1857.] A DECLARATION BY BUCHANAN.

85

repeatedly overpowered by Missouri invasions, the Free Soilers had absented themselves from the polls, believing that the Border Ruffians, who held all the machinery of government, would cer

tainly defeat them by force or fraud. Now the Free State men held an immense numerical majority. But to vote on the day and in the manner prescribed by the illegal and invading legisla ture seemed to give a kind of recognition to the bogus laws. Advices from Washington had just assured them of President Buchanan's design 'with the help of God,' to enforce those statutes. They were fully determined to resist them to the last. The apportionment too was notoriously unfair. The old Pro-slavery counties were given an enormous excess of representation, while a Free State section of twenty counties comprising almost half the population of the Territory, was entitled to only three out of fifty-two members of the legislature.

But Governor Walker had promised that the test oath should not be enforced, and that he would insure them a fair election. Many, distrusting him, earnestly opposed voting. Others advo

86

THE BALLOT OR THE RIFLE.

[1857.

cated it as a stratagem: to beat the enemy at his own game; to get possession of the Territorial government, at all hazards. Their counsels prevailed; it was decided to vote. Lane declared:

"The Territorial legislature belongs to us, and we are going to have it—by the ballot if we can, by the rifle if we must. If we elect only one member we intend to make him a good working majority.'

The fall canvass was exciting. Pro-slavery men confidently asserted that they should triumph-which meant either invasion or fraud. The Free Soilers organized and went armed to the polls.

In Quindaro, when the voting was over and before the general result was known, public feeling was painfully wrought up. It was like the choking anxiety in a court-room, after an absorbing trial, while prisoner and foreman stand up face to face, and all wait breathless for the verdict. First came a report that the Territory was so closely divided, that Leavenworth, the most populous county and electing eleven members, would decide the character of the legislature. At the heels of this followed another rumor, that through gross frauds and hundreds of illegal votes at the little precinct of Kickapoo, Leavenworth county had elected the Pro-slavery ticket; and that Governor Walker had given cer tificates to the candidates fraudulently chosen, thus retaining the government in Border Ruffian hands for two years more.

In the midst of the indignation this caused, his excellency paid Quindaro a visit. Within half an hour after his arrival, a grayhaired citizen, who, until then, had always borne the reputation of a Conservative, took me aside, and said with flashing eyes:

'We shall never get our rights peaceably. Walker persuaded us to vote with fair promises; and now he has betrayed us. Here he is; let us make an example of him, and teach old Buchanan that we are in earnest. The boys are all ready.'

'Ready for what?'

'Ready to take him out of the hotel, and hang him upon that tree!' was the startling reply.

My fiery friend finally acquiesced in the suggestion that we should wait to verify the reports. The event proved that Walker had given certificates to the fraudulently-chosen delegation. But

1857.]

87

RUPTURE IN THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY there was a large Free State majority in the legislature, which turned out the spurious members during the first week of its session. And thus the Territorial government passed into the hands of the bona fide settlers.

But the end was not yet. During the previous summer a Proslavery convention to form a State constitution had been held at Lecompton. The act of the bogus legislature authorizing it disqualified all but registered voters from participating in the election of delegates. In half the counties no registry was made; in others the Free State men were not registered, and they staid away from the polls. They would have dispersed the convention by force of arms but for Governor Walker's emphatic assurances that he would oppose any constitution it formed, unless submitted to a vote of the people, and that President Buchanan had solemnly promised him to take the same course. So they quietly ignored the gathering, intending to repudiate its offspring at the polls.

But the convertion did not submit to the people for ratification the constitution which it made. Buchanan, infamously violating his plighted faith, urged Congress to admit Kansas as a slave State under this fraudulent instrument adopted by a minority of the voters in less than half the counties of the Territory. He even used the patronage of his high office to induce senators and representatives to join in the outrage. Governor Walker kept his pledges, and Buchanan remorselessly dismissed him. Senator Douglas, too, broke away from his life-long political associates, and stood firm against this outrage upon the rights of the settlers, declaring that if it was persisted in they ought to resist, even to fighting the Government of the United States. Thus began that rupture in the democratic party which resulted in the election of Abraham Lincoln and the southern rebellion; and thus the Lecompton convention has a national and historic interest.

