Tabitha Brown, Portland, OR (WPA interview)

[David D. Robertson]

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American Life Histories: Manuscripts from the Federal Writers' Project,
1936-1940

Item 14 of 18

[Pioneer Life of Tabitha Brown]

W13868

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[?] no.
[?] {Begin handwritten} 13868 {End handwritten}
[?] received {Begin handwritten} [?] {End handwritten}
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WPA L. C. PROJECT {Begin handwritten} Writers' {End handwritten} UNIT
Form [md]3 {Begin handwritten} Folklore {End handwritten} Collection (or
Type)
Title {Begin handwritten} Pioneer Life of Tabitha Brown {End handwritten}
Place of origin {Begin handwritten} Portland, Oreg. {End handwritten} Date
{Begin handwritten} 2/6/39 {End handwritten}
Project worker {Begin handwritten} Sara B. Wrenn {End handwritten}
Project editor
Remarks

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{Begin handwritten} CC Pioneer Life {End handwritten}
Form A
Circumstances of Interview
Federal Writers' Project
Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn Date February 6, 1939.
Address 505 Elks Building, Portland, Oregon
Subject Pioneer Life of Tabitha Brown
Name and address of informant Mrs. H. A. Lewis #8 N. E. 97th Ave.,
Portland, Oregon.
Date and time of interview February 3, 1939 1:30 to 3:30 P. M.
Place of interview Above address, home of informant.
Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with informant --
Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you --
Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.
Large, comfortably but plainly furnished living room, of the ordinary
colorless type. House, two-story, six-room, of the early nineties
architecture; in fair condition. A garden of the usual variety, enclosed by
a fence, surrounds the house, which is situated on a corner. A nursery of
considerable acreage adjoins -- the business and property of Mr. Lewis. The
place is more than eleven blocks from the end of the carline on East
Glisan, with sidewalks, terminating after two blocks. The cross street,
97th Ave., is unimproved, being a succession of big chuckholes, now full of
muddy water and resembling portions of the old immigrant trail across the
Cascade Mountains. To avoid these holes, the worker made her zigzaging way
until she finally staggered through the gate.


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Form B
Personal History of Informant
Federal Writers' Project
Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn Date February 6, 1939.
Address 505 Elks Building, Portland, Oregon
Subject Pioneer Life of Tabitha Brown.
Name and address of informant Mrs. H. A. Lewis, 8 N. E. 97th Ave.,
Portland, Oregon.
Information obtained should supply the following facts:
1. Ancestry
2. Place and date of birth
3. Family
4. Places lived in, with dates
5. Education, with dates
6. Occupations and accomplishments with dates
7. Special skills and interests
8. Community and religious activities
9. Description of informant
10. Other points gained in interview
1. English.
2. Forest Grove, Oregon, July 18, 1863.
3. Alvin Clark Brown, father; Sarah Ann Ross, mother; two sons, Clayton and
Dee.
4. Forest Grove, 1863-1889; Portland, Oregon, 1889 to date.
5. Public schools; Pacific University, Forest Grove, Ore.
6. Teacher, public schools; bookkeeper; housewife. No special
accomplishments.
7. No special skills. Interested in Oregon history, flowers and nature.
8. No church affiliation as to denomination. Has always taken part in
community Sunday school and social and welfare work. Member of Parent
Teachers' Association, Daughters American Revolution, Sons and Daughters of
Oregon Pioneers, XPU (Ex-students Pacific University), Oregon Grange.
9. Intelligent appearing woman. Medium sized, with gray hair, hazel eyes
and ordinary style of dress -- just one of a thousand women of American
lineage. Her ancestors came to America in the 17th century.


