the Presbyterian Gospel, an' we wants 
 you to come out an' give it to us. We thinks 
 it's more savin' than the Baptist or Methodist. 
 
126 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 We wants you to brand us with your gospel 
 irons, for we be running wild like mustangs 
 in the woods. We want you, Parson, to 
 lasso us, and burn the gospel onto us ; and 
 Sister Henson will take care of you over the 
 night." 
 
 What preacher could reject such a Mace- 
 donian call for religion? The time and place 
 being fixed on, Sam returned to Scrub Oak 
 Valley with bright visions. At the appointed 
 time I was on hand, lariated my horse out on 
 the prairie, preached to the '' mustangs," and 
 put myself under the protecting wing of 
 Sister Henson for the night. 
 
 Before the next daylight my fine bay horse 
 left for the Indian nation, taking unholy Sam 
 on its back, and I had to foot it home twenty 
 miles. I fear that I did not brand the cun- 
 ning mustang deep enough. He did not 
 make much of it, however, for I had him 
 arrested and tried. He got five years in the 
 penitentiary, and while working out his time, 
 with a squad of other prisoners, made a 
 break for liberty and was shot dead by the 
 guard. 
 
 Sometimes the Texas cowboy had an eye 
 
THE COWBOY. 1 27 
 
 to the main chance, and when he did, he in- 
 creased greatly in weahh, and is now perhaps 
 a banker. 
 
 There, for instance, is old Bill Taylor of 
 Dallas. Before the war he might be seen 
 prowling through the cedar brakes of Palo 
 Pinto, and you would not give five cents for 
 all that was on him, with his carcass thrown in. 
 And as for school learning, if it had the 
 smallpox, he v/ould n't have caught it. But 
 Bill kept on running cattle for wages, and 
 when he could conveniently do so, branded 
 a few yearlings for himself. Then the war 
 broke out, and every patriotic citizen took to 
 the field of blood, but Bill took to preaching 
 and branding mavericks. While others were 
 laying waste and destroying life. Bill would 
 be spreading himself, the gospel, and his 
 cattle over all the land. 
 
 He took his branding irons in one hand 
 and the Bible in the other, and he made a 
 wonderful impression in favor of Bill Taylor. 
 He had more faith in the Bible and branding 
 irons than he had in the sword for the exten- 
 sion of Bill's kingdom. Sometimes on a Sun- 
 day, when he would be preaching in the woods 
 
128 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 to his fellow-sinners, a passing maverick 
 would be spied. A stampede of the congre- 
 gation would follow, and foremost in the fray 
 would be Bill, throwing the lariat and claim- 
 ing the beast as his for the collection. The 
 time came when Bill's cattle roamed and ate 
 grass all over Northwestern Texas, and to- 
 day he is worth his millions, has a bank, and 
 lives in lordly style. There has always been 
 more religion in Texas than in Nevada. 
 
 This can be proven by the prayer offered 
 by old Tim White, a cow man, when hostile 
 Indians surrounded his house and he felt that 
 his hour of reckoning had come. Here it is : 
 " O Lord, thou knowest that I have been bap- 
 tized twice ; that I have kept the faith, and 
 entertained the preachers. Everything is 
 straight but the cow book. Square it, good 
 Lord, and then let the Indians shoot." In 
 the cow book was recorded the number of 
 cattle branded. It was considered square 
 when a man branded only his own year- 
 lines. 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 TRICKY FELLOWS. 
 
 nPHEY were tricky dogs also, those Texas 
 ^ cowboys. If I rode with them on the 
 prairies, they would be sure to come to rivers 
 where we would have to swim our horses. 
 They liked to see the parson get under the 
 water, for, somehow or other, they had more 
 faith in his preaching when they knew that 
 he had been immersed. 
 
 My horse at first was a little afraid of 
 water, being a good Presbyterian, but he got 
 used to it and rather liked the fun and 
 exhilaration of the plunge. 
 
 Having preached for several days in a 
 town near the Red River, I left to return 
 home. I was gone about three miles, when 
 a deputy sheriff came galloping after me 
 with a warrant for my arrest, charging me 
 with stealing a bridle. I protested, but 
 searching my saddlebags, sure enough, he 
 found the bridle. I was led back to the 
 
130 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 Court House in shame and confusion of face, 
 and placed before the justice of the peace, 
 who gravely heard the charge against me 
 and my plea of innocency. Then he summed 
 up with all the seriousness imaginable, pro- 
 nouncing me guilty, and sentenced me to 
 preach to the boys for a week, which I did, 
 and I trust to their good. It was all a cow- 
 boy's lark. In another town, shortly after I 
 went to Texas, the young men of the place 
 insisted one night that I should go out hunt- 
 ing with them. They wanted to bag, they 
 said, a certain bird in that country that could 
 not fly, for it had but very short wings. 
 Believing the rogues, I went with them. 
 When we got about two miles out of town, 
 they stopped at the foot of a tall hill and 
 said : " Now, Parson Riley, this is the way 
 we hunt these birds : You stay here and 
 hold this empty sack over this sheep trail, 
 and we will go up to the top of the hill and 
 drive them down into your sack. They can't 
 see in the night, but they will run along this 
 little trail into the open mouth of the sack, 
 and when it is full, whistle to us." I waited 
 all night holding the open mouth of that 
 
TRICKY FELLOWS. I3I 
 
 sack over the sheep trail, and went home in 
 the morning feeHng that I wanted to — well, 
 preach to somebody. 
 
 Great was the cowboy's love of playing 
 pranks on a stranger from the old States, 
 especially if said stranger was disposed to 
 put on airs. A St. Louis drummer realized 
 this once to his mortification in the town I 
 lived in. He came westward from Fort 
 Worth City in a stylish buggy drawn by a fine 
 span of horses, and for his guide a negro 
 driver in livery. Putting up at one of our 
 hotels, he requested the landlady to give him 
 a suite of her best rooms for dining and 
 sleeping in, as he was "a first-class com- 
 mercial traveler representing a first-class 
 house in St. Louis," and did not care to eat 
 his food in the common dining-room. The 
 obliging old lady complied, but told the boys, 
 who went to the sheriff and swore out a 
 warrant against him for stealing his buggy 
 and horses. He was taken and placed in 
 the county jail in spite of his protestations 
 that he was a first-class commercial traveler, 
 representing a first-class house in St. Louis, 
 and innocent of horse stealing. Procuring a 
 
132 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 lawyer at a cost of five hundred dollars, he 
 appeared for trial before the county judge 
 on the morrow. By this time judge, sheriff, 
 prosecuting attorney, and all were in the plot 
 to teach this uppish drummer to eat with 
 common folks and put up with such quarters 
 as the country might afford. A jury was 
 regularly impaneled, and before it the 
 county attorney made a scathing speech 
 against the prisoner, who, he said, went 
 about among simple-minded Texans, putting 
 on airs, stealing horses, and pretending to be 
 selling St. Louis goods when he really should 
 be in the penitentiary. It was one of the most 
 eloquent and denunciatory frontier speeches 
 I ever listened to, and the poor prisoner 
 fairly quailed under it. The attorney for the 
 defence was no less, apparently, earnest for 
 his client's rescue from the clutches of the 
 law. '' Gentlemen of the jury," he would 
 say, while he slapped the prisoner's bald head 
 till it blistered, " can you for a moment 
 imagine that this gentleman, this first-class 
 commercial traveler from St. Louis, would 
 be guilty of such a thing as horse stealing ? 
 Why, gentlemen, look at that noble brow ; 
 
TRICKY FELLOWS. 1 33 
 
 look at these kindly eyes ; look at the elegant 
 dress and refined manners of my client." 
 In this strain, for at least half cin hour, he 
 pathetically pleaded for the prisoner s release. 
 Then, after the prosecuting attorney had 
 spoken again, the judge began summing up. 
 He did fairly well for about five minutes, 
 when he broke out into a wild burst of 
 laughter and ran from the Court House. 
 The sheriff, the lawyers, the jury, and the 
 assembled crowd followed suit, roaring with 
 laughter. The astonished prisoner was left 
 alone to realize that it was all a practical 
 joke. It, however, taught him to be a little 
 more lowly in his manners when he came to 
 our village again. 
 
 Sam Crowley was a born cowboy, and 
 raised in the saddle from childhood. A 
 jovial, good-natured fellow was Sam, with a 
 smiling face ; and an extraordinary cheek to 
 it made Sam in the course of time one of 
 the principal cattle men of Northwestern 
 Texas, and a deacon in my church. His 
 little boy, who did not understand the impor- 
 tance of his father's ecclesiastical standing, 
 used to go about telling with pride to other 
 
134 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 boys that his " dad " was the " dickins in the 
 church," and I had to teach him the great 
 difference there was between '' deacon" and 
 *' dickins." 
 
 Sam Crowley was a generous, Hberal- 
 hearted man and used to brand a yearhng 
 for me, for every sermon I preached. Minis- 
 ters of the gospel were honored for their 
 work's sake in Texas as they are not up here 
 in the North. I will always reckon Sam as 
 among the best of deacons I have yet met 
 anywhere. He was none of your small men, 
 but a whole-souled, good fellow who would 
 give you his last dollar if you were in need, 
 whether it was his own money or somebody 
 else's capital. 
 
 In an evil hour a number of his fellow- 
 cattle men, believing that the gentlemanly 
 manners, the ecclesiastical standing, and the 
 good name of this pillar of my church was 
 just the man they wanted to go on a mission 
 to England where the people were all sup- 
 posed to be Christians, and had more money 
 than they knew what to do with, came to him 
 with letters of credit and said, " Go, and the 
 Lord be with thee " ; and he went. The 
 
 i 
 
TRICKY FELLOWS. I35 
 
 object of the mission was not exactly reli- 
 gious, or political, but financial. 
 
 In London Sam lived at one of the grand- 
 est hotels of the city, in style becoming a 
 deacon of my church, and the land and cattle 
 interests of Northern Texas. It was nothing^ 
 less than the organization of a mammoth 
 Anglo-Texan Land and Cattle Company 
 that was in view ; a company that would 
 be given millions of acres and the cattle 
 of a thousand hills. 
 
 The titled nobility, both political and 
 ecclesiastical, took to Sam as if a very 
 brother. They dined and wined this simple- 
 hearted prairie deacon of mine in style such 
 as he never had dreamed of enjoying in this 
 life. 
 
 Dining with Lord Thurlow, the queen's 
 head chamberlain, at his castle, he actually 
 had twelve courses of the best '' grub," he 
 told me, that any mortal man ever ate, served 
 by a waiter dressed in a red coat with gold 
 buttons, knee breeches, silk stockings, slip- 
 pers on his feet and a powdered wig on his 
 head ; and he had him, too, all to himself, 
 standing behind his chair and attending to 
 
136 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 him as if he were a prince of the blood. 
 There were ten or twelve others present, 
 dukes and lords, as well as Lord Thurlow, 
 and each had, like himself, a waiter to change 
 his gold plates and fill his glasses. 
 
 In describing this grand occasion said he, 
 " Never will I forget that dinner ; you could n't 
 get the like of it in Texas if you paid a thou- 
 sand dollars for it." In return for the hospi- 
 talities shown, Sam was generous, for there 
 was nothing small about him, and at his 
 hotel he entertained some of the "swellest 
 Britishers" in the kingdom. He contem- 
 plated inviting even the queen to his din- 
 ners, but the Prince of Wales told him that 
 she had the rheumatism at the time. 
 
