Indians were so numerous that I don’t remember when they first came out of the haze into my consciousness, but probably in my third year.  They were Winnebago and Pottawatomi, the river being a common inheritance of both tribes.  In the winter of 1839-40, about thirty families of the former tribe camped for several weeks opposite our home and were very sociable and friendly.  Diligent hunters and trappers, they accumulated fully a hundred dollars worth of otter, beaver, bear, deer, and other skins.  But a trader came up from Watertown in the spring and got the whole lot in exchange for a four-gallon keg of whisky.  That was a wild night that followed.  Some of the noisiest came over to our house, and when denied admittance threatened to knock the door down, but my father told them he had two guns ready for them, and they finally left.  He afterwards said that he depended more on a heavy hickory club which he had on hand than on the guns—­it could be fired faster.

An ugly squaw whose nose had been bitten off years before in a fight, stabbed her brother that night, because he refused her more whisky.  He had, according to custom, been left on guard, and was entirely sober.  The next day the Indians horrified my mother by declaring that they should cut the squaw into inch pieces if her brother died.  They went down to Lake Koshkonong two days later, but he died the first day out.  The squaw escaped and lived a lonely life for years after, being known up and down the river as “Old Mag.”

At any time of the year we were liable to receive visits from Indians passing to and fro between Lakes Horicon and Koshkonong.  They would come into the house without ceremony further than staring into the windows before entering.  Being used only to town life in the East, my mother was afraid of them, but she always carried a bold face and would never give them bread, which they always demanded, unless she could readily spare it.

One summer afternoon, when she had finished her housework and had sat down to sew, half a dozen Indians, male and female, suddenly bolted in and clamored for bread.  She shook her head and told them she had none for them.  When she came West she had brought yeast cakes which, by careful renewal, she kept in succession until the family home was broken up in 1880.  Upon the afternoon referred to, she had a large pan of yeast cakes drying before the fireplace.  Seeing them, the Indians scowled at her, called her a lying woman, and made a rush for the cakes, each one taking a huge bite.  Those familiar with the article know how bitter is the mixture of raw meal, hops, and yeast, and so will not wonder that presently a look of horror came over the Indians’ faces and that then they sputtered the unsavory stuff out all over the newly scrubbed floor.  My mother used to say that if they had killed her she could not have kept from laughing.  They looked very angry at first, but finally concluded that they had not been poisoned and had only “sold” themselves, they huddled together and went out chattering and laughing, leaving my mother a good share of her day’s work to do over again.