On the Way Home (Little House 10)

Crossed Deer Creek at 11 o’clock. At 4 in the afternoon we came to Marysville, the county seat of Marshall County, on the Blue River. Here there is a watermill, capacity 300 barrels a day. We saw many nice houses and two palatial residences in the town. Around one is a massive brick fence about 5 feet high, thick and strong looking. On each side of the front gate a large granite lion is crouching, and on each side of the side gate a large granite dog is lying down.

Beyond Marysville we saw an acre of sweet potatoes, large dark green leaves on vines covering the ground.

We drove 27 miles today and camped near a house where there were two men drunk. They had lost the bars off their wagon, wanted to trade horses, etc. Manly had a time getting rid of them without offense.

August 8

Started at 8:30. Soon crossed Little Elm Creek and Big Elm Creek and drove through beautiful woods of elm, oak, ash, hickory, butternut and walnut. Wild plums, grapes and currants are abundant, and briars and wild flowers of all kinds. A rich sight.

Crossed Blue River again, a lovely river, so clean always, and fresh and cool. We crossed it on a bridge. This bridge is about 300 feet long. Irving is a tiny small town but it has an Opera House with a round roof, it looks like an engine boiler.

Then we crossed the Blue again. Every time we cross it, it is lovelier than before. Improved land here is from $15 to $25 an acre. Could buy an 80 on the Blue bottoms, well improved, for $3,000. The bottom land is all good farms. The bluffs are stony.

We camped near Spring Side, well named. There are springs on every side. I got water from a spring that boils up out of solid rock, cool and clear.

August 9

Started at 8:30. Awfully hilly roads, and stony. We saw a milk-house built of stone with a spring running through it, a splendid thing. Land in Pottawatomie County is $4 an acre up.

Camped in the edge of Westmoorland, the county seat. At supper time we had company, some men, two women, and children. They are regular southerners, camped near by, traveling north. To Nebraska or maybe Dakota, looking for work.

August 10

Started at 8:30 and drove through the driest country we have seen since leaving Dakota. Went through Louisville, drove 3 miles farther and camped on the bank of Vermille River, some call it Stony Creek.

August 12

Today was not as monotonous as common. 3 emigrant wagons passed us going south, and one going north. Manly and Mr. Gooley took turns talking to the people. Five wagons were going to Missouri or Arkansas, one to Arkansas, one to Indian Territory.

We had a good camping place on a little headland by the river. I rode Little Pet awhile, bareback, not going anywhere – she was turned loose to feed. Two emigrants talked to me, a young man and his mother in their wagon. They used to live in Missouri, went to Colorado, are now going back to Missouri to stay.

August 13

Drove through St. Mary’s. A pleasant town but strange, it is altogether southern, and Catholic. There is a beautiful large church with a pure white marble Saint Mary above the wide doors and two white marble statues of Mother and Child in the yard. The houses are neat and pretty. It is a clean town.

We drove to the top of a little bluff to look over the Kansas River, and there on the bottom lands we saw cornfields stretching as far as the eye could reach. Manly said he should think there were a thousand acres in sight.

On our way Manly went to a farmhouse to

trade a fire mat for some green corn for our supper, and we had an invitation to stay to dinner and put our horses in the barn and feed them. The woman came out to make me welcome. Such nice people, and a nice place, everything well kept up. Of course we could not stay. We could not be neighborly to them in return and we must get to Missouri and settled before winter.

At noon we went through Rossville, a small place, but just as we were going by the depot the train came in. The engine frightened Prince and he went through a barb-wire fence.

He struck it straight and went right through it, end over end, jumped up, ran against a clothesline and broke that and ran back to the fence. He stopped when Manly said, “Whoa, Prince,” and Manly helped him through the wire. He had only one mark, a cut about an inch long where a barb had struck him. How he ever got through so well is a wonder.

Watermelons are ripe and plentiful. Manly and Mr. Cooley bought big ones for 5 cents. We stopped by the road in the shade of trees and all of us had all the watermelon we could eat.

We passed Kingsley Station, 80 miles west of Kansas City, Missouri, and 558 miles east of Denver, Colorado. Went through Silver Lake. The lake itself is south of the town; it is 4 miles long and a half a mile wide, and trees are all around it. There is a place where a man rents boats.

We camped in a schoolhouse yard. There was a hedge all around it and a pump by the house, besides a sycamore tree. Two families going by in covered wagons stopped for water. They had been to Missouri and were going back home to dispose of their property in Nebraska, then they are moving to Missouri.

It is terribly dusty. We breathe dust all day and everything is covered thick with it.

August 14

Started at 8:30. Dust is 3 to 5 inches deep on the road and the breeze is on our backs so all the time we are in a smother of dust. Along the roads are hedges of Osage Orange trees, 20 or 30 feet high, set close together. They are thorny. Their fruit is like green oranges, but no good to eat nor for anything else.

We stopped to eat dinner about a mile from Topeka, then drove on through the city. There are a great many colored people in and around it. In North Topeka the street cars are electric, in South Topeka they are motor cars.