INTRODUCTION. 
5 
The winters are usually very mild and open, with little snow, 
— none falling in the night, save what the morrow’s sun will 
quickly cause to disappear. So mild are they, that the cattle of 
the Indians, as those of .the settlers in Western Missouri, feed the 
entire year in the prairies and river-bottoms. The Indians say 
that, once in about seven years, Kansas sees a cold and severe 
winter, with snows of a foot in depth. Two weeks of cold weather 
is called a severe winter. Then the spring-like weather comes in 
February ; the earth begins to grow warm, and her fertile bosom 
ready to receive the care of the husbandman. 
The winds of March and April are the most disagreeable out¬ 
door arrangements in Kansas. It were quite useless for a person 
of little gravity, or strength, to attempt much progress in locomo¬ 
tion, when from out the halls of .ZEolus the winds have rushed 
untrammelled, and unrestrained. The breezes of summer, however, 
are most delightful. With the sun the wind rises, and makes 
such a difference in the actual effect of the temperature upon one’s 
senses, as to lead to doubts as to the correctness of thermometers 
in this country. The mornings and evenings are always cool and 
pleasant, and one experiences nothing here of those summer nights, 
so common even in New England, where, between weariness occa¬ 
sioned by intense heat, and mosquitoes, no refreshing sleep will 
come. Very seldom are the nights, in Kansas, that blankets are 
not found an essential comfort. The rains are frequent, and copi¬ 
ous. So far as my own experience goes, we have no more of a 
wet or dry season than in Massachusetts. Seldom a week passes 
in the summer without rain, often coming in most gentle showers 
in the night, unaccompanied by thunder and lightning ; 'while, 
early in the spring especially, there is such display of electricity 
as one seldom sees. The whole heavens will be one perfect sea 
of flame, and thunder deafening in the continual roar, while the 
waters fail so abundantly, that they run in all directions, after the 
earih has filled its pores, like a miniature deluge. There is a 
sublimity, an awe-inspiring influence, in such displays of grandeur 
and power, as make the creature feel his nothingness, and that the 
Creator is indeed all, —the great All-Father, All-wise, All-good, 
All-powerful. Days, like September days in New England, linger 