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Form C
Text of Interview (Unedited)
Federal Writers' Project
Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn Date February 6, 1939.
Address 505 Elks Building, Portland, Oregon.
Subject Pioneer Life of Tabitha Brown
Name and address of informant Mrs. H. A. Lewis, 8 N. E. 97th Ave.,
Portland, Oregon.
Text:
My grandmother, as you already know, was Tabitha Brown, who, with her
little orphan school, started what is now the Pacific University at Forest
Grove. I don't believe I know of any incidents that have not already been
told and written many times concerning her crossing the plains with her
fatherless children and her heroic efforts after reaching here. Her journal
is preserved among the treasures of the Pacific University, where it has
been available to many students of Oregon history. Being a descendent of
thrifty New Englanders, when she found the obstruction in her riding glove
finger was a picayune, or 6 1/4 cent piece, you may imagine how happy she
was at the discovery, on one of the dark days shortly after arrival. With
the picayune clutched tightly in her hand she went at once to the trading
post, where she exchanged it for three needles. Then she traded same old
clothes -- and they must have been mighty old, threadbare and ragged
clothes for her to have parted with them at all -- to the Indians for
buckskin, after which she made gloves - and made gloves - and made gloves.
She used to say afterward that she had "made gloves for all the ladies and
gentlemen of Oregon."


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When grandmother started her little school at Forest Grove, it was first
for orphan children, and in addition to teaching them the alphabet and the
three Rs -- reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic -- she taught them how to keep
house and sew. Wait a minute -- see, here is the old iron with which she
taught them how to iron their clothes. (The iron was of the old-fashioned
sadiron type, with an iron handle and all in one piece, the iron now
corroded and pitted with small holes). Once, when the strawberries were
ripe -- the strawberries were so big in those days, much larger than now;
my husband thinks it was because of the land having been burned over so
often and the rich soil resulting from the ashes. Well anyway, grandmother
was sending her little brood out to pick strawberries for dinner. By this
time, however, she had other pupils than orphans. Others were sending their
children, paying for their education and board with vegetables and grain
and such provender, when they hadn't the money. One little girl, whose
parents were paying real money in her behalf, decided on this day that she
didn't have to pick strawberries. She was heard to say, "My pa pays for me,
I'm not going to pick her old berries", and didn't. But that night at the
supper table one place was lacking a saucer of luscious, red wild
strawberries. One little girl sat with nothing to eat, while all the rest
of the little boys and girls gobbled down strawberries and cream -- for
they had cream by this time -- whether they were rich or poor. There was no
more trouble of that kind. Grandmother knew how to deal with class
distinction.
Mother, who came to Oregon in 1847, and whose people settled in Portland,
was one of grandmother's early pupils, because there was no school in
Portland at the time. Her romance with my father must have begun rather
early. This little song book, called "The School Singer, or Young Choir's
Companion," was one of the books she took out to Forest Grove with her.
They all took just such books as they might have. Another textbook she had
was Webster's speller. My mother was a

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Congregationalist. But we used to go to other churches and meetings. I
remember they used to hold camp meetings regularly at what was known as
Ames Chapel, near Crescent Grove cemetery, near what is now Tigard. I can
still hear the sonorous voice of one revivalist, who solemnly intoned over
and over again: "If the Son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed."
They used to hold these camp meetings for days at a time, sometimes for two
or three weeks. They had one big building or shelter, where they slept; the
men at one end and the women at the other. Who slept in the middle, between
them? Well, as I recall, it was the leader of the meetings and his wife, a
Mr. and Mrs. William Kelly. Mr. Kelly slept next to the men and Mrs. Kelly
next to the women.
To go back to Grandma Tabitha Brown, it may interest you to know that for a
short period, while she and grandfather, who was a clergyman, were waiting
for the completion of their parsonage, they lived in the home of George
Washington at Mount Vernon. That was in the year 1815, and I remember
hearing her tell about it, and the little "cat-door" with hinges, that was
in the door leading to Martha Washington's room. I suppose it was her
bedroom. It always interested me so as a child, picturing the cat going in
and out through its little hinged door.
Of all the lovely things that have been said and written of Grandmother
Brown, the loveliest to me, is the tribute written by Mrs. Elizabeth
Wilson, one of the early teachers sent out to Oregon by the New England
Board of Education, and whose first work here was with grandmother, wherein
she says: "Her heart was as tender and kind as her spirit was energetic."
In the wagon train in which my mother came to Oregon a woman joker caused
trouble that might have ended in a tragedy. One day an Indian brave of the
Nez Perce tribe visited them when in camp. It was up in the Nez Perce
country, and, fortunately, as matters turned out, he came alone. This
woman, who could talk a