In Kansas the attempt to thrust it upon the people kindled hot resentment. Several assassinations ensued, and in south-eastern counties along the Missouri border frequent and bloody skirmishes occurred. At Territorial conventions all the delegates, in writing, pledged their lives their fortunes and their sacred honor to resist. the usurpation, even by force of arms. Ordinarily the Free Soilers were divided into cliques and factions, but this pressure compacted them into concord and forgetfulness of old feuds.

88

FIFTEEN WHISKY PUNCHES.

[1857. The legislature held an extra session, passed, over the govern or's veto, an act for organizing and enrolling the entire popula tion capable of bearing arms, and elected a military board, consist ing of one major-general, (Lane,) eight brigadiers, and adjutant, inspector, quartermaster, commissary and surgeon-general. I knew no more of military matters than of Sanskrit; but the greatness thrust upon me converted me into assistant adjutant-general and secretary of the board.

That body meant business; but its paraphernalia was not gorgeous. Indeed it looked a good deal like the Arizona legislature, which used to meet in a log-cabin with a dirt floor. Our sessions were held in a Lawrence hall over the Commercial' restaurant. The members lived in widely separated portions of the Territory. Chilled with long winter rides, they would enter, in slouched hats, top boots and blue army overcoats with enormous capes; crowd around the stove, and canvass the latest news or rumor of disturbance. No inferior rank was tolerated; every man was a general. At the appointed hour Lane, ex-officio president, would rap on the table and command in his hoarse gutturals:

'The board will come to order.'

Then he pulled at the bell-rope until a waiter appeared.

'John, bring us one, two, three, four,' (counting the members present,) fourteen hot whisky punches and a box of cigars. Ah! John, fifteen hot whiskies. General Walker, you are just in time. General Richardson, you will read the minutes of the last meeting.'

The completion of the reading found the board warmed externally and internally for the transaction of business. Under its auspices organization and enrolment progressed rapidly. The Territorial governor, (Denver,) issued a proclamation against it; but proclamations were cheap and plenty, and his was unheeded. There were frequent rumors that he was about to promote its leading members to the honors of martyrdom by arresting them; but, once begun, he could hardly have stopped without arresting the whole population of Kansas. So he confined his warfare to paper bullets of the brain.

1858.]

NIGHT RIDES ON THE PRAIRIES.

89

CHAPTER VII.

THE winter of 1857-8 was a stirring one for a Kansas newspaper correspondent. Every week was alive with excitement an alarm to-day, an outbreak to-morrow; and the point of interest shifting so constantly kept one flying back and forth like a shuttlecock to meet it. I took long prairie rides, sometimes remaining all night in the saddle. The nights were most lovely; often so bright that even in the woods, and when there was no snow upon the ground, I could easily read the finest type of a daily newspaper. Sometimes the fast-falling snow would obliterate the prairie roads, and clouds darken the sky. More than once I wandered bewildered until daylight, and then found myself miles out of the proper course. The wind always blows: it chills the whole frame, and at times is so violent that in riding against it, one is in danger of being swept out of the saddle. I frequently saw men so chilled that after walking awhile to warm themselves, they had to be lifted upon their horses.

Some of the night rides were easy and agreeable--peaceful hours passed in the soothing society of nature; and hours, too, of rest, for while the horse walks, or even trots slowly, the practised rider often sleeps, until the stopping or changing gait of his steed awakens him. There is no appreciable danger of falling, unless the horse stumbles or the saddle turns. Mexicans and Indians easily sit on horseback when so drunk that they cannot stand upon the ground.

In equestrianism men have an easy, natural and safe position. If women were to adopt it instead of their present tiresome and perilous mode of riding, the gain in health, comfort and security would be very great.