their reach all the billets of wood, sticks, and stones, lest they should kill each other with them. But with all the caution of the squaws, an Indian chief was slain in one of these drunken overtures, and I noticed that they sought and selected from the masses, without regard to his own family, those who were considered the best criers, whose duty it was to assemble at stated times around the house in which the fallen chief had lived, and bewail his loss.

During my stay, my landlord, Jones, left to convey some public messages to Vincennes, which place he reached in safety, but as he was returning he was taken prisoner and adopted as the son of an old Indian. After a good long stay, however, he procured his release by giving his note to his new parent for the sum of one hundred and fifty dollars, and thus, after so long a confinement, made his escape and returned home without any other injury except loss of time, for he of course never liquidated the debt which he had incurred to be free.

The next thing I noted was that the greatest insult which could be given to an Indian warrior was to call him a woman. This I learned by

being out with Jones near where some Indians were talking, and seeing one assume a certain posture, I was led to inquire why he did it, and Jones informed me that he had been heretofore conquered, and that it was a stipulation in their treaties that a conquered warrior should be called a squaw.

I will now wind up these short and scattering stories by giving you an account of a shooting match I had at Kaskaskia, with an Indian. It was my habit during my stay to frequently stroll among the tents, notice the habits of the Indians, and whenever an opportunity would offer to take a shoot at a mark with one of them, I was sure to take instantaneous advantage of it; and in one of these peregrinations I wore a velvet jacket with bright buttons upon it, and catching the eye of an Indian whose fancy it wonderfully struck, he advanced and by signs gave me to understand that he would stake his new beaver hat against it and shoot with me for the two. Agreed, gestured I, and holding up three fingers and pointing at two of them, by which means to make him understand that I meant to shoot the best two out of three; but he shook his head and held up one

finger, meaning the first shot. I nodded my head for an acceptance of his terms, and the target now being set up we shot, and upon examination of the mark I picked up my jacket and the hat, but he opposed my having them on the ground that we were to shoot the best two in three, and having great confidence in my aim and to avoid a difficulty, I staked up both articles again. The target was again fixed up. He shot. His ball took effect near the centre, but no matter, I levelled my rifle and fired, and what remained for me to do was to take into possession my plunder, for I had knocked the cross clear out. And now, after having endeavored to entertain you with the foregoing, I find the next in course is that of

MY GREAT HUNT WITH ANDERSON.

About the time above referred to, an old experienced hunter, Anderson by name, having been struck-as he expressed himself—with my success as a gunsman when from time to time he had noticed my luck in shooting with the Indians, proposed to me to take a hunt with him. And having long since grown tired of Kaskaskia—a

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place in which I as a poor man had no desire to remain, unless I could make more than mere experience, and this had been my fate ever since my arrival, for that cur of all curs, the ungrateful swindling Alexander Douglass,* never paid me a solitary cent for my trip agine how eagerly I accepted the invitation of the old hunter, and joined him for a tour of two or three months.

one can im

We provided a large kettle, the substance of which being very thin rendered it quite light, a butcher-knife, a hatchet, and some other necessaries, as our guns, ammunition, etc., and on the morning of the 20th day of May, 1793, we departed for the Big Saline, aiming to reach a point now known as the Salt Works. We travelled on all day, and about the time the shades of night began to fall upon the beautiful landscape which we were entering, "and all the air a solemn stillness hold," we found ourselves about twenty-five miles on our journey. We now concluded to make arrangements for camping, and after we had hobbled our horse-having but one,

* No kin to Elmore and Ila Douglass.

which we rode time about—Anderson took his gun and started out to kill some meat for supper, leaving me to make up a fire; but not being able to bear the idea of camp-keeping when at the same time my comrade's rifle was ringing through the forest, I dropped all, and catching up mine, bounded away in an opposite direction into the wilderness, and soon had a fine deer stretched upon the ground, and another and another, until three had fallen. We met, at the camp, Anderson with one poor turkey, which could not have been eaten even in the absence of other food without first skinning it, for the ten thousand ticks that were gnawing into its body. But I had done the work. We cast the filthy bird aside and skinned my three deer, prepared venison, and after a hearty and well-relished meal retired. The next morning we set out again, first one riding and then the other, and after travelling on for a couple of days we came upon buffalo signs, and in a little while we reached what is known as Knight's Prairie, Illinois, in which there was a large lick, and pausing a minute on the confines of this great opening, we concluded to separate; Anderson to go round, and myself