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little jargon, just a few words, gathered some of the girls about her and
told the Indian they were all hers, and wouldn't he like to have one. He
indicated he would, and picked out my mother. Then the woman, either
because she thought the joke would be funnier, or possibly becoming a
little frightened, said; "Oh that one is specially fine; she is very white.
I want a hundred spotted ponies for her." The Indian grunted and rode off,
and it was hoped that ended the incident, for when the men of the party
learned of the matter they were greatly concerned. And they had need to be,
for next morning, bright and early, here came the Indian, driving in sixty
spotted ponies, all that he could collect, and for which he demanded his
young white squaw. They said my step-grandfather, Isreal Mitchell, was
white as a sheet, when he, with several of the men, finally placated the
Indian; and until they got out of that section of the country, the camp
guards were kept double what they had before been. They fully expected him
to return with reinforcements to demand his bride.
My step-grandfather was a very peaceable man. He didn't come to the Oregon
country so much to better his condition, but rather with the idea of
helping Dr. Whitman in his missionary efforts. When they reached the Walla
Walla country they encamped at the Whitman Mission, and grandmother took
advantage of the opportunity to do some laundry. Among the things she
washed were a pair of stockings. Meantime an Indian, with his blanket
wrapped around him, had stalked, unannounced, into her little domain.
Suddenly grandmother missed her stockings. She looked all about, but they
were not to be found. Then she turned on her unwelcome visitor, demanding
to know if he had them. He was a Mission Indian and could talk some
English. He grunted no, he didn't have them, and shook his blankets, but
without revealing his hands, to prove his denial. But grandmother was not
convinced, and that night she announced to grandfather that

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"We are not going to stay here among these thieving Indians. We are going
on to the Willamette Valley." And on to the Willamette Valley they went. It
was only a short time later that the Whitman massacre occurred. Grandmother
always felt she owed a good deal to a pair of stockings.
Another story of the Indians my mother's family told, was about the
stealing of their horse, Prince. That was in the Walla Walla country too.
The Indians stole Prince, and the next day they brought him back, the chief
demanding one shirt. The one shirt was given him. The next day or night
Prince was stolen again, and again brought back, and another shirt
demanded. This was repeated until grandmother was compelled to make a shirt
out of an old dress skirt. This time two shirts were demanded, one big one
and one little one, for the chief's son. By that time the wagon train was
getting out of the tribe's territory, I suppose, for they left Prince to go
on his way unmolested further.


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Form D
Extra Comment
Federal Writers' Project
Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn Date February 6, 1939
Address 505 Elks Building, Portland, Oregon.
Subject Pioneer Life of Tabitha Brown
Name and address of informant Mrs. H. A. Lewis 8 N. E. 97th Ave., Portland,
Oregon
Comment:
It was hoped that this interview mould result in considerable personal
detail concerning Mrs. Lewis's grandmother, Tabitha Brown, but apparently
all she had is that which the records of Pacific University reveal.


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EXCERPTS FROM THE EARLY OREGON REMINISCENCES OF MRS. E. M. WILSON
In 1851, the year of our first residence in Oregon, the Indians were
roaming at will. I was very much interested in them and never afraid. Had I
been as observant then as I afterward became, I would never have been so
fearless in giving food or clothing. I would insist that the men should
carry the burden. The squaw would not comprehend, but I would refuse to
hand over the gift until I had some sort of an acquiescence to my plan. But
I had no reason to think it was lasting, and suppose the customary burden-
bearer took up her load as soon as my back was turned.
----------
Once, some ten or fifteen fine-looking fellows (Indians) gadded into my
father's study. Seating themselves on the floor, they stared about in their
dignified way, till my father dropped his plate of teeth into his hand, to
remove a blackberry seed that annoyed him. One frightened look and then a
scramble for the door. Never waiting to rise to their feet, they shot out
as if impelled by the Evil One, as they verily believed. No inducement
would bring them back. The power to drop one's teeth into the hand and put
them back again where they belonged was too "big medicine" for them. I do
not doubt my father's life would have been safe with this power, had he
otherwise been in danger.
One cold, rainy night, in December, in Albany, the first winter of our
Oregon life, I was struck with the terrible misery of two Indians --
houseless,

