our Government shall participate," answered the
Secretary. "As to the report, have you not acknowledged the
contributions to all those who have sent?"

"Oh, yes; every dollar and every box of goods where the donor was
known," I replied.

"Has any one complained?" he asked.

"No; not a single person so far as is known. We have had only thanks."

"Then to whom would you report?"

"To you, Mr. Secretary, or to such person or in such manner as you shall
designate."

"I don't want any report; no report is necessary," answered the
Secretary. "Our Government relief-boats have reported you officially,
and all the country knows what you have done and is more than satisfied.
Regarding your illness--you have had too much fresh water, Miss Barton,
I recommend salt--and shall appoint you."

This was done, and the appropriation for expenses was made, and at my
request Judge Joseph Sheldon, and by invitation Mr. A. S. Solomon, our
vice-president, were also appointed to accompany me. The appropriation
sufficed for all.

The conference was held at Geneva, September 17, 1884, and thus was had
the first official representation of the United States Government at an
International Conference of the Treaty of Geneva. There have since been
five. I have attended all but one.

II

THE TEXAS FAMINE AND THE MT. VERNON CYCLONE

Before the close of the following year, 1885, came what was known as the
"Texas Famine." Thousands of miles of wild land, forming the Pan Handle,
had been suddenly opened by the building of a Southern Railroad. In the
speculative anxiety of the Road to people its newly acquired territory,
unwarranted inducements of climatic advantages had been unscrupulously
held out to the poor farmers of Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia.

Lured by the pictures presented them, some thousands of families had
been induced to leave their old, worn-out farms, and with the little
they could carry or drive, reach the new Eldorado, to find a new farm
that needed only the planting to make them rich, prosperous, and happy,
without labor. They planted. The first year brought some returns--the
second was a drought with no returns--the third the same. Hunger for
themselves and starvation for their stock stared them in the face. They
could not pick up and go back--the rivers were dry from the Rio Grande
to the Brazos--the earth was iron, and the heavens brass; cattle
wandered at will for water and feed, and their bones whitened t