360

SAGACITY OF THE MORMON LEADERS.

[1865. diate valley in which Salt Lake City lies is much its best portion. With irrigation the soil is very productive. Settlements of the Saints extend hundreds of miles in all directions. Almost every valley in Utah is dotted with little dwellings of adobe, herds of

cattle, flocks of sheep, great stacks of hay and barley, and thriving young orchards.

Probably eight-ninths of the Mormons are of foreign birth. Many are English, while Norway and Sweden are largely represented. They thrive in spite of their heavy, enforced contributions to the church; for the leaders are men of rare sagacity who steadfastly inculcate industry, frugality, temperance and peace

fulness.

Not more than one man in four or five is a polygamist. Brigham exhorts them to persevere in the system and defend it with their lives, even against the Government of the United States. The women regard it as a sore trial, to be compensated only by the happiness of eternity. Often two or three sisters have the

1865.]

PRACTICAL WORKINGS OF POLYGAMY.

361

same husband. Some men are married to a mother and her daughter; others to their own half-sisters. When possible, each wife occupies a separate house or room; but poverty sometimes compels three or four to live in the same apartments. I think they never bring in the mothers-in-law. Even Mormon grace would hardly suffice for that!

The Gentile women recognize and visit only the first wives. I conversed alone with three Mormon ladies on their system. Two were young and unmarried. The first was an active member of the church, and apparently an earnest believer in its doctrines. She spoke of it with great ardor, manifesting the anxiety universal in the entire community for the respect and commendation of stran gers. She laid great stress upon the honesty, frugality and hospi tality of the people, the kindness and justice of the leaders in all their dealings, and the special favor and protection of the Almighty which their history seemed to imply. But to my remark that I liked every thing I saw except polygamy, she answered ingenuously:

6

Well, I don't like that, and I don't know of anybody who does!'

The second, though reared in the faith, and nominally one of the Saints, had steadfastly refused all offers of marriage. She regarded the leaders as charlatans, declared she would die rather than wed in a community where plurality of wives was tolerated, and would leave the Territory but for family ties. A few months later she did leave, to become the wife of a Gentile.

The third was the wife of a prominent Saint. I had already formed her acquaintance in public, and now I encountered her accidentally for ten minutes in a Gentile parlor. Again and again had I heard her husband aver that the women not merely acquiesced in polygamy, but often urged their consorts to take additional wives. After some general conversation she asked:

'What is the most noticeable thing you find among us?'

'The peacefulness of the rival wives. The fact that they not only refrain from breaking each others' heads, but generally seem friendly, sometimes even affectionate.'

"That is from strong religious conviction. Nothing else could produce it. I believe our women are better, more patient

362

ONE WIFE TOO MANY.

[1865,

than any others in the world. Nobody knows the severity of the trials they have to endure.'

'Your people have treated us with the greatest courtesy, and shown us much which excites our sympathy and admiration. They have exhibited little of your home-life; but that little only confirms my previous belief that to give another woman the sacred name of wife, is the greatest crime, the last possible outrage a man can commit against his own wife and the mother of his children.' The lady replied in painful earnestness, with teeth clinched and every muscle tense:

เ

Certainly it is! I would rather see my daughter in her shroud than married to a pluralist.'

The first wife deems herself superior to the rest, sometimes refusing to associate or speak with them, or to recognize the legíti macy of their marriage.

'Are you Mr.

lady.

's only wife?' asked a Gentile of a Mormon

'I am,' was the reply; 'though several other women call them selves his wives l'

We were told of one poor fellow with a pair of wives, in a single house containing but two rooms. When he brought home his second spouse, the first indignantly repudiated him and would no longer even speak to him. Soon after, the second wife also refused to serve him further; and the luckless man was sleeping alone upon the floor of his cabin and doing his own cooking, washing and mending, while his consorts were at least agreed in hating him cordially! Like old Weller he had 'done it once too often.'

We dined at the house of a leading Saint, whose two wives present at the board, but only as waiters, were dressed precisely alike and really seemed to regard each other as sisters.