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soaked with rain -- their moccasins fairly water-logged. It was nine
o'clock at night. One of them was shaking with ague, or the chill of
pneumonia. His lungs were so congested, the rain so severe, he could only
catch his breath in gasps, ' wake siah memaloose' . -- I thought .... he
was about to die. The other had a violent toothache. I took them into the
little house where I taught school, built up a red-hot fire in the stove,
and brot blankets from home, food too, though both were too sick to eat.
Then I took the laudanum bottle to father and asked him to show me an
average adult dose. But in giving it, remembering father's homeopathic
proclivities, I thot it better to double the dose. I wanted to insure one
night of complete forgetfulness. But with my own bedtime came compunctions
and fear. What if they, unused to white man's concoctions, should be
unusually pensitive. Now I was sure I did not want to commit murder. What
if I should find two dead Indians in my schoolroom in the morning. With
fear and trembling I went over in the early morning -- but a still earlier
hour had sent them on their way. The following year two fine looking
Indians accosted me. I did not remember them, but they identified
themselves as my hospital patients of the year before, and repeatedly
declared, 'skookum medicine'.
In Sept., 1851, I was riding horseback through the unsettled counties of
Polk and Yamhill, on my way from Albany to Forest Grove, where I was
teaching. Somewhere in the northern part of Yamhill County, we saw the
cabin of a new settler. A fence, newly built, enclosed a small piece,
broken up for a garden. A man was ploughing at a little distance in the
open. The sun was gone; the world lay in twilight; only this little cabin,
the result of a few days' work, to make the scene look otherwise than it
had looked for a thousand years. It might be many miles to the next house,
so, uninviting as the prospect

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was, we thot better to beg shelter for the night and supper, to risking the
possibility of not finding any at all. My escort rode to the man who was
still with his plow, and I dismounted at the cabin, where two little
children, perhaps two and four years of age, were looking at me thru the
rude fence. 'Please tell your mother to come out'. They did not speak, only
looked at me. I tried again. 'Tell mammy to come.' I then went in, and
taking the oldest by the hand, I said, 'Take me where mammy is,' and the
little thing led me around the corner of the house to the other side of the
enclosure, and stopped by a new-made grave.
In February, 1855, I was going on the steamer Canemah to Oregon City. I was
married then but a short time, and very able to enter sympathetically into
the emotions of a young married couple -- married that morning -- that came
on board, the bride not much over sixteen. They were going to the Cascades,
he to work in a sawmill, she to cook for the men. She was dressed as she
thot proper for a bride, but not at all suitably for a boat ride on a cold,
rainy day. I got into talk with her. She said it was her first time on a
steamboat. I advised her to go behind a portier and change into something
warmer... I became much {Begin deleted text} inrerested {End deleted text}
{Begin inserted text} {Begin handwritten} interested {End handwritten} {End
inserted text} in the young couple, and it was with a sense of personal
bereavement that I heard the following fall of the young husband's being
killed by the Indians, in the sawmill; having first witnessed the
butchering of his wife.
In the fall of 1855 my mother and brother (?) took up a claim, two and one-
fourth sections on the south edge of the French Prairie. To make the
necessary proofs they had to go to Oregon City. My husband was very
unwilling

