AN EMIGRANT IN DISTRESS. 193 



in future they should shoot nothing that was not large 

 enough as well as good enough to be worth the powder 

 and shot. My bag of game that day, of which the men 

 killed one or two, was six grouse and two quails or part 

 ridge, Chalice continuing to work whenever called on 

 as if he had been bred and born beneath the rays of the 

 American sun. As we were proceeding through a very 

 lonely and desert extent of prairie, in one of those dips 

 or bottoms before alluded to, crossed by sluggish rills of 

 water, I observed a waggon stuck fast in the slough, and 

 that a countryman of the poor emigrant who, with his 

 wife and children, was thus hopelessly situated, passed 

 by on horseback without offering the least assistance. I 

 joined my waggons immediately, before they came to the 

 slough, when taking a warning from the mishap of those 

 in distress, Mr Canterall and myself sounded the ground 

 on either side, and found a place at which my waggons 

 crossed in safety. When safe over, not one of my men 

 taking any notice of the sufferers, I gave the word to 

 " hold on," which means to halt, and desired every spare 

 hand to assist the travellers out of the mud. 



This having been done by lightening the load, most 

 of which had been taken out by the emigrant, we 

 pulled and pushed at the wheels, one of the hinder 

 ones of which was sunk considerably above the axle. On 

 the man thanking me for the timely assistance thus 

 rendered, I replied, " No thanks are needed, my good 

 fellow. I am an Englishman, and most happy to have 

 been of use to you. That is the way the men of 

 England and America should help each other out of the 

 mud ; were I stuck fast, you would do the same for 

 me." " That I would," the man replied, apparently 



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