but a short stage for the afternoon, and, having
pulled some seven or eight miles to a spot a short distance below the
"little Butte," we drew in at a beautiful opening among the trees.

The soldiers now made a regular business of encamping, by cutting down a
large tree for their fire and applying themselves to the preparing of a
sufficient quantity of food for their next day's journey, a long
stretch, namely, of twenty-one miles across Winnebago Lake. Our
Frenchmen did the same. The fire caught in the light dry grass by which
we were surrounded, and soon all was blaze and crackle.

Fortunately the wind was sufficient to take the flames all in one
direction, and, besides, there was not enough fuel to have made them a
subject of any alarm. We hopped upon the fallen logs, and dignified the
little circumscribed affair with the name of "a prairie on fire." The
most serious inconvenience was its having consumed all the dry grass,
some armfuls of which, spread under the bear-skin in my tent, I had
found, the night before, a great improvement to my place of repose.

Our supper was truly delightful, at the pleasant sunset hour, under the
tall trees beside the waters that ran murmuring by; and when the bright,
broad moon arose, and shed her flood of light over the scene, so wild
yet so beautiful in its vast solitude, I felt that I might well be an
object of envy to the friends I had left behind.

But all things have an end, and so must at last my enthusiasm for the
beauties around me, and, albeit unwillingly, I closed my tent and took
my place within, so near the fall of canvas that I could raise it
occasionally and peep forth upon the night.

In time all was quiet. The men had become silent, and appeared to have
retired to rest, and we were just sinking to our slumbers, when a heavy
tread and presently a bluff voice were heard outside.

"Mr. Kinzie! Mr. Kinzie!"

"Who is there? What is it?"

"I'm Krissman; didn't you mean, sir, that the men should have any liquor
to-night?"

"Of course I did. Has not Kilgour given out your rations?"

"No: he says you did not say anything particular about it, and he was
not coming to ask you if you forgot it; but I thought I wouldn't be
bashful--I'd just come and ask.'"

"That is right. Tell Kilgour I should like to have him serve out a
ration apiece."

"Thank you, sir," in a most cheerful tone; "I'll tell him."

Krissman was getting to be quite a character with us.

A row of a