 The result of it all was that the great 
 Texas Cattle Company was formed with Lord 
 Thurlow as president. There was an im- 
 mense rush for the stock, lest the Scotch or 
 American capitalists should get hold of it 
 first. So that Texas Cattle Company and 
 Sam Crowley were on the lip and in the 
 heart of every Englishman who had money 
 to lend with a view to getting twenty-five 
 per cent, interest for it instead of three per 
 
TRICKY FELLOWS. I37 
 
 cent, in home investments. The board of 
 managers met one night when they were 
 ready to pay Sam his commission, which was 
 sixty thousand dollars, also to hand over the 
 first instalment on the Texas property, which 
 was one million dollars, and also to have 
 papers signed making Sam the manager of 
 the concern at twenty thousand dollars a 
 year. 
 
 Everything was moving along beautifully, 
 and the words of wisdom that dropped from 
 Sam's lips were like honey from the honey- 
 comb, when, sad to relate, an "old heathen 
 Scotch banker," doing business in London, 
 suggested that before they signed papers or 
 handed over this enormous amount of money 
 to a man they had never seen before, they 
 had better first send two practical men, who 
 had been to Texas and knew the laws there, 
 to examine the deeds to the land and count 
 the cattle. Sam's heart went down to his 
 boots and his face lost its glow, but it would 
 never do for him to object in case he might " be 
 arrested and put in the Tower," so he " spoke 
 as philosophically as he could," and kept 
 his countenance straight till he got outside 
 
138 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 and then skipped with the first steamer 
 to America, and such was his haste that he 
 forgot to pay his hotel bill till he got home. 
 The telegrams arriving every day for the 
 cattle men of Texas, up to this disastrous 
 point, were so full of cheer that arrange- 
 ments had been actually made, including a 
 brass band, to give the successful financier a 
 tremendous reception when the train arrived 
 at Fort Bellnapp, his home. He was to be 
 taken through the main streets of the city in 
 a carriage drawn by four white horses. But 
 the deacon did not believe in such worldly 
 displays and slipped out on arrival at the back 
 end of the train and was lost in the darkness 
 of night before any one could see him. He 
 was waited upon on the following day by the 
 party who sent him to present their congratu- 
 lations, and that party was again on the same 
 day waited upon by a messenger from the 
 Bank of England for fifty thousand dollars, 
 the same being what was spent by it in keep- 
 ing up Sam's credit. 
 
 Sam was a very humble, good Christian 
 man after his trip to London, and that is 
 more than most Christians can say, and those 
 
TRICKY FELLOWS. 1.39 
 
 pious cattle men who tempted him to develop 
 the beautiful idea of fleecing the English 
 lords, got fleeced themselves instead, for 
 they had to pay the good deacon's expenses, 
 and when the hard-hearted, cruel investi- 
 gators came and saw what there was of the 
 land, the cattle, and the deeds they went 
 back and told the great Anglo-Texan Land 
 and Cattle Company to let the Lone Star 
 State alone, and turn their attention to 
 Africa ; which they did. 
 
 A good many people to-day, both in the 
 North, in Scotland, and England, wish that 
 they had never invested a dollar in Texas 
 lands and Texas cattle. People should look 
 before they jump. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 DANGEROUS FELLOWS. 
 
 "D IDING into a lazy-looking town not far 
 -'-^ from the Rio Grande River one day, I 
 hitched my horse to a post opposite a saloon 
 and was about to hunt up the postoffice, 
 when a crowd of the toughs of the place 
 gathered about me, asking where I came 
 from. They then invited me to come in and 
 have a drink with them. I declined. '' Wall," 
 they said, " there 's galls and tobacco and 
 cards in har." I declined again with thanks. 
 " Do you never drink whiskey, play cards, or 
 go with the galls ? " said a murderous-looking 
 rascal. I again answered in the negative. 
 '' He 's a tenderfoot ! " shouted another ; 
 ''let's chuck him in the river." ''Do you 
 ever steal cattle ? " asked still another. I 
 said "No." " Do you pray ? " "Yes." "Go 
 to Sunday-school ? " " Yes." " Gad, yer a 
 preacher!" "That's what I am, boys," I 
 replied. " Well, b' Gad, turn her loose. 
 
 140 
 
DANGEROUS FELLOWS. I4I 
 
 Let 's have a sermon so as we can write home 
 that we 's been to church." '' All right, boys, 
 round 'em up ! " I said. In an hour or so 
 there were several hundred of as hard a look- 
 ing crowd before me in a hall over the saloon, 
 as I ever looked upon, and I preached them 
 one of my best sermons, to which they lis- 
 tened attentively, but an old negro who was 
 present upset everything. In my closing 
 prayer I prayed fervently that the Lord 
 would curtail the power of Satan in that 
 place, and the old darky shouted, *'Yes, 
 Lord, cut 'im's tail off cl'ar up to the ears ! " 
 There was an immediate stampede down- 
 stairs, and when I got through there were 
 only myself and my black brother present. 
 I lost the collection too. 
 
 The Rev. Frank Waters was preaching in 
 Texas when I went there. He was a Presby- 
 terian preacher now, but used to be an officer 
 in the Confederate Army during the war. 
 He was a splendid fellow and was popular 
 with the boys wherever he went. But, like 
 myself, he would occasionally lose a horse 
 at the hands of thieving cutthroats. Doing 
 missionary work not far from the Red River, 
 
142 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 which separates Texas from the Indian nation, 
 his horse was stolen one evening while he 
 was at supper, and it made him wish that he 
 was back in the army again. A dozen or so 
 of the young men of the place buckled on 
 their revolvers, and followed him out into the 
 country to hunt for the thief. 
 
 They spied him going at an easy trot about 
 four miles out. Pretending that they were 
 going to pass him on the gallop, one of them 
 dashed up close and jerked the revolver from 
 the thief's belt. Quick as lightning another 
 lassoed him, and in that condition drove on 
 till they came to a large oak tree. Making 
 him ride in below it, the rope was soon over 
 a limb and fastened to a stump in the ground. 
 The boys then looked at the parson and asked 
 him what he was going to do with his horse. 
 ''Well," said the parson, ''it is none of my 
 business how that thief got into that saddle. 
 I am going to take my horse ; " and so saying 
 took hold of the bridle and led his horse 
 away. The man with the lariat about his 
 neck having neither saddle to sit on nor 
 earth to stand on, could not draw his breath, 
 and died. 
 
DANGEROUS FELLOWS. 1 43 
 
 When they went back home it was asked 
 who did the hanging. The man who took 
 the revolver out of the belt said he did not ; 
 the man who threw the lariat over his neck 
 said he did not ; the man who threw it over 
 the limb said he did not ; the man who tied 
 it to the stump said he did not ; and the par- 
 son said he did not ; he only took his horse, 
 which he had a right to do wherever he found 
 it. Just who did the hanging the com- 
 munity could not decide, and did not care. 
 They told the sheriff that the man must have 
 put his head in the noose himself by accident, 
 and the sheriff left him there for a week, 
 dangling in the wind, in the hopes that others 
 of his tribe might go and do likewise. But 
 they did n't, they skipped the country. The 
 thief was a very bad character any way, and 
 had several nicks in the ivory handle of his 
 revolver, that were to keep him in mind of the 
 number he had killed. He was a desperado 
 of the worst sort, and neither the preacher nor 
 those who helped him had any other feeling 
 than that they had done their duty. The 
 country was better off with the thief's head 
 in the noose than his legs in the saddle, and 
 
144 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 all the people thanked the parson for his 
 good sense, and attended his preaching 
 better than they ever did before. 
 
 Eating my noonday meal on the banks of a 
 stream one hot day in summer, a young man 
 came riding along the main road near by, 
 and invited himself to partake with me. I 
 made no objections, for I was lonely, the 
 nearest settlement being twenty miles away. 
 He was very companionable, and told me 
 that he was from the North, but left there 
 for some reason he did not tell me. He 
 was going to the same town, too, that I 
 was, so after we had rested in the shade a 
 while, we mounted and rode at a fast trot. 
 When we came within a mile of the place 
 he wheeled his horse about, and, with re- 
 volver in hand, said: " Fork over your gold 
 watch and everything else that glitters, or 
 you 're a dead goner ! Am Jack Shephard ! " 
 
 He was a highwayman and I did not 
 know it. There was nothing for me but to 
 obey orders ; and I did so, like a soldier. 
 When he had all my valuables he told me 
 to ride on to town, and if I told on him he 
 would waylay and kill me on the morrow. 
 
DANGEROUS FELLOWS. 1 45 
 
 I rode on and told every one I met. In an 
 hour or so I was riding with a brave band 
 of men in search of him. We got on his 
 trail and came up close to him, but he had 
 a magnificent horse and he bade us good by. 
 He went, unfortunately for him, in the 
 direction of a town to which we could tele- 
 graph, and we did so, to the sheriff of that 
 county. He did n't know that we could 
 do so, and when he was drinking his cof- 
 fee next morning at the suburbs of the 
 place the sheriff came on him with a posse 
 of well-armed men and called to him to sur- 
 render. 
 
 Jack Shephard showed fight, and he got 
 it. When it was over the sheriff dug a 
 hole and put him in it, and his mother in the 
 North is still wondering why her boy who 
 went to Texas don't write her. 
 
 On another occasion I was returning from 
 one of my preaching stations through a 
 lonely wood, when I was met on the high- 
 way by two men on foot, carrying guns upon 
 their shoulders, who were arrayed in Indian 
 blankets and had their faces daubed with 
 paint. At sight of them my horse trembled 
 
146 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 in every fibre of its body and refused to 
 advance. 
 
 I confess that I myself did not feel in any 
 bolder frame of mind, and would gladly 
 have wheeled about and run, but for the 
 fact that I was at least ten miles from any 
 setdement to the rear of me, and a bullet 
 from their guns could easily catch me. I 
 therefore concluded to urge my horse on 
 and take my chances. Coming up to the 
 would-be Indians, who now stood still in 
 the middle of the road and eyed myself and 
 horse in anything but a kindly manner, 
 I could see that they were really white men. 
 Indeed, they were hard, suspicious, ugly- 
 looking tramps of the worst character, as I 
 could see the closer I got to them. One of 
 them took hold of the bridle and remarked 
 to his companion that my horse resembled 
 very much the one they had lost, and look- 
 ing up at me, asked where did I get it. I 
 replied that it was none of his business where 
 I got it, and to let go the bridle instantly or 
 I would blow his brains out, and made with 
 my right hand as if I would pull a revolver 
 from my hip pocket. Then, quick as thought, 
 
DANGEROUS FELLOWS. 147 
 
 I planted the spurs in the flanks of my fleet- 
 footed beast, and Hke a flash of Hghtning it 
 sprang forward, pitching one of the rascals 
 aside and the other on his back. It was a 
 critical moment, and what was to be done had 
 to be done quickly ; and instinct seemed to 
 teach my horse the same truth, for it ran with 
 almost the swiftness of a bird through space, 
 while its rider, casting himself forward, hung 
 on to its neck by his right arm and to its back 
 by his right leg, Indian fashion, thus putting 
 himself in a safer position in case they fired 
 on him. This they did not fail to do as 
 soon as they got themselves righted. One 
 bullet struck a tree as I passed it, and 
 another whistled over my head unpleasantly 
 near. Three or four shots were fired alto- 
 gether, but fortunately none of them struck 
 me. My assailants were dangerous tramps, 
 who probably knew that I would be com- 
 ing that Monday morning that way, so fixed 
 themselves up as they did, with a view to 
 frightening me into giving them my horse on 
 demand, but the plot miscarried. It did n't 
 pay always to fool with the preachers in 
 Texas. 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 TRAIN AND LAND ROBBERS. 
 
 T^RAIN robbing used to be as common 
 ■^ in Texas a few years back, as stage 
 coach robbing was in Nevada twenty-five 
 years ago. 
 
