Annals of our ancestors; one hundred and fifty years of history in the ...

224 ANNALS OF OUR ANCESTORS
The topic everywhere was war. There was much conjecture
as to its speedy settlement. They were enhsting one
hundred days' men, little realizing to what extent the conflict
was to be carried. On reaching the river to take our steamboat,
we found it booming from the melting snow. At the
landing the beautiful steamboat War Eagle was in readiness
for us. It was evenmg and a big crowd was waitmg to go on
board. I found among the throng fine ladies whose husbands
were going out to take up claims far from civilization as they
had always known it. I wondered how their gold bracelets
and fine cloth dresses made by skillful dressmakers would look
in some claim shanty. One was out for the first time without
her baby's nurse; but she was sensible enough to say that she
knew it would mean the sacrifice of many things to start as a
poor man's wife.
I spent all the time on the guards that the cold winds would
permit. How I admired the high bluffs which stood out like
sentinels rearing their lofty heads directly from the Mississippi,
and were doubtless used by many an Indian brave as a vantage
point of lookout. We saw the rock called Maiden's Leap and
heard its story — the tale of the maiden Winona and her two
lovers, one favored by the father and one by the daughter, and
of her leap to death rather than marry the chief she could
not love. This rock faded to give place to Sugar Loaf, a bold
bluff whose apