in P. Whipple, said of her study of
Mormonism:--

She undertook a perfectly original method of arriving at the truth, by
intimate conversations with Mormon husbands and wives, as well as with
the most intelligent of the "Gentiles." She discarded from her mind
pre-conceptions and all prejudices which discolor and distort objects
which should be rigidly investigated, and looked at the mass of facts
before her in what Bacon calls "dry light." Cornelius Vanderbilt, the
elder, was accustomed to account for the failures and ruin of the
brilliant young brokers who tried to corner the stocks in which he had
an interest, by declaring that "these dashing young fellars didn't see
things as they be." Miss Field saw things in Utah "as they be." She
collected facts of personal observation, analyzed and generalized them,
and, by degrees, her sight became insight, and the passage from insight
to foresight is rapid. After thorough investigation, her insight
enabled her to penetrate into the secret of that "mystery of iniquity"
which Mormonism really is; while her foresight showed her what would
be the inevitable result of the growth and diffusion of such a horrible
creed.

The winter lapsed into spring and still she lingered in Salt Lake City.
She relinquished all pleasure for the real work of studying deeply the
anomaly of a Polygamous hierarchy thriving in the heart of the Republic.
Every facility was accorded to her by United States officials, military
officers, leading Gentiles and Apostates. Prominent "Latter Day Saints"
offered her marked courtesy. She pursued this research unremittingly for
eight months and when, at last, she left Salt Lake City, the leading
Gentile paper, the Tribune, devoted a leading editorial to Miss Field's
marvellously thorough study of Mormon conditions, and, on her departure,
said:--

"Miss Field is probably the best posted person, outside the high
Mormon church officials, and others who have been in the church, on
this institution, in the world, and its effects upon men, women and
governments. With a fixedness of purpose which nothing could swerve,
and with an energy which neither storm, mud, snow, cold looks, the
persuasions or even the loss of friends, could for a moment dampen, she
has held on her course. In the tabernacle, in the ward meeting house,
in the homes of high Mormons, and, when these were closed to her, in
the homes of the poor, she