 Indeed in Texas this daring business 
 seemed to flourish for a time as nowhere 
 else, and the robbers became bold and fat 
 on it. Not far from where I preached, they 
 used to stop the Texas Pacific Railroad 
 trains, get on board and go through the cars, 
 one holding his hat, and two behind him 
 with cocked revolvers, saying, *' Contribute 
 to the poor." And in this way they usually 
 got a hatful of money, for the passengers, 
 both male and female, were only too glad 
 to contribute to have them pass on. Those 
 bold knights of the road, too, seemed to 
 know in advance when there was something 
 valuable in the mail bags, for they invariably 
 struck it rich when they ripped open Uncle 
 
 148 
 
TRAIN AND LAND ROBBERS. 1 49 
 
 Sam's leather bags. That wild, broken 
 country you see in passing through Palo 
 Pinto was generally their headquarters, and 
 there it was supposed they lived in style, after 
 the manner of the knights of old in Europe. 
 So frequent did these robberies become, that 
 I used to keep a sharp eye on the collection 
 box after sermon till the benediction was pro- 
 nounced, lest they should make a dash for it. 
 
 We used to have lots of small lawyers and 
 real estate agents who were very dishonest, 
 too, in Texas. I knew one who"* fraudulently 
 claimed a few hundred acres of land north of 
 Fort Worth, and he had the cheek to measure 
 it off into lots and streets and erect a great 
 signboard with hands painted on it, one point- 
 ing to New York and the other to San Fran- 
 cisco. He then published all over the North 
 and West that he owned this '* city" through 
 which a through train from New York to 
 San Francisco would pass immediately. The 
 whole scheme was fraudulent, but he made 
 lots of money before the location of his city 
 lots and his rascality were found out. 
 
 This same lawyer, to my knowledge, was 
 often guilty of setting neighbor against 
 
150 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 neighbor, that he might make a fee defend- 
 ing either of them in court. Two intimate 
 friends of mine, one an EngHshman and the 
 other a Scotchman, both farmers, had a Httle 
 difference over a cow, and finding it out, he 
 went to the EngHshman and told him that 
 for five dollars he could make his the cow in 
 dispute. Once in court, the cow was kept 
 there until more than twice her value was 
 spent on lawyers. The Scotchman finally 
 got possession of the cow, but that did not 
 end the trouble, for on meeting afterwards, 
 the Englishman pulled his little cannon and 
 shot the Scotchman in the left leg about the 
 knee so badly that he (the Scotchman) lost 
 one half of said limb ; and for mischievous 
 fooling with firearms the Englishman got 
 one year in the penitentiary. Nor did this 
 wholly end the trouble, for a certain preacher 
 of the place, who was full of holy indignation 
 at the wicked lawyer for the part he had 
 played in bringing on the trouble between 
 the two honest country neighbors, coming 
 up to him one day when he was standing 
 with his back against the Court House, planted 
 his left hand under his chin, pinning him 
 
TRAIN AND LAND ROBBERS. I5I 
 
 to the wall, and rained sledge-hammer blows 
 on his face, quoting as he did so certain 
 suitable passages of Scripture. While this 
 operation was going on, the lawyer kept 
 yelling to "those looking on, ''Take him off 
 there ; take him off there," but they did n't 
 until the preacher got through with him. 
 Then it was the preacher's turn to be hauled 
 into court for mischievously bruising the 
 lawyer's face, and he was fined ten dollars 
 and costs ; but so pleased were the good 
 people of his church with his spunk, that 
 they paid all the expenses incurred. 
 
 I would not justify this mode of administer- 
 ing the law and the gospel in all similar cases 
 when the wicked lawyers deserve it, and yet 
 there may be times when this is the best and 
 only method of reaching their conscience. 
 
 I had one of these gentry in my church 
 down there. He was even an elder and 
 a Sabbath-school superintendent. He was 
 from Indiana, and his name was Jacobs. 
 This one-horse lawyer, when he first came to 
 us, lived on a farm of ten acres, just outside 
 the county seat, but that little farm grew to 
 a thousand acres, yet Jacobs was not happy. 
 
152 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 He ate mush and milk three times a day, and 
 his wife mended his old blue jeans every 
 morning. Still he was inconsolable. Over 
 the way was Naboth Washington, and he 
 had a goodly little farm of eighty acres. 
 Jacobs coveted Naboth's vineyard, and his 
 heart was weary within him, and his life 
 was a sore burden to him. One day, while 
 looking over the fence, a beautiful and bril- 
 liant idea struck him, just such as used to come 
 to him away up in Indiana. Then said he to 
 himself: '' I will take my plow and cover it 
 up in yonder ditch by his barn, then I will 
 publish that some one has stolen it ; and 
 then with a witness I will stumble accident- 
 ally on it in the old darky's ditch. After that 
 I will have him arrested and put in jail. Then 
 Naboth will be glad to sign me a deed for his 
 farm to get out." The idea developed into 
 realization, and one morning Jacobs entered 
 the prison cell where Naboth was weeping 
 and waiting for trial and said : '' Here, nigger, 
 sign this deed or I will send you five years to 
 the penitentiary, and mind you don't tell this 
 to any one — not to a living soul, or I will put 
 a bullet in you." '* Yes, massa; bress de Lord, 
 
TRAIN AND LAND ROBBERS. 1 53 
 
 Ise sign it an' nebber tell nobody neither," 
 replied the poor old darky, wiping his eyes. 
 Many months passed, and Naboth let the 
 pig out of the bag, and it ran round the 
 whole town, telling how Naboth lost his farm 
 and how Jacobs found it. I had Jacobs re- 
 lieved of the care of the Sunday-school, tried 
 before the church session, and expelled. 
 But Jacobs was industrious as well as dark in 
 some of his ways, and he went among his 
 friends in a slow, lazy fashion, and spoke 
 against me as a disturber of the church and 
 a shepherd that was not able to feed the 
 flock. And — how strange life is ! — some of 
 the very people who shouted most for his trial 
 and punishment were the first to side with 
 him and against me. So I bade that church 
 good by, and I suppose they have Jacobs as 
 shepherd, feeding them now. The preacher 
 who will do his whole duty towards the goats 
 of the flock will very often come to grief. 
 If the goats would remain goats after you 
 have separated them from the sheep, it would 
 be all right, but they won't ; they become 
 wolves in sheep's clothing. Such is the 
 transforming power of Satan in the church. 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 LONELY TRAVELING. 
 
 nPRAVELING alone through the wild 
 ^ woods of Northwestern Texas twenty 
 years ago was dreary business, and when 
 it rained it was doubly so. One night I 
 came to a log cabin by the roadside and 
 asked permission to stay there overnight, 
 as both myself and horse were tired and 
 hungry. The man who came to the gate 
 was deaf and dumb, but he understood my 
 wants, and, taking the bridle of my horse, 
 motioned to me to go inside. On entering, 
 I was met by an old lady, who was also deaf 
 and dumb. She had a strange look about 
 her, and when she saw that I was dripping 
 wet she gave me a jerk up to the fire and 
 motioned to me to stand there. In the mean 
 time she went into the kitchen to prepare 
 supper for me, but now and then she would 
 come running out, run her hand down the 
 side of me next the fire, and, if it was dry, 
 
 IS4 
 
LONELY TRAVELING. I 55 
 
 she would give me a jerk round a bit. I 
 confess that her operations made me sus- 
 picious, for it dawned upon my mind that it 
 was just in that neigborhood that a traveler, 
 while asleep In a cabin by the roadside not 
 long before, was murdered for his money. 
 
 The squealing and strange signs between 
 mother and son, and the old lady's feeling of 
 me up and down, made me conclude that 
 it was all to find out if I had any of the 
 precious metal about me. When I ate sup- 
 per I went to bed, but did not sleep any, the 
 least noise during the night making me feel 
 that my last hour had come. 
 
 Next morning four of us sat down to 
 breakfast ; the old man whom I did not see 
 the evening before having introduced him- 
 self, telling me that his wife and son were 
 mutes, and then having asked the blessing, 
 he asked what my business might be. I 
 told him, and he expressed his regret that 
 he did not know it sooner, as we might have 
 had a preaching service at his house that 
 morning. The surroundings were rough 
 and the looks of the whole family were in 
 keeping, but for all that they were a kindly, 
 
156 TWENTY -FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 Christian people, who did their utmost to 
 make me comfortable, and would take 
 nothing for their services either. 
 
 The diamond in the rough is diamond all 
 the same. 
 
 On another occasion, and several hundred 
 miles from there, I came to a cabin on the 
 prairie about midnight, where an old Scotch- 
 man and his wife lived and cultivated a 
 small farm. 
 
 There was a furious rainstorm raging, 
 and the nearest house was at least five miles 
 away ; the road was all mud, and my poor 
 beast, like myself, no doubt felt that we had 
 traveled far enough to deserve a few hours' 
 rest under a roof. 
 
 I knocked at the door, and to the question 
 '' Wha 's there ? " from a man in a bed inside, 
 I replied that it was a passing traveler who 
 desired to get inside for the night. " Weel, 
 just keep passing on," said he. I protested 
 and begged to be admitted at any cost, but to 
 no purpose. Knowing by his broad Scotch 
 that he was from the land of the heather, I 
 told him that I was from there too, but the 
 reply came quickly back : " Na, na ; nae 
 
LONELY TRAVELING. I 57 
 
 good Scotchman would be oot at this time 
 o' nicht." 
 
 I remonstrated against his conclusion, and 
 thinking that I could surely move him 
 through the old kirk, I told him that I was 
 a Presbyterian minister, and a Scotch one at 
 that ; but the crushing response was : " Then 
 gae wa aboot yer business, and may the 
 muckle De'il catch you, for the last preacher 
 wha was here stole my Bible." That was a 
 clincher, and I made up my mind to keep 
 plodding on my way. I had not gone far 
 when the thought struck me that he might 
 be a Freemason, and I went back and gave 
 the Masonic knocks and the cry of a brother 
 in distress. That went home to the right 
 place and brought him with a bound from 
 his bed to the door, where he gave me the 
 Masonic grip and bade me welcome in the 
 name of King Solomon and all the ancient 
 saints of the fraternity. 
 
 Then turning to his wife he said : '' Get 
 up, Jennet ; get up, woman, and put on the 
 kettle. This is a gentleman, an' no' like the 
 scrub that took oor Bible." 
 
 The best that was in the house that night 
 
158 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 was mine, and the best in the stable was my 
 horse's, all because the old man and I were 
 bound together, not by blood or religion, but 
 by the mystic tie. It is good to have more 
 than one arrow in your quiver if you are 
 traveling in a wild frontier country. 
 
 I have known many instances in which the 
 grip of a Freemason pulled through trouble 
 when nothing else would. 
 
 The Freemason's goat may butt hard at 
 the lodge door before it lets you enter, but 
 after you are inside, it changes into a lion for 
 your defence. 
 
CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 THE CHANGED SCENE. 
 
 \ Jl 7HILE riding once in the neighborhood 
 ^ ^ of the Indian nation I stopped for 
 shelter overnight at a house to which I was 
 recommended. The night was dark and my 
 nag and self were nearly played out, for I 
 was sleepy and hungry, and it was lame and 
 tired. 
 