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to leave us alone at night, but no time could be lost. Mr. Wilson wrote to
my brother, who was assessing Marion County, asking him to come if
possible. He also took me into the yard and gave me a lesson is self-
defense. So, when the Salem stage wagon came along, they started, going
over the Champoeg road -- mother and Joseph, my husband, leaving myself and
my two younger sisters alone. The whole eastern part of the State was then
in a state of outbreak.
The long summer day came to a close. My younger sister and I retired,
leaving Mary reading. Presently I was awakened by her gasping voice, 'The
house is surrounded by drunken Indians!' It seemed true, but I recalled
that a log cabin, with but one well-barred door, no window that could be
entered; a wide, low chimney, to be sure, but that could be easily defended
by fire. Their voices were drunken, but a great comfort came to us when we
recognized Frenchmen. Yet still there was no quieting our fears till they
moved on. Shortly after what seemed to be a round of parting drinks, we
heard the delightful sound of their moving away. We were so weakened by
fright that we had not left our post of lookout, when Mary, in a voice of
utter despair said, 'One of them is jumping his horse over the fence!' At
that instant he began to sing. No song or anthem will ever carry up from my
heart a fuller burden of devout gratitude than the words we heard:

'Oh, I almost wish
That I were a fish,
To be caught by
My sweet Kitty Clyde.'
My brother, Frank, had found the note in Salem and rode out to the ranch,
keeping well behind the other party, whom he had seen were unusually merry
and boisterous.


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Once in awhile, at White Salmon, we all went up the mountainside, to where,
on a small plateau, were a number of tepees, the occupants of which were
going thru the ceremonial of the Snohollo excitement or belief. I
understood it imperfectly. As far as I did it seemed very similar to the
Messiah craze, in the Dakotas, a few years ago. I soon wearied of what, to
me, seemed utterly meaningless, and went into a tepee, where sat an old,
smoke-dried crone. She was glad to see me. Seemed to have some burden on
her heart that I must hear. After much repeition on her part, and much
bewilderment on mine, I gathered that, in spite of appearances, she was not
like them -- the crowd outside, that she was like me, 'my sister.' I did
not know at what she was aiming till I heard the name 'Jason Lee' repeated
over and over again. Then she asked me to listen, and with her teeth
tightly closed, she sent thru them some vocal sounds which at last I caught
to be two or three lines of Greenville. I began to sing, 'Come ye sinners,
poor and needy.' She accompanied me with what sounded like singing on a
comb. She enjoyed it and so did I. Her story I translate to be this. At one
time she had been to the Salem school, or under the teaching of Jason Lee;
that she had glimpses of a higher life than savagery had given her; that in
the following years she had held on to the little she had, stoutly refusing
to countenance by her presence the Snohollo incantations going on outside.
The wigwam smoke and the wild life had wellnigh obliterated the little she
knew, but to the name of 'Jason Lee' she held as to a watchward. Most truly
she seemed to be one feeling for God's hand in the darkness. I believe she
was then lifted up and strengthened. This was the only time I ever chanced,
knowingly, to meet anyone who had been brot under that early missionary
influence.


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One spring, my husband being gone on his first circuit to hold court, I was
taken ill, and to make it more convenient for those who cared for me, my
bed was brot down into the living room. I was alone there, quite ill, when
the door was opened, and a big Indian walked in and said that he would
bring his ictas to me, that I must take care of them while he was away on
some journey. Another Siwash had stolen his klutchman (cloochiman - his
woman) and he was going after them to recover either wife or ponies. But he
could not leave his possessions in his wigwam or they would be stolen. I
was quite helpless; only children in the house. There mere many things I
would rather house than the belongings of an Indian. I asked him how long
he would leave them; 'three suns.' 'Very well,' I told him, 'but not one
minute longer than three suns.' Could I have had my choice they would not
have shared my room three minutes, but he was faithful to his word and kept
his appointment to the minute.
In 1885, one June afternoon, I heard peculiar noises on the sidewalk, in
the shade of my house, and found them to be the result of an extraordinary
sewing club that was squatted there, working hard. They explained that the
boat that day was to bring the students of their reservation, who had been
away at the Forest Grove Indian School. They had come to meet them, but had
not had time to completely finish all the preparations they were making. As
needles and thimbles were put to work, sleeves finished and set in, buttons
put on and buttonholes worked, the change from old to new clothes was made
under our high sidewalk, and when the boat whistled a neatly dressed score
of more of relatives went down to meet the students.


