she
came to bake them, they turned perfectly black and had to be thrown
away. The man was gone. Again my father bought half a hog from a man who
brought in a load of pork, but my mother had learned her lesson and
cooked a piece before the man left town and, as it proved to be bad, my
father hunted him up and made him take back his hog and refund the
money.

The first Thanksgiving my mother said she was going to invite some young
lawyers to dinner who boarded with "Old Uncle Rundle". What she had I
can not remember, except "fried cakes" and rice pudding made without
milk or eggs, but the guests said they never had eaten anything so
delicious.

Judge Thomas S. Buckham--1856.

In 1856 three or four hundred Indians on their way to the annual
payment, camped in the woods between town and Cannon City. One evening
we went, in a body, to visit them and were entertained by dancing.
However, too much "fire water" caused some fear among the guests.

We had several courses of lectures during those early years. One year we
had as lecturers, Wendell Phillips, Douglas, Beecher, Tilton and
Emerson; following them came the Peake family, bell ringers and last of
all, a sleight of hand performer from Mankato, Mr. Wheeler, who
astonished his audience by swallowing a blunt sword twenty-two inches
long.

At another time we had a home-made "lecture course" in which Mr. Cole,
Mr. Batchelder, Judge Lowell, myself and others took part.

One of our first celebrations of the Fourth of July ended rather
disastrously. We had planned a burlesque procession in which everybody
was to take part. It started out fairly well. Dr. Jewett delivered an
oration and Frank Nutting sang a song called "The Unfortunate Man," but
the enthusiasm was shortly quenched by torrents of rain which in the end
literally drove most of the participants to drink.

After the panic of 1857-8, I was sitting idly one day in front of my
office on Main Street, as there was absolutely no law business. No other
man was in sight, and there hadn't been a dollar seen in the town in
months, except the "shin-plaster" issued by banks, which must be cashed
on the instant lest the bank in question should fail over night.
Suddenly I saw a stranger walking down the street, and as very few
strangers had come to town of late, I watched him idly. As he came up
he asked, "Young man, do you know of a good piece of land which can be
bought?" I spoke of a farm south of town of which I had c