 A thin, tallow-faced lass of perhaps twenty 
 years sat by the fireside. She was dressed 
 in colors so loud that I could not help laugh- 
 ing in her face, and asking what was the 
 matter. She was a bride that night and was 
 waiting for the arrival of the bridegroom. 
 Oh, she was so happy ! so proud of her 
 '' noble, dearly beloved Romeo " who would 
 come shortly. She quoted poetry in his 
 praise by the yard, and named him after all 
 the distinguished heroes of fiction. She 
 spoke of him as having descended from a 
 noble family in England who came over the 
 
l60 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 briny ocean and settled in Virginia long 
 before the days of Wallace and Bruce. 
 Indeed, she did not know but that she might 
 some day herself be a countess, or a queen of 
 Sheba. Poor thing ! her little head was away 
 up among the stars while her big, flat feet 
 were on the earth ! At last the dogs began 
 to bark. '* Behold, the bridegroom cometh," 
 she said, and rushing out to the gate, plunged 
 into his arms with such demonstrations of 
 joy that my horse, forgetting his lameness 
 and his owner, galloped off at a rate to do 
 credit to an Arab steed. The newcomer 
 entered the cabin, arrayed in all the glories of 
 field and forest, with his Sail hanging on his 
 arm. He saluted the old folks in great style. 
 He was a long, lean, lank, lounging sort of 
 a mortal, and had with him a preacher, a 
 fiddler, a bottle of whiskey, and a bag of 
 candy. I left and went after my runaway 
 quadruped which I found about two miles off 
 at another farmhouse where we both put up 
 for the night. 
 
 A few years later I was driving through 
 the same country, and going towards the 
 same old house I observed a large number 
 
THE CHANGED SCENE. l6l 
 
 of people running to it from the village near 
 by. When I arrived I witnessed a sad sight. 
 The old man and his daughter, the romantic 
 bride of other days, were weeping and wail- 
 ing over two dead bodies on the porch. 
 They were shot just about ten or fifteen 
 minutes before, and the blood was streaming 
 from their wounds. The old man wept for a 
 son, the daughter for a husband and brother. 
 It seemed that they all lived together and 
 not always on the best of term.s. The 
 *' noble" bridegroom of former days, it ap- 
 peared, found fault with his spouse because 
 of her fictitious life generally. He told her 
 that she was a very poor wife for a strug- 
 gling man in the Southwest. " Dad " on the 
 occasion stepped in and spoke a word for 
 " Sail." Hot words passed and repassed be- 
 tween father-in-law and son-in-law. To teach 
 the father-in-law and his own wife a lesson 
 in practical farming and obedience, the 
 young husband drew his revolver and with a 
 threat of instant death made both '' Dad " 
 and " Sail " go out into the timothy patch and 
 cut hay with their teeth. He kept them thus 
 employed for an hour or so, in the hot sun, 
 
1 62 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 when Dick, a brother-in-law, arrived home 
 and seeing what was being done in the 
 timothy patch was roused to kill. 
 
 There was an old buffalo gun in the house 
 that had done good service in former years 
 in Dick's hands. This he grasped, and put- 
 ting a bullet into it large enough to kill a 
 horse, sent it crushing through his brother-in- 
 law's skull. The brother of this murdered 
 boss, hearing what was done, armed himself 
 for battle, and swore a solemn oath that he 
 would kill Dick or die in the attempt. He 
 lived in the village only a little ways off, and 
 before Dick knew what he was about he had 
 holes in him from head to foot. It was now 
 the old man's turn to burn powder, and he 
 got a bullet into the left leg of his son's mur- 
 derer as he rode off. Two men dead and one 
 wounded ! All over nothing, so to speak. 
 
 Few in the East realize, when casting their 
 gifts into the several treasuries for church 
 building and Home Mission work generally 
 in the West, how great is the good they do. 
 Without the generosity of the East the wild 
 West would be a good deal wilder than it is 
 to-day. Church buildings and preachers of 
 
THE CHANGED SCENE. 1 63 
 
 the gospel would be few indeed in those 
 restless, godless communities if assistance 
 did not come from without. Churches cost 
 money on the frontier, but the money invested 
 in them yields a hundred-fold in the uplifting 
 of the people. In the region I went first to 
 preach in, in Texas, when the Circuit Court 
 met, the judge had to be surrounded by about 
 twenty-five Texas rangers with loaded guns, 
 while the horse thieves and murderers of the 
 place were being tried. I remember well how 
 glad that judge was on first meeting with me. 
 He said, " The very presence of a gospel 
 minister out here means even safety for the 
 judge on the bench." So it turned out to be, 
 in his case at least, for not long after the 
 rangers were dispensed with in his court. 
 
 The gospel minister is everywhere wel- 
 comed in the rudest of those frontier com- 
 munities, and his earnest labors are warmly 
 appreciated by all. The first visible change 
 is usually seen among the women. The old 
 sunbonnet and the plain calico dress with 
 which they first attend church are laid aside, 
 and somethincr more like what is seen in the 
 
 o 
 
 old communities takes their place. The chil- 
 
164 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 dren respond at once and cluster with happy 
 hearts around the preacher as once they did 
 around his Master. The salvation of the 
 wild West lies in the gospel of Jesus Christ 
 and in good women from the civilized East. 
 I mean no offence to the native frontier 
 woman by this. She is the creature of cir- 
 cumstances, over which she has no control. 
 Her education and whole upbringing are such 
 as to disqualify her for being the wife of a 
 man who has been bred and raised in a more 
 liberal and wider atmosphere. Misfortune 
 generally it is to both parties when an Eastern 
 man marries a woman bred and raised in the 
 wild West. I speak from experience. The 
 good book told me that a bishop should be 
 the husband of one wife, and being a lonely 
 bachelor bishop in Texas I married far out on 
 the front a native girl. Somehow ever since 
 Father Adam lost a rib in the making of 
 woman, his sons have an aching void at the 
 left side until that lost rib is replaced. I had 
 at least, and putting that with what the Bible 
 said, when I came across one whom I thought 
 was mine and had her placed where I thought 
 she belonged, I found to my sorrow, at the 
 
THE CHANGED SCENE. 1 65 
 
 end of fifteen years, that she was not mine at 
 all. If marriages are made in heaven, as it 
 is said they are, they are strangely unmade 
 on earth. Thirty thousand divorces a year in 
 the United States are appalling ! One hun- 
 dred recently in Chicago in one day ! 
 
 In some parts of the Southwest the 
 competition between certain cities for the 
 shameful business is almost incredible. Cir- 
 culars are sent out all over the land 
 expatiating on the advantages they offer. 
 Going down on the trains you are handed a 
 card with this on it from some iniquitous 
 lawyer: ''You are guaranteed absolute se- 
 clusion in O City and freedom from 
 
 inquisitive reporters there, and decrees are 
 never published." You are told also that 
 you might better yourself by discarding the 
 present yoke and looking around. 
 
 The change for the worse this degrading 
 business is bringing about is alarming. 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE UNLUCKY RANCH. 
 
 /^"^ERTAIN spots of this earth, hke certain 
 ^^ individuals, seem somehow or other to 
 be always unlucky, and everything done in 
 connection with them turns out unfortu- 
 nately. 
 
 Journeying through a part of the Indian 
 Nation with a companion, one upon whose 
 head were thickly fallen the snows of years, 
 we came to a very high bluff overlooking a 
 winding stream and as beautiful a valley as 
 eyes ever looked upon. 
 
 "Let us stop here," said my friend, ''and 
 look at this scene. You see yon large stone 
 house and those stone fences reaching away 
 in the distance. That 's the unlucky ranch, as 
 they call it, and indeed it seems to have the 
 curse of Heaven resting upon it. It has had 
 a checkered history. Long ago when the 
 United States government was establishing 
 military posts through this country, Captain 
 
 166 
 
THE UNLUCKY RANCH. I 67 
 
 Lee, afterwards general of the Confederate 
 Army, was marching with his troops along 
 here, selecting suitable positions, when a 
 great storm overtook them and they sought 
 shelter under this bluff. The storm raged 
 for many days and the soldiers, finding the 
 caves below and the dens of the wild 
 beasts so comfortable to live in, also fish 
 and game so plentiful, that Lee concluded to 
 remain and erect a post in yon field across 
 the river, which he did. From the day that 
 that post was started to this moment, trouble 
 of some sort or other has been the lot of the 
 place. Soldiers would quarrel and shoot each 
 other down there ; they would get drowned 
 with their horses while crossing the river, 
 and the Indians would put arrows through 
 them when they least expected it. By 
 and by Lee was removed and Captain Davis, 
 afterwards President of the Confederacy, 
 was in command here. Being engaged as a 
 medical missionary to the Indians out here in 
 my young days, I knew both Lee and Davis 
 very well. Lee was a noble, Christian young 
 man and his troops thought all the world of 
 him. I, myself, was much attached to him. 
 
1 68 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 It was not so with Davis. He was a haughty, 
 selfish, cold-blooded disciplinarian, and cared 
 as little for the comfort of his men as he did 
 for the lives of the Indians, and as little for 
 the lives of both as he did for that of the 
 prowling panthers. I was located about 
 forty miles from here, when a terrible and 
 fatal disease broke out among his troops, 
 and he despatched an orderly to me, asking 
 if I would come of my own accord and 
 doctor his men, or if he would press me 
 into the service. I replied that there was no 
 occasion for pressing me, -that I would gladly 
 come if I could be of any service in saving 
 human life. As soon as I could make 
 arrangements for my work at home, I went to 
 his fort to find the soldiers in a woeful state. 
 My medicine had the desired effect in sav- 
 ing some of the poor fellows, and when it was 
 almost used up Davis wrote and sent me an 
 order requesting some of my medicine for 
 his sick horse. I refused to comply, explain- 
 ing to him that I was nearly out of it and that 
 before a new supply could be procured from 
 the East that his men would be all dead. 
 His orderly came straight back with a per- 
 
THE UNLUCKY RANCH. 1 69 
 
 emptory demand that I hand him over my 
 medicine at once. I again decHned and he 
 sent two soldiers who arrested and placed me 
 in the guardhouse. I immediately sent off 
 a despatch to the Secretary of War at Wash- 
 ington, protesting against my treatment, and 
 a message came quickly back apologizing 
 to me, another to Davis ordering my release 
 and severely rebuking him. I said to myself 
 at that time, I will watch the future history of 
 this man, and I am now, after sixty years, not 
 disappointed. 
 
 During the War of the Rebellion a com- 
 pany of Confederate soldiers demolished the 
 old post in search of nails and such other 
 things as they needed. Some twenty-five 
 years back a young cow man, with his newly 
 married wife, bought a half section of land 
 down there, taking where the post stood, and 
 utilized the stones of the old government 
 buildings for the erection of the big house 
 yonder and the fences. His bride's father, 
 being a well-to-do stockman in the neighbor- 
 hood, gave her as her dowry five hundred 
 head of fine young cows. Her brother, who 
 was in company with the old gentleman, on 
 
170 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 finding out what was done, went and drove the 
 young cattle back and replaced them with the 
 same number of old scrubs. The young cow 
 man, on coming home and finding what his 
 brother-in-law had done, sent him his old 
 cows and told him to go to Jericho with them 
 or somewhere else not so far away. This led 
 to family feuds and bad blood in the neigh- 
 borhood generally. One morning about sun- 
 rise the young cow man went out forgetting 
 to go armed, and he had pointed in his face 
 from behind a stone fence a half-dozen cocked 
 Winchesters, with the demand to surrender. 
 He did so, was taken to prison about thirty 
 miles away and that night was shot to pieces. 
 Two years passed and the young widow 
 married a preacher, and he not being accus- 
 tomed to the use of the branding irons, his wife 
 sold her cattle and invested her money in 
 sheep, believing that her good man could 
 manage easily two fiocks — a woolly one and 
 one that was n't woolly. The latter flock was 
 sometimes troublesome enough, for the frol- 
 icking wethers would stray away and mingle 
 with the ewes of neighboring herders, and 
 that would raise the dust on the prairie. The 
 
THE UNLUCKY RANCH. I71 
 
 woolly flock, however, was the one that filled 
 his soul with sorrow six days in the week. The 
 herders were unreliable, and though strictly 
 commanded not to, would get drunk on duty, 
 and then they could n't tell a sheep from a 
 goat, nor their own from a neighbor's flock, 
 and the result invariably was a scattering of 
 thousands and a total loss of hundreds. The 
 scab, too, struck the woolly flock and this cost 
 thousands of dollars and a world of annoy- 
 ance. Then the politicians reduced the tariff 
 on wool, and the railroad companies raised 
 the freight on wethers to Chicago, and the 
 consequence was dead loss instead of much 
 gain ; and then, to crown all, a dreadful winter 
 following a long drouth, which melted that 
 woolly flock away like snow in spring. 
 
