Morning after morning, one square after another was seen stripped of the board barricades which had sheltered windows and doors from intrusion.  In front of every gateway wagons were emptying their loads of household furniture.  The streets soon lost their deserted aspect, though for many days the only wayfarers were men,—­not a woman being visible, except, by chance, to the profane eyes of the invaders.  It was near the end of July before a single house was rented except to the intimate associates of the Governor.  Up to that time, those Gentiles who did not follow the army to its permanent camp bivouacked on the public squares.  By a Church edict, all Mormons were forbidden to enter into business transactions with persons outside their sect without consulting Brigham Young, whose office was beset daily by a throng of clients beseeching indulgences and instruction.  Immediately after his return to the city, however, he secluded himself from public observation, never appearing in the streets, nor on the balconies of his mansion-house.  He even encompassed his residence with an armed guard.

Gradually, nevertheless, the necessities of the people induced a modification of this system of non-intercourse.  The Gentile merchants, who were present with great wagon-trains containing all those articles indispensable to the comfort of life, of which the Mormons stood so much in need, refused to open a single box or bale until they could hire storehouses.  The permission was at length accorded, and immediately the absolute external reserve of the people began to wear away.  Both sexes thronged to the stores, eager to supply themselves with groceries and garments; but there they experienced a wholesome rebuff, for which some of them were not entirely unprepared.  The merchants refused to receive the paper of the Deseret Currency Association with which the Territory was flooded; and its notes were depreciated instantly by more than fifty per cent.  Many of the people were driven to barter cattle and farm-produce for the articles they needed; and for the first time since the establishment of the Church in Utah an audible murmur arose among its adherents against its exactions.  The sight of their neglected farms was also calculated to bring the poorer agriculturists to sober reflection.  They perceived that the army, which they had been taught to believe would commit every conceivable outrage, was, on the contrary, demeaning itself with extreme forbearance and even kindness toward them, and was supplying an ampler market for the sale of their produce than they had enjoyed since the years when the overland emigration to California culminated.  Nevertheless, their regrets, if entertained at all, found no public and concerted utterance.  The authority of the Church exacted a sullen demeanor toward all Gentiles.