One portly brother has a wife in nearly every village; so that when he makes the annual tour of the Territory with Brigham, he can always stay in his own house and with his own family! Polygamy is at least self-sustaining; the women are expected to support themselves.

Many grave crimes including cold-blooded murders are alleged against the Mormons in past years, and there were two peculiarly atrocious assassinations in Salt Lake City in 1866. The first victim,

1865.]

ASSASSINATIONS IN SALT LAKE CITY.

363

Brassfield, had married the second wife of a Saint, and was subjected to several harassing suits in the Mormon courts upon charges of stealing her clothing, (from her husband!) and the like. While walking the streets, in the custody of an officer, he was shot down by a concealed assassin, the only instance of the kind in American history. The second, Dr. J. K. Robinson, a Gentile physician of high character practicing in Salt Lake City, had incurred hostility by contesting in the courts the ownership of the Warm Spring against the city government. His property was entirely destroyed by the municipal authorities, and after receiving several anonymous warnings to leave, he was decoyed from his residence at midnight to visit a wounded man. Responding to this call of humanity, he went out into the darkness, and was cruelly murdered near his own threshold. Neither assassin was apprehended, though the pervading eye and far-reaching arm of the church could have secured them without the least difficulty, had Brigham and the other unscrupulous leaders desired to have them found and punished.

In all new countries scarcity of money is the mother of inven tion. Before gold discoveries in California, hides, the general circulating medium, were called California bank-notes. Wheat and beaver-skins were the early currency of Oregon, tobacco of Virginia, and 'coon-skins of Cincinnati. In the last-named city, after the introduction of specie, silver dollars were cut into fifths or tenths to make change. The former passed as quarters and the latter as halves, the rapacious originators of the scheme retaining the extra twenty per cent. to pay them for cutting the coins! Whether from their wedge-shape, or in satire upon the persons who made them, these pieces were called 'sharp-shins.' They acquired general circulation.

The early settlers of Utah, like those of California, Oregon and Colorado, coined their domestic gold, dug from the mountains, for the purposes of commerce. A few of these primitive pieces are still in existence.

It is now twenty years since the Mormon pioneers-one hundred and thirty-nine men and four women—reached the site of their present capital. Their prophet killed, themselves exiles from Missouri and Illinois, after a weary journey of many months they

364

EARLY TRIALS OF THE PIONEERS.

[1865. reached this basin to struggle for existence with the unkindly soil, with Indians and with Mexicans. They claim that they left the Missouri with no definite point of settlement; that on the route Brigham Young saw in a vision a beautiful mountain-guarded valley, which heaven assured him was their future home; that on coming in view of Ensign Peak, the Jordan and the great Salt Lake, he instantly exclaimed: 'Here is the spot!'

PONITOH

TO. THE.

TWO

G.S.L.C.P.C

1849

AND

DO

HA

LF.

Immediately upon arrival they knelt down and thanked God for his guidance and protection. The same day they commenced plowing. An old trader, the only white man within hundreds of miles, declared that he would give a thousand dollars for the first ear of corn they could raise from the parched and barren soil. But there is always a future for settlers who pray and then go to plowing. How this strange beginning carries one back to that other despised band which landed at Plymouth on a dreary December morning!

AN EARLY MORMON COIN.

[Great) S(alt) L(ake) C(ity.) Pure) G(old).]

Snowy winters and rainless summers, hostile Indians and alldevouring grasshoppers did not dishearten the Mormons. Like other historic emigrants, they combined strong religious enthusiasm with great wisdom in practical affairs. They learned this new agriculture; established homes; began to have cattle upon a thousand hills; contributed largely from their lean purses to the church, sending missionaries all over the world. The great deluge of California migration furnished a market for their grain and beef. Even Johnston's army, sent out to restrain and if needful to subdue them, purchased their crops and added to their wealth; and when it departed eastward, left wagons and guns, enormous quantities of iron, which proved of priceless value to them.

Nevada and Idaho silver, and California, Colorado and Montana gold have contributed vastly to their prosperity. How can farmers fail to grow rich where flour commands ten dollars per hundred throughout the year? They have made the treeless desert indeed blossom as the rose, and laid the foundations for a rich and prosperous State.