 In the mean time the preacher went about 
 aiding the starving Indians who were neg- 
 lected by their government, and apparently by 
 the rain-making powers, and thus differed from 
 his wife's brother already referred to, who 
 commanded him to cease his efforts and let 
 them go to some other hunting grounds. 
 The preacher would not recognize his author- 
 ity over him in such a matter, and then began 
 
172 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 to arise a spirit of opposition and wrongful 
 treatment almost incredible. That preacher 
 to-day is a homeless wanderer, for though 
 he invested five thousand dollars of his own 
 money in improvements on the ranch it has 
 been taken from him and all that it contained. 
 A young man from Scotland, who was look- 
 ing over the country for a cow ranch, cast his 
 eyes on this one and was captivated by the 
 beauty of the scene, for it was in the spring- 
 time of the year, and he rented it, and while 
 waiting for the proper season to buy cattle, he 
 planted forty acres in watermelons. He was 
 a visionary youth and believed that he could 
 show the natives how to make money raising 
 watermelons. When he planted the seed he 
 would sit for hours on yon cross fence looking 
 at his melon patch and impatient for the 
 sprouting of the vines through the soil. At 
 last they came and then the watery fruit fol- 
 lowed. Tom Greenlees was now full of 
 expectation by day, and of bright dreams by 
 night. He saw himself a wealthy ranchman 
 away in the future, with lots of servants round 
 about him. When the watermelons grew 
 and grew, till they were large enough to 
 
THE UNLUCKY RANCH. 173 
 
 winter a sheep inside, Tom loaded his 
 wagon and started for the railroad, believing 
 that he could sell his melons at about twenty- 
 five cents apiece. He left home about sun 
 up, and at noon he rested in the shade of a 
 large tree and made his dinner of water- 
 melons. That was a sad mistake for Tom. 
 As he drove his team along the road all that 
 afternoon, the cattle would lift their heads 
 in amazement, listen a little, and then in 
 terror make for the woods, believing that a 
 new sort of a cyclone was coming. The loafer- 
 wolf would look down from the brow of a 
 hill at him and begin howling in unison with 
 the music that came from the passing melon 
 wagon. 
 
 It was a sorrowful drive for Tom. But he 
 was glad when he saw a negro cabin by the 
 roadside, and coming up to it, he begged in 
 mercy's name to be taken in and cured. 
 The old " aunty," who was mistress of the 
 cabin, thought him at first crazy and barred 
 the door ; but seeing him writhing in pain on 
 his melon bed, with the tears rolling down 
 his cheeks, she pitied him and ventured out. 
 She lifted him down tenderly from his wagon 
 
174 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 and stretched him on the hearth before her 
 fireplace and argued with the coHc a priori 
 and exposteriori, but to Httle purpose. In 
 the mean time a half dozen of her pick- 
 aninnies got into the wagon and made havoc 
 of Tom's watermelons. Sadly and painfully 
 the railroad was reached, to find that the 
 watermelons were selling at about two cents 
 each, and even at that you could only trade 
 them for something else. Tom traded his 
 load for a fifty-cent hat and when he settled 
 with the doctor he was poorer by five dollars 
 than he was when he left home. All this 
 soured the honest Scotchman, and though a 
 good Christian at home in his native land, he 
 took to swearing awfully at things in general, 
 and at watermelons in particular. It was 
 just terrifying to be within a mile of him at 
 any hour of the day. Shortly after his return 
 from the railroad, an old cow belonging to 
 a neighbor got into his melon patch, and 
 though she could do but little financial dam- 
 age, the melons being now worthless, Tom 
 made the air blue and the hills tremble with 
 his oaths, and in a fit of anger put a pitchfork 
 into her side. This brought the owner of the 
 
THE UNLUCKY RANCH. 1 75 
 
 COW to remonstrate, and seeing him approach 
 his gate the fooHsh Scot challenged him to a 
 fistic encounter. 
 
 "We don't fight that way in this country," 
 said the neighbor ; '' but how does that suit 
 you ? " Tom fell, but the shot was not fatal, 
 and when the bullet was extracted and he 
 was able to go about again, he bade farewell 
 to ranching in the wild West and made long 
 strides in the direction of " bonnie Dundee." 
 
 Others also rented or bought the place, but 
 the same bad luck followed all alike, and the 
 man who now owns it has not procured it 
 justly, and when he is through with it he is 
 likely to say that his ranch was a bag with 
 holes in the bottom. 
 
 Having thus rested our horses and viewed 
 the unlucky ranch, we passed on, discussing 
 as we did so the strange fatality that seems 
 to cling to certain places and persons. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE STRUGGLE. 
 
 OOME years ago a very bitter feeling 
 *^ existed between the cattle men and 
 farmers in Northwestern Texas, because of 
 the fencing in of great tracts of land by the 
 former to the great disadvantage of the 
 latter. 
 
 The cow man wanted the whole earth for 
 himself and fenced in whole counties of it 
 that did not belong to him. The farmer, 
 therefore, found himself often shut up in a 
 corner, out of which he could not get unless 
 he traveled ten or twenty miles, perhaps, 
 to visit a neighbor who might only be half 
 a mile off. This made bad blood between 
 the parties, and the wire-cutting war began, 
 which forced the governor to call a special 
 meeting of the Legislature to put a stop 
 to it. 
 
 On the heels of this a terrible two years' 
 drouth followed. My church at the time 
 
 176 
 
THE STRUGGLE. I 77 
 
 was composed almost entirely of cattle men, 
 but I took the part of the farmers, who were 
 in great distress, even on the verge of 
 starvation. I appealed for aid through some 
 New York papers, and small sums came, 
 with which I fed all who applied to my 
 utmost ability. 
 
 Forty counties were in distress and the 
 suffering was alarming. I preached to my 
 church the duty of assisting the suffering 
 farmers, but they would not. I then told 
 the farmers not to die of hunger while there 
 was a hoof on the prairie or in the woods, 
 and they did n't, either. This caused a com- 
 mittee of relief to be organized, and I was 
 asked to come up North and solicit aid. 
 I came, but did the soliciting publicly before 
 representative bodies of every sort, from St. 
 Louis to New York, and from Boston to 
 Washington City. This method was not 
 taken into calculation by the cattle men who 
 sent me, and as I exposed the condition of 
 the country in a way they did not like, they 
 called to me to return home ; and as I did 
 not till I got through with my mission, they 
 opposed me through the press to their 
 
178 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 Utmost. The reason for this opposition was 
 the fact that at that time many of the lead- 
 ing cattle men of Texas were busy selling 
 off their ranches here in the North and in 
 Europe to syndicates, who were buying up 
 land and cattle without proper investigation. 
 The late Jay Gould also opposed me through 
 his secret agents, for he owned the Texas 
 Pacific Railroad and I was hindering immi- 
 gration. The good people, however, of the 
 North contributed, but not what they would 
 were I allowed to tell the truth unopposed. 
 I could write a very interesting book on this 
 theme alone, but will only state briefly that 
 after three months' pleading in the North I 
 returned to Texas, where the capitalistic 
 press was cursing me and my enemies, 
 burning me in effigy, and hanging me to 
 lamp-posts. I did not care, however, what 
 they did to me in this way, and I went boldly 
 on my mission through the State, conscious 
 of the integrity of my purpose and strong 
 in the feeling of independence because of 
 the silver hole which I owned in Nevada. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE VICTORY. 
 
 ^ I "O confirm what I published, and to plead 
 ^ even more strongly than I did, the 
 judges of forty counties met in Albany, where 
 I lived, and appointed me as their special 
 agent to go first to the State Legislature, 
 and if that body did not respond, I was to 
 proceed to Congress and demand instant 
 relief. The distress now was becoming 
 terrible. 
 
 On my way to Austin, the capital of the 
 State, I called on the editor of The Dallas 
 News, the main paper in the employ of the 
 capitalists for my abuse. He had just pub- 
 lished three editorials denouncing me as a 
 liar and fraud of the first water. I gave the 
 gentleman to understand that if he did n't 
 change his tone I would shortly head a pro- 
 cession of five thousand starving farmers, 
 who would soon demolish both him and his 
 paper without ceremony. I demanded an 
 
l80 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 immediate reply, and he begged for a few 
 hours till he could call a meeting of the board 
 of managers. I consented, and next morn- 
 ing there was a complete somersault and a 
 loud calling for subscriptions, for the needy 
 farmers, and an editorial endorsing my efforts. 
 Calling also at Waco, where the State cattle 
 men's convention was in session, I presented 
 myself before the cattle barons and was given 
 an opportunity to speak, which I did, stirring 
 up the wrath of some to such an extent that 
 I was cautioned lest there might be some 
 powder burned. In going before the Legis- 
 lature I was accorded an opportunity to speak 
 before a joint meeting of both branches, and 
 spoke for two hours, showing the need of 
 relief and the treatment I had received at the 
 hands of my opponents, and especially of 
 Governor Ireland, who was then the popular 
 candidate for the United States Senate. 
 
 During my speech the governor, who was 
 listening, sent a page boy with a letter mak- 
 ing a sort of apology and excusing himself 
 because he did not know the matter was so 
 serious. When I got through, the verdict of 
 all was that I had killed the governor for the 
 
THE VICTORY. l8l 
 
 Senate ; and sure enough, when the election 
 came off in a few days he was retired to pri- 
 vate life and Reagan was sent in his place to 
 Washington. Next morning, after my plea 
 for the farmers, a bill was set a-going giving 
 one hundred thousand dollars, and with this 
 help the poor tillers of the soil managed to 
 get along until the rains came and every one 
 had plenty. This completed my work and 
 my vindication before the whole country. 
 
 My efforts were solely humanitarian, and 
 so far as I was concerned I did my work with 
 no thought of what might be the future con- 
 sequences to myself. My reward, however, 
 came in due time. 
 
 The cattle men of my church requested 
 my resignation, and they got it, and a fare- 
 well sermon too, which perhaps they have 
 not forgotten yet. 
 
 Mass meetings were held and resolutions 
 passed urging me to stay in Texas, but I left. 
 I left feeling that I had done nothing but my 
 duty to a deserving people who needed some 
 Moses to save them from the Aarons who 
 worshiped the Golden Calf. The ill-will, 
 however, gendered during that struggle has 
 
152 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 followed me ever since, and cruel, unjust, and 
 treacherous conduct on the part of my wife's 
 near relatives, who are among the leading 
 cattle men of the State, has now robbed me 
 of property, wife, and children. 
 
 Ah, me ! this is not a world where a man, 
 if he is a preacher, can afford, if he wants a 
 roof over his head, to take the part of the 
 oppressed poor against the power of capital. 
 
 " He who ascends the mountain-tops shall find 
 
 The loftiest peaks most wrapt in cloud and snow ; 
 He who surpasses or subdues mankind 
 Must look on the hate of those below." 
 
 The Texas of to-day is a civilized place. 
 I built three churches there, and preached a 
 great many good sermons ; I did, indeed. Any 
 man's life and property are as safe there now 
 as anywhere else, but you are not considered 
 as belonging to the aristocracy unless you 
 have cattle drinking water from all the water 
 holes of the prairies, and eating grass on a 
 thousand hills. The cow man will not drink 
 at a saloon bar with a sheep man or a farmer. 
 No, indeed, he is too good for that, and if he 
 gets religion he won't drink at the bar at all. 
 The sheepman of Texas is an honest man, 
 
THE VICTORY. 1 83 
 
 if there are no other sheep within reach of 
 him. He is a sort of Arab wandering about 
 with his flock from water hole to water hole. 
 He is a lonely man without any family wor- 
 ship, and all days of the week are alike to 
 him. At night he sleeps in a little round 
 tent close by his sheep with his weather eye 
 open on the wolves. He usually gets three 
 crops a year ; one of lambs in the spring, one 
 of wool in the summer, and one of bones in 
 the winter. He is not happy, however, for 
 though a democrat in politics, he is a great 
 protectionist. He chews tobacco and swears 
 at all free traders as the children of the 
 wicked one. Yet, for all this, he is an honest 
 man. 
 
 The Texas farmer is a kind man and given 
 to hospitality. He sleeps in the house at 
 night and under a shady tree in the day. 
 He is religious as a rule and goes to church 
 on Sunday like any other Christian. He is 
 not lazy, only born tired ; and what are Texas 
 trees good for if you don't enjoy their shade, 
 so cool and delightful? There you can lie 
 down and be at peace with Texas and all the 
 world beside. 
 
184 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 I like the dashing cow man of Texas and 
 the honest sheep man, but I love the farmer 
 down there. Cotton raising is his main crop, 
 and it takes thirteen months in the year to 
 do it too, but he is courageous and industri- 
 ous, and he produces what keeps many of 
 the cotton mills of the world a-running. 
 
 I don't believe that the Texas farmer is 
 lazy, though I got so lazy myself when there, 
 and^lept so much in the shade, that I had no 
 time to examine him. There is no difference 
 between a man that is born tired and a man 
 who becomes tired, and neither should be 
 blamed, for nature does it. 
 
 The Texas farmer is perfectly orthodox 
 both as a Christian and as a politician, and 
 you need never be at a loss, if you are 
 hungry, for a meal of victuals, and never for 
 a good bed to sleep in, even if he has him- 
 self to go to the hayloft. 
 
 I will never allow any one in my presence 
 to say a disrespectful word of the Texas 
 farmer, for I know him as a kind, good man 
 who has a heart as big as his barn. 
 
CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 THE BUSY EAST. 
 
 'T^HIS country here called New England 
 ^ is considered a Christian section, I 
 believe, but I have seen some queer speci- 
 mens here as well as in the West and South- 
 west. There, for instance, is Mr. Dry-goods, 
 an elder in a church hereabouts. He is just 
 like my old friend Jacobs down in Texas. 
 Shortly after I came to this country up here 
 he subscribed two hundred dollars towards 
 my church debt at Fall River, and then went 
 about and begged for it from certain Sunday- 
 schools. He got it all but eighty dollars and 
 this he refused to pay because a certain friend 
 of his was put out of office in the church at 
 Fall River for using in his own business the 
 Lord's money. Well, remembering that I 
 had that silver hole out in Nevada, I gave 
 him his character in writing just as it is, and 
 he put a knife in the bag that took my salary 
 from New York, and cut a hole so big in it 
 
 185 
 
1 86 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 that it has never brought me a dollar since. 
 It will not do for any one section of this coun- 
 try to imagine that it is very much superior 
 to the rest. Man is man the world over. 
 
 Shortly after coming here a great strike of 
 the mill operatives took place in the city I 
 lived in. When this strike was on, and the 
 suffering among the operatives was becom- 
 ing serious, a deputation from the Weavers' 
 Executive Committee came to my house 
 about twelve o'clock one night, and asked 
 me to meet with them early next morning, to 
 see if I could assist in bringing the opposing 
 factions to some sort of agreement. I com- 
 plied, and urged for the immediate resumption 
 of work. I then, by request, went with 
 them to the park and addressed the great 
 gathering there in favor of ending the strike. 
 
 This was going against the current of feel- 
 ing, and when a show of hands was called for, 
 not many responded. Feeling sorry for the 
 people in what I considered their blindness 
 to the existing conditions, I brought on the 
 " rousements," as we preachers used to do 
 at camp meetings out West, when sinners 
 were stiff-necked, and spoke so loud and long 
 
THE BUSY EAST. 1 87 
 
 that I was laid up after for several days with 
 sore lungs. I had an overwhelming feeling 
 within me that I was speaking on the side of 
 God and humanity, and therefore felt deter- 
 mined that the great assemblage should think 
 as I did, and I succeeded. But success in 
 the great efforts of one's life is sometimes 
 followed by unpleasant consequences. 
 
 The same summer's sun that clothes the 
 fields with beauty brings the mosquito from 
 the swamp. Our joys and sorrows are near 
 akin, and the sweetest song of triumph has 
 its undertones of sadness. The cause of 
 labor belongs to the Master Workman of the 
 Universe, and not to scheming politicians. 
 He who would honestly speak out for labor's 
 highest interest may expect opposition even 
 from those for whom he proclaims, for so it 
 was with the perfect One some two thousand 
 years ago. 
 
 I am pleased to know that I have the respect 
 and good will of a large number of the people 
 there still, though some speak against me, 
 because of misrepresentations sent abroad 
 among them by interested parties. Three 
 years ago they were kind enough to send 
 
1 88 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 me to the Legislature of this State, and 
 while there I cautioned against the further 
 reduction of the hours of labor for the time 
 being, seeing that the year before there was 
 a reduction of two hours a week made below 
 any other State in the Union. This led 
 many to suppose that I had deserted their 
 cause, but they are beginning now to see 
 that the stand I took in the Legislature was 
 really the only one that could be taken at 
 the time for their own best interests. 
 
 I believe in the eight-hour workday for 
 women and children when a national law 
 compels every State to grant it. 
 
 The discussion was over a bill Introduced 
 in the House of Representatives to make 
 the weekly work time fifty-four hours. I 
 opposed this bill on the ground that it would 
 greatly cripple the manufacturers of Massa- 
 chusetts, while other New England States 
 run their mills sixty hours, and the South 
 went even as high as seventy. I could 
 see in the forced reduction meanwhile but 
 disaster for the operatives themselves, as it 
 always happens that they, more than any 
 one else, have to bear the consequences of 
 profitless manufacturing. 
 
THE BUSY EAST. 1 89 
 
 The main argument of the advocates of 
 the bill was the necessity of constant agita- 
 tion in order to carry the measure, but I am 
 not worth a cent on parade, and never was, 
 hence often a failure. Give me a good, hon- 
 est object to fight for, and I will go into it with 
 all my heart, but I will never burn powder for 
 the sake of making smoke and noise. 
 
 While in the Legislature I did not make 
 many speeches, but did on a certain day 
 take part in a discussion over a bill intro- 
 duced to do away with the State Fast Day. 
 I advocated the measure, seeing that the 
 day was no longer observed as in the days 
 of old, when a little chap, who was a 
 descendant of the Puritans, sprang to his 
 feet and shouted : " Mr. Speaker, I want to 
 ask the gentleman from Fall River if he 
 went to church with his parents when a boy 
 in Massachusetts." 
 
 I replied : *' Mr. Speaker, this man is 
 insinuating that I am a foreigner. 
 
 *'I acknowledge the corn, but I think on 
 that very account I am better qualified to 
 make laws for this State than he is. I came 
 into this State clothed and in my right mind ; 
 
IQO TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 he came in naked and had no mind at all. 
 I came here after deliberation and due con- 
 sideration, of my own free will ; he was 
 brought in and had no say-so in the matter. 
 I came here paying my passage money as I 
 came along, and he got in free. Am not 
 I the better man ? " 
 
 That legislator never asked me another 
 question while I was there. I suppose, 
 however, that when he and I are up yonder 
 in the Great Assembly Hall, where people 
 are gathered from all the tribes of earth, 
 that if I should say anything that did not 
 suit his prejudices, he will be jumping to 
 his feet and shouting to the presiding offi- 
 cer : " Mr. President, I would like to know 
 if the gentleman went to church with his 
 parents when a boy in Massachusetts ! " 
 
CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 THE EASTERN WOMAN. 
 
 T WANT to say just a word or two on the 
 ^ New England woman, in the hope that 
 she will hear it. If I were a young man and 
 wanted to select a wife, I do not know that I 
 could go anywhere in this broad land to find 
 abetter than can be found right here in great 
 abundance. I will go further than this, and 
 say that for a real, womanly wife you cannot 
 find her superior anywhere on this round 
 earth. I say this in all seriousness and after 
 much knowledge of the ordinary woman as 
 she is found to-day in all her tribes, nations, 
 and societies. This clearly understood, I 
 would say to the New England woman, 
 '' Sister, you have a great mission before you 
 in regard to the West, and if you fail in your 
 duty there must come, sooner or later, another 
 opening of the heavens, and another angelic 
 manifestation of a positive character which 
 will introduce a messenger who will speak 
 
 191 
 
192 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 both to you and the Western man in the 
 name and by the authority of God Almighty. 
 You are now doing something, I fully know, 
 in the way of sending educational and gospel 
 institutions to the far West to enlighten and 
 save your brothers there, and not a word from 
 me will ever discourage you from doing a 
 thousand times more hereafter in the same 
 way than you have been doing in the past. 
 I can heartily bear testimony to the good you 
 are doing from what I have seen in the West 
 of your labors of love. What you must, 
 
 HOWEVER, DO IS TO GIVE YOURSELF ! " 
 
 That, my friend, would be my last and all- 
 important message to the Eastern woman, if 
 I were never again to put foot on her native 
 soil. She is not at present giving herself as 
 God intended she should, and if she will 
 continue in her course the social equilibrium 
 of this country will go on from bad to worse, 
 until there will be such a shaking from sea to 
 sea as will either destroy or create anew. 
 To better show you what I mean I will point 
 to ancient Roman and Jewish histories. For 
 many hundred years the republic of Rome 
 was, socially, almost in every sense a model 
 
THE EASTERN WOMAN. 1 93 
 
 even to our present Christendom. The mar- 
 riage relation between the sexes was then 
 honored, and truth, frugahty, and virtue were 
 supreme. Gradually, however, because of 
 military and national aggrandizement, the 
 young men spread themselves out over the 
 world, leaving their sisters at home, and these 
 sisters in their turn took to ways and manners 
 of life that were not conducive to the highest 
 domestic morality, brought about such a state 
 of society that marriage was utterly ignored, 
 and soon the republic went under, and on its 
 ruins rose the empire which finally destroyed 
 the nation from centre to circumference. In 
 vain did Augustus, the first Roman emperor, 
 pass laws compelling marriage between the 
 sexes. The disease was too deeply rooted in 
 all classes of society for that, as you can 
 easily understand by reading Paul's Epistle 
 to the Romans. 
 
 One great reason for the introduction of 
 Christianity was the elevation of marriage 
 and proper establishment of the family. 
 The Jew as well as the Roman was slighting 
 the divinely ordained institution, now as never 
 before, and needed to have *' the heart of the 
 
194 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 fathers turned to the children," and because 
 Jew and Roman aHke turned a deaf ear to 
 him who began his works of divine power at 
 a wedding in Cana, thus putting honor on 
 marriage above all other institutions, the one 
 was scattered abroad without a home or a 
 country, and the other was blotted from off 
 the face of the earth. 
 