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Among the remarkable Indians of early days was one called 'Lawyer.' His
son, (?) also called Lawyer, took charge of the horses of Lewis and Clark
on their expedition to the Pacific in 1804-6. Here is an individual - a
special development, leading an advance guard; small perhaps, but easily
distinguished from the rank and file... his generations following may be
ready to carry onward a few steps farther, the banner of progress -- this
was the case with the famous Indian, Lawyer, a Nez Perce.
All who claim Oregon as a home are indebted to this truly noble red man for
the powers he possessed and exercised toward promoting unity. In June,
1877, in the old Congregational Church on Third Street, I saw Archie
Lawyer, his son, en route to Portland to receive ordination as a
Presbyterian minister. He was accompanied by two others, and a more
dignified, gentlemanly, intelligent class of students, it was never my
privilege to see. This was the year of the death of his father at about the
age of eighty. Lawyer was one of the first pupils of H. G. (?) Spaulding in
1837, who came to the West with Dr. Whitman. He learned to read well, and
to the end of his life showed the bearing of an intelligent and cultivated
gentleman.
Another example of industry was found in the person of an Indian woman,
known as Jennie Mitchell. She was once the wife of the last chief of the
Nehalems. In 1860, the chief being dead, she came to her own land, the
Clatsop country, and there married Michael Martineau, with whom she lived
until his death. Indian women age rapidly in appearance. Her age, is, of
course, unknown. She remembers, as a child, hearing the bombardment of the
Indian village at the mouth of the Columbia, by Dr. McLaughlin, in 1829.
What with smoke and disorder she seemed

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extremely old. She did not talk English. I was made to observe what I had
seen before, the peculiar devotion of the Indian woman who marries a white
man. He may not be a very noble speciman of his race, but, such as he is,
the native woman submits to -- returns for everything the utmost devotion.
>From the first light of dawn to the last glimmer, she wrought constantly
over her baskets and rush mats. The last of her race -- all of her kindred
dead -- childless. How good it was that she could weave mats!
In the year 1869 we spent some time at the Indian Agency of Fort Simcoe.
Agent Wilbur was a wonderfully gifted man, fitted as few are for his work.
>From camping with the Indians in the forest, showing them how to fell the
trees, to make and load the skids, which supplied the sawmill, and the
lumber to construct the various buildings on the Reserve; to acting on
police force; he was infinitely resourceful, lightning quick in thought and
action. I asked him once where he learned how so quickly to plant that
giant fist of his just where it was most needed. He said he was once a
deputy sheriff in N. Y. I cannot compare Mr. Wilbur to distinguished
leaders of men I have read of in history. He was a man of affairs, often
called from his remote sphere of action to confer with those at the head of
Indian affairs at Washington, where his counsel was regarded with rare
reverence. The first time we visited the Reservation was after a terrible
bereavement, the loss by drowning of my son, Alfred. The Indians all knew
of it and I an reminded of that touch of nature that makes kinship of
copper color and white, in remembering that one of them went to a house
that was near and brot thence a rocking chair, which he placed for me. I am
sure it indicated sympathy, tho no doubt they were proud of the unusual
possession of so elegant an article of furniture, and not unwilling it
should be used by the strange visitors... We visited a farm house with Mr.
Wilbur -- the pride of his heart.


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He said the amount of work done by that family was surprising, and it was --
 a decent farm house, floored, with glass windows, some chairs, table, etc.
The pride of the house, however, was the quantity of crochet work.
Everything to which a crochet edge could be fastened, had it. It was not
quite so smoked and grimy as it would have been had they been living on the
ground floor of the original tepee. The beds were veritable constructions,
with quilts, pillows, pillow cases, trimmed deep with their own work, and a
great improvement over the huddle of skins and horse blankets that make
their usual bed. But I hope by this time they spend a little less time on
washing the floor, and a little more on the bed linen.
Information about SGML version of this document.

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