“Oh!” cried I, “he will be drowned!”

The gentlemen laughed.  “No, there he is; they are helping him in again.”

The course of the boat was immediately changed, and the party returned to the shore.  It was not until one disembarked and came dripping and laughing towards me, that I recognized him as my own peculiar property.  He was pleased to treat the matter as a joke, but I thought it rather a sad beginning of Western experience.

He suffered himself to be persuaded to intrust the care of his effects to his friends, and having changed his dress, prepared to remain quietly with me, when just at this moment a vehicle drove up to the door, and we recognized the pleasant, familiar face of our old friend, Judge Doty.

He had received the news of our arrival, and had come to take us at once to his hospitable mansion.  We were only too happy to gather together our bags and travelling-baskets and accompany him without farther ceremony.

Our drive took us first along the edge of Navarino, next through Shanty-town (the latter a far more appropriate name than the former), amid mud and mire, over bad roads, and up and down hilly, break-neck places, until we reached the little brick dwelling of our friends.  Mrs. Doty received us with such true, sisterly kindness, and everything seemed so full of welcome, that we soon felt ourselves at home.

We found that, expecting our arrival, invitations had already been prepared to assemble the whole circle of Green Bay society to meet us at an evening party—­this, in a new country, being the established mode of doing honor to guests or strangers.

We learned, upon inquiry, that Captain Harney, who had kindly offered to come with a boat and crew of soldiers from Fort Winnebago, to convey us to that place, our destined home, had not yet arrived; we therefore felt at liberty to make arrangements for a few days of social enjoyment at “the Bay.”

It was pleasant to people, secluded in such a degree from the world at large, to bear all the news we had brought—­all the particulars of life and manners—­the thousand little items that the newspapers of that day did not dream of furnishing—­the fashions, and that general gossip, in short, which a lady is erroneously supposed more au fait of, than a gentleman.

I well remember that, in giving and receiving information, the day passed in a pretty uninterrupted stream of communication.  All the party except myself had made the journey, or rather voyage, up the Fox River and down the Wisconsin to the Mississippi.