 Is there not a word of warning in all this 
 to this great Western republic ? How do we 
 find matrimonial matters to-day ? Decidedly 
 out of gear. The young men are no longer 
 wanted in factories, stores, or offices, and are 
 crowding out West in search of employment 
 and the gold of the mountains, leaving their 
 sisters behind just as the young Romans did, 
 and we find them by the thousand out yonder, 
 wifeless and homeless. Have I not seen 
 them in Texas and Nevada ? Do I not know 
 that they would gladly marry Eastern girls if 
 they would only come out to them ? Have I 
 not seen the degradation of Indian women by 
 the hardened miners of the Pacific Coast ? Is 
 there not rising up here in the East and yon- 
 der in the West a condition of things that is 
 ruinous to the nation ? You may smile at 
 
THE EASTERN WOMAN. 1 95 
 
 this which I have just dipped from a Boston 
 paper, but it shows that the unmarried women 
 of Canada propose to give more substantial 
 evidence of good will to their brothers on the 
 Pacific Coast than even gospel ordinances. 
 
 AN UNEQUAL DISTRIBUTION OF THE FAIR SEX IN CANADA. 
 
 Vancouver, B. C, April 16. — The mayor of Vancou- 
 ver has received a peculiar letter from Toronto, written 
 in the interests of the young women in Toronto and other 
 Eastern Canadian cities. In this unique epistle the writer 
 states that, according to statistics, there is a shortage in 
 the female population in the northwest territories and 
 British Columbia amounting to about forty thousand, and 
 there is in Eastern Canada a corresponding overplus of 
 unmarried women. In order to equalize matters it is 
 proposed to send young women of good health and moral 
 character West to be distributed where the demand is 
 greatest, and for this purpose it is sought to establish a 
 home at Vancouver for the reception and distribution of 
 the young women for British Columbia. 
 
 The very thing proposed by the good women 
 of Canada is what should be taken up and 
 considered seriously by the New England 
 women. For the same thing is, perhaps 
 even more so, true of this section than of 
 Canada. What is wanted in our new States 
 and Territories are women that will be true 
 
196 TWENTi^-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 wives to those rough, lonely fellows who are 
 now living a life that is degrading to both 
 themselves and others. The Chinese and 
 other nations that live through the ages are 
 those that have their men and women go 
 hand in hand to the remotest parts of their 
 territories and marry according to some well- 
 established system. 
 
 If the Western man is to be kept from 
 becoming a savage, he must have the Eastern 
 woman to accompany him to his Western 
 home. He needs her refining influences in 
 the hour of his prosperity, and her soothing 
 hand in the hour of adversity. 
 
 " For contemplation he, and valor, formed ; 
 For softness she, and sweet, attractive grace." 
 
 This does not imply but that there are 
 women now living in the wild West. There 
 are some of course, but not enough to go 
 round, and because of this shortage the 
 native young woman, as a rule, is petulant, 
 narrow in her sympathies, and much given 
 to running home to her mother when she is 
 in the least crossed. 
 
 This is why the new States and Territories 
 
THE EASTERN WOMAN. 1 97 
 
 have such easy-going divorce laws. The 
 men that made those laws had in mind the 
 possibility of their being needed by themselves 
 to get rid of a truant wife at some time or 
 other. I will just mention one instance to 
 show you how badly a man gets mated some- 
 times where men are plentiful and women 
 scarce. Jim Anderson had a cow ranch far 
 out in the southern part of the Indian nation. 
 He stumbled across a girl there whose father 
 kept a small store on the banks of the Koon 
 River, and he loved her at sight, proposed, 
 and was accepted all in one day. The Koon 
 River at times overflows its banks and forms 
 here and there what might be called lagoons. 
 When this happens, it is not always easy for 
 you to get to the point you want to reach. 
 Jim Anderson was dead in love with his girl, 
 and used to go to see her every few days, 
 lest some other fellow should run away with 
 her. On one of those love-sick visits he 
 came to the neighborhood of the Koon, but 
 was debarred by a lake in front of him from 
 reaching her father's house. It was night, 
 and the moon hung high over the tall, red 
 pine trees. Thus poor Romeo could do 
 
198 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 nothing but sit on a log looking at the play- 
 ful frogs, and sing over the waters of the 
 Koon to his Juliet till the daylight brought 
 the mud boat to his relief ; and here is what 
 he sang : — 
 
 " Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Koon, 
 How can ye sing so sweet and clear? 
 How can ye chant, ye little toads. 
 And I so far from Mary dear? 
 Thou 'It break my heart, thou warbling frog 
 
 That paddles through the silvery sea ; 
 Thou minds me o' the coming joys. 
 When Mary brings the cake to me. 
 
 " Oft hae I row'd on bonnie Koon 
 
 To see the oak and redwood twine. 
 And ilka crow sung to its mate, 
 
 Oh, where ? oh, where is baby mine ? 
 Wi' lightsome heart I pulled the oar, 
 
 And Mary's lamb did sweetly sing, 
 While she and I wi' joyfu' glee 
 
 Spoke softly o' the wedding ring. 
 
 " But now I sit by bonnie Koon, 
 
 And waiting for the swift canoe. 
 While Mary sighs, and all forlorn. 
 
 Sits waiting for her own cuckoo. 
 Thou 'It strike me dead, ye cruel hours. 
 
 That slowly pass to yesterday ; 
 Ye mind me o' the lazy sloth 
 
 That climbs the trees of Uruguay." 
 
THE EASTERN WOMAN. 1 99 
 
 That 's how he sung about the Koon 
 River when in love. By and by he got 
 married, and then he sung the same song 
 with considerable variation. His Mary Ann 
 was a vain and frivolous creature who would 
 pout and be disagreeable if things did not 
 go to suit her. If, for instance, when out 
 after his cattle, he did not get back when she 
 thought he ought to, she would scold and fret 
 about it ; and if he dared to say a cross 
 word in reply, she would run home to her 
 mother ; and then he would have to go after 
 her and be lectured by the old lady. She 
 had a big, rawboned brother, too, who used 
 to abuse him when he saw fit, simply because 
 he was unable to split as many rails a day as 
 he could. Not providing for her jewelry and 
 other fineries, she accused him of not loving 
 her ; and to plague him, she would go out 
 riding with more stylish young men than he 
 was. As the years rolled by, this got to be 
 too scandalously frequent, and then it got to 
 be Jim's turn to scold for tardy returns on 
 her part. He provided good books for her 
 to read and a piano to play on, and did 
 everything that an honest, industrious man 
 
200 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 could do to make her contented and happy, 
 but to no purpose. Two Httle children were 
 born in this home, but even this did not have 
 sufficient influence to keep her from riding 
 out with her lovers. And leaving the two 
 little tots one day alone, they wandered out 
 into the woods to gather flowers, and one of 
 them fell over a bluff and was killed. The 
 father, on coming home, was crazed with 
 grief and indignation, and, naturally enough, 
 upbraided his wife for her shameless conduct. 
 But can the Ethiopian change his skin, or 
 the leopard his spots ? The same sun that 
 softens butter will harden clay, and afflic- 
 tions sometimes will only make bad people 
 worse. When the dead child was laid away 
 in its grave, one dark night she stole the 
 living one and made off with one of her ad- 
 mirers to Texas, leaving honest Jim Anderson 
 wifeless and childless. He properly procured 
 a divorce, and after a time went eastward to 
 his own native land and procured a homely 
 but honest girl, who made him a good, faith- 
 ful wife. 
 
 Some time before he got his second wife, 
 he happened to be in the neighborhood of 
 
THE EASTERN WOMAN. 20I 
 
 his first wife's girlhood home. He went and 
 sat down and sung on the same old log on 
 which he used to sing in praise of the Koon ; 
 and this is how he did it : — 
 
 " Ye banks and stumps o' slimy Koon, 
 
 How can ye look to heaven above ? 
 How can ye peep, ye hateful frogs, 
 
 And falsely mutter o' your love ? 
 Thou 'ast broke my heart, thou great bullfrog. 
 
 That 's sprawling in the deep, green mire, 
 Thou minds me o' the crocodile 
 
 That 's down below in 'ternal fire. 
 
 " Oft hae I rode, you ugly Koon, 
 
 Along your muddy banks so drear, 
 To see your logs and horrid swamps 
 
 That 's cost me now so very dear. 
 Your lands and sheep are all a fraud, 
 
 And so are all your ravens black ; 
 Thou art the thief that stole my peace. 
 
 But ah ! some day thou 'It be caught ! 
 
 " Thou loathsome Koon ! thou nasty Koon ! 
 
 Your reeds and weeds, your frogs and crows, 
 I bid farewell forevermore, 
 
 And seek in other climes repose. 
 Thou, too, farewell, deceitful wife. 
 
 That 's stole my darling child away ! 
 If 't will give you joy to know it 's so. 
 
 Then know that thou hast cursed my life." 
 
 Jim finally left the Indian nation, taking 
 
202 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 his second wife and cattle to Kansas, where 
 he is now a happy and prosperous cow man 
 and farmer. 
 
 Such men as this are out yonder by the 
 hundreds of thousands, and they would 
 gladly welcome to their bachelor halls home- 
 loving, virtuous women from the old States, 
 who would be unto them true and loving 
 wives. The Eastern woman has a great 
 mission before her in life. And where the 
 field of that mission is should be as plain 
 to her as if God had written it in letters of 
 fire across the heavens — the wild West. 
 
 There she is needed, and there she should 
 be, and there she will stand '' clad in the beauty 
 of a thousand stars," if she will but act her 
 part in harmony with her nobler instincts* 
 
 At the very beginning it was said from 
 heaven that it was not good for man to be 
 alone ; and if it was not good for him then, 
 when the trials of life were few compared to 
 those of the present day, what else but 
 positive evil can be the lot of him who is 
 roughing it alone in the wild West ? It is, 
 indeed, an evil which no man should be 
 called upon to endure. 
 
THE EASTERN WOMAN. 203 
 
 As a rule it is the noblest, the bravest, the 
 most enterprising that go to the front. The 
 drones of the hive stay in the rear. Are 
 these daring sons of America, who risk their 
 lives fighting the rude Goliaths of the fron- 
 tier that the unbounded wealth of the great 
 West may be developed, to do it alone, 
 without the inspiration which comes from 
 woman's companionship ? Must they walk 
 the wide plains, cultivate the rich valleys, 
 climb the mountains, and dig into the bowels 
 of the earth without the music of a woman's 
 voice or the blessing of a woman's presence? 
 
 Let the women of the East awake to their 
 duty to the wild West, and on some such 
 lines as those on which the Canadian women 
 are moving, let them provide true and loving 
 wives for their roaming brothers that are far 
 out towards the setting sun. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 THE MARRIAGE. 
 
 /~\NE hundred years, or thereabout, ago 
 ^^ there sailed across the Atlantic and set- 
 tled in Nortli Carolina where he farmed and 
 owned slaves, a member of Clan Campbell, 
 — that is one of the Scottish clans formerly 
 inhabiting a large part of the Western High- 
 lands, whose chief was the Duke of Argyle. 
 
 In the course of years this man and the 
 Highland lassie he took with him as his wife 
 had round about them a large family, one of 
 whom, at least, a daughter, is still living, 
 though considerably over the allotted span of 
 life. 
 
 Inheriting the energy and enterprising 
 spirit of her paternal clansmen, this lady 
 married, and with her Carolinian husband 
 went to Northwestern Texas, far out beyond 
 the limits of civilization, and there engaged 
 in cattle raising. Surrounded on every side 
 by hostile Comanche Indians, they defended 
 
 204 
 
THE MARRIAGE. 205 
 
 their cattle and raised a family, mostly boys, 
 who knew from their childhood how to ride 
 horseback and fight the redskins. 
 
 Into the same region, and about the same 
 time, moved also another young couple, 
 natives of Alabama, and engaged in the same 
 line of business. When the children of these 
 cattle ranchers grew up to manhood and 
 womanhood they interlaced in wedlock, and 
 now they far eclipse the fathers in cattle 
 raising. 
 
 Some forty years after the departure of 
 the Highland clansman from his native 
 heath, a nephew of his married a sister of 
 my mother. They also crossed the briny 
 deep, and settled in the backwoods of 
 Canada, near where the city of London now 
 stands. There, with the vigor of his race, this 
 younger clansman bravely faced the prowling 
 Indians and savage beasts, while he stretched 
 at his feet the big trees of the forest. He 
 too raised a large family, now prosperous 
 and enterprising in various spheres of life, 
 but neither the Canadian clansman nor his 
 uncle in North Carolina knew anything of 
 the whereabouts of the other. 
 
206 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 About four years ago, and just a year 
 before his death, he being now about eighty- 
 three years old, I visited my Canadian rela- 
 tion on his beautiful farm, and while sitting 
 together before his large open fireplace, he 
 happened to remark that an uncle of his 
 went to North Carolina a long while ago and 
 settled there. The thought entered my mind 
 like a flash that in all probability the venerable 
 Texas lady, who, by the way, was about his 
 own age, and extremely like him in appear- 
 ance, and the mother of my wife's two 
 brothers-in-law, was his cousin. Her maiden 
 name too was Campbell and she spoke Gaelic, 
 the native language of her parents, in her 
 girlhood days, all of which she herself told 
 me. 
 
 Investigation was set on foot, and sure 
 enough, ** Aunt Ann," as we called her, was 
 my uncle's full cousin. I was thus linked to 
 the North Carolina branch of Clan Camp- 
 bell through marriage, and to the Canadian 
 branch through blood. 
 
 How came this about ? 
 
 Along the frontier of Texas, when I 
 went there, our government maintained a 
 
•THE MARRIAGE. 207 
 
 number of military posts for the protec- 
 tion of the overland mail to California, 
 and also the settlers along the route, against 
 the wild Comanches. It was, therefore, 
 my privilege and pleasure to make the 
 acquaintance of a large number of officers 
 and their troops, and also to preach to them 
 on occasion. When Commander Lincoln, 
 son of a New England minister, was in 
 charge at Fort Griffin, he used quite often to 
 send his carriage a hundred miles east and 
 take me out to preach to his men. 
 
 Among the officers at that post was a 
 *' brither Scot " from Edinburgh, who seemed 
 to have taken to war as a duck does to water. 
 When quite a youth he ran away from home 
 and fought in the Crimean War, then in the 
 War of the Rebellion in India, then again in 
 China. 
 
 Crossing the Atlantic he fought in the 
 Confederate Army, and then again in Mexico, 
 against Emperor Maximilian. Recrossing 
 the Atlantic, he fought in France against 
 Prussia, and when he could find no fighting 
 to do anywhere else he went out to fight 
 Indians in Texas. 
 
208 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 An intimacy sprung up between us, and 
 when poor ''Jack" was sick, and nigh unto 
 death, the Bishop of Texas (for Jack was an 
 Episcopahan) asked me to go out and see 
 him. I went, and arrived just one hour after 
 Jack was laid away in his soldier grave with 
 military honors. 
 
 That evening a friend requested me to 
 visit with him a certain cow ranch, the owner 
 of which was originally from Alabama. Then 
 began the real joys and sorrows of my life. 
 I did n't do like Isaac, send a servant for her 
 afterwards, but I went myself, taking another 
 preacher with me, three days' journey towards 
 the setting sun. I don't believe in omens, 
 good or bad, and I don't think, after consult- 
 ing with myself, that I am superstitious, and 
 yet I tell the following for the honest opinion 
 of those that believe in signs. The first day 
 out, one of our horses got the colic and it 
 would lie down in the traces and try to roll 
 over. We traded the brute off for another 
 that evening. The second day out, our new 
 horse had the scour so bad that we took ten 
 dollars for it, and bought another from an 
 honest farmer with whom we put up that 
 
THE MARRIAGE. 2O9 
 
 night. The third day's new horse had a 
 mental ailment, and when it trotted ten miles 
 from home it became exceedingly homesick 
 and uncertain as to the way it should go. 
 We preachers tried by gentle words to per- 
 suade it to continue the onward journey, but 
 it would n't. We pulled it by the ears, but it 
 stuck its forefeet forward and acted more like 
 a mule than a decent horse. We tried the 
 whip on his hind-quarters, but to no purpose. 
 My companion was much versed in the 
 science of horseology, and he gave me a 
 pointer on how to deal with a balky horse. 
 First he unhitched it, then rode it round and 
 round blindfolded till it was so dizzy that it 
 could hardly stand up, and then he hitched it 
 again, still blindfolded, and told it to go and 
 it did. We had no more trouble with that 
 beast, for it imagined that it was going back 
 home when it was n't. 
 
 When we arrived at one of the old man's 
 outer gates, I jumped from the buggy to 
 open it and my bran new broadcloth coat 
 caught in the barbed wire fence and it was 
 torn to such an extent that I, too, then had a 
 mental ailment and got uncertain as to the 
 
2IO TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 way I should go. As there was not a tailor 
 within two hundred miles of us, my friend 
 urged me on, threatening to blindfold me if 
 I did n't. On the following day the knot 
 was tied and we started for Galveston on our 
 marriage tour, and after fifteen hours of jos- 
 tling and thumping in a barbarous old stage- 
 coach over the rockiest, roughest road mortal 
 man ever rode on, we reached a railroad town 
 about two o'clock in the morning to find all 
 the hotels full, and so had to walk the streets 
 till our train arrived about six hours after. 
 The conjugal voyage thus started lasted just 
 fifteen years and then our bark was beached. 
 Truly, '' life is a mingled yarn.'* And when 
 the mingling that has tears in it comes from 
 the treachery of professed friends, the hatred 
 of foes, or from your own impulsiveness it is 
 bad enough, but when it arises from the 
 dearest relation that can exist out of heaven, 
 it is sorrowful in the extreme. Oh, it is a 
 thousand times better to be disappointed in 
 courtship than deceived in marriage, for the 
 stem that the rose may bud on to-day will bud 
 again to-morrow, but the tree that is dead in 
 the morrow of wedlock is dead forever ! 
 
CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 THE KYLES OF BUTE. 
 
 OINCE coming here to the East I have 
 *^ succeeded in making a great many 
 friends and enemies, just as I used to do in 
 the wild West when I tried to do my duty. 
 
 This world is not a place where a man can 
 speak the truth and not be hated. The 
 shadows are lengthening, however, and I 
 must be going, I know not where, but there 
 is a dear spot over the sea in the Kyles of 
 Bute which I hope to see again before I end 
 this pilgrimage. 
 
 Don't you ever go to Scotland, brother, 
 without visiting the Kyles of Bute. They 
 are more beautiful than the Bosphorus. 
 
 There is the home of my childhood, and 
 though I say it myself, it is one of the most 
 charming spots on earth. 
 
 The surroundings are lovely, and when 
 troubles crowd upon my path I go on fancy's 
 wing and lie down in the soft woodland grass 
 
212 TWENTY-FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 beside the brook yonder that goes laughing 
 to the sea below. There the sun lingers in 
 passing over, and when he sets behind the 
 western isles that rise like sleeping kings 
 out of the Atlantic, he sends back his golden 
 rays to kiss the sweet-scented blossoms and 
 glorify wood and heather. There the birds 
 come from the South to build their nests and 
 to linger long among the yellow leaves of 
 autumn. I have seen them weep when they 
 had to go back to Spain and France. The 
 wild bee revels i-n winter on the honey he 
 gathers there in summer. The night cannot 
 stay there long in June and July, only a few 
 hours. Go with me at two o'clock in the 
 morning for about a mile up through the 
 steep woods that rise from the shore where 
 my boyhood's home is, and then climb an- 
 other mile or so back of this up a steep 
 heathery mountain so beautifully terraced as 
 if the Creator had made it with a golden 
 spade, to the level ridge above the clouds. 
 Now cast yourself on your back in the 
 heather and watch the larks rise from their 
 dewy beds on all sides of you, follow their 
 upward flight singing as they go up and up 
 
THE KYLES OF BUTE. 213 
 
 into the ethereal blue. When they are so 
 far up that you cannot see them you hear 
 something that will make you imagine that 
 you are on the plains of Bethlehem the night 
 Christ was born. 
 
 But the King of Day is sending ahead of 
 him from the east his spears of light to tell 
 of his approach. Rise up now and look 
 down to the sea, so calm and glasslike, and 
 there in the middle of a bay embosomed by 
 the woods on the shore is a cottage, not large 
 nor ornamental. How like a pine of the 
 Sierras rises the smoke from the chimney ! 
 But listen ! Hear the swelling concert that 
 comes up from the woods blow. The mavises, 
 the starlings, the blackbirds, the linnets, 
 the cuckoos, and the robins, to say nothing 
 of lesser songsters, all are trying to outdo 
 each other in making the countryside re- 
 sound with their marvelous melody. 
 
 Descend now and enter the cottage by the 
 sea. It is Milton Cottage, named after him 
 who sung of Paradise. It is five o'clock in 
 the morning, and the husband and father is 
 breakfasting on porridge and milk, followed 
 perhaps by a little tea. As he eats he casts 
 
214 TWENTY- FIVE YEARS A PARSON. 
 
 a glance now and then on the old clock 
 hanging- on the wall, for he would not be a 
 moment late, for the world, in being at his 
 daily toil down at the laird's. A little prayer 
 is said for guidance to him and his for the 
 day, and then he is off down the highway as 
 happy as if he owned all the gold of Cali- 
 fornia. On his return in the evening, and 
 supper over, he digs or plants in the garden, 
 or prunes the rose bushes around the cottage 
 for an hour or two, or maybe listens to the 
 youngsters repeating the shorter catechism. 
 He sleeps the sleep of the just now among 
 the "mouls" in the little churchyard down by 
 the roadside, and his soul is with the angels. 
 Twelve children went out from his old home, 
 and the graves of some of them are scattered 
 far and wide o'er mount and land and sea, 
 but the eye of any of them never saw, nor 
 the ear never heard coming from him that 
 which memory rejects. 
 
 Never saw the Kyles of Bute ? Why, it 
 was there that Robert Burns met his High- 
 land Mary, that Byron met the Maid of 
 Athens, and Longfellow his Evangeline. 
 
THE KYLES OF BUTE. 215 
 
 It was there, near Milton Cottage, that 
 Jacob kissed Rachel and lifted up his voice 
 and wept, and Tom Moore sighed over the last 
 rose of summer. Oh ! this world is beautiful 
 and the heavens are pretty, but the Kyles of 
 Bute are bonnie. Yon cottage by the sea 
 was only a peasant's cottage, but there was 
 and is that about it which shall never die from 
 this heart wherever I roam. 
 
 "You may break, you may ruin the vase if you will, 
 But the scent of the roses will cling to it still." 
 
 Thus spake Parson Ralph Riley, and as 
 the sun was now setting, he arose to leave, 
 and as he did so, I could see that he was 
 vexed at the wrongs of this wicked world, 
 and even more so at the shams and hypoc- 
 risies of some professing Christians. His 
 narrative gives a pretty good idea of the 
 manner of life in the wild West and South- 
 west twenty-five years ago. There is no 
 frontier any longer now to this country, and 
 those who would experience the excitements 
 of a new country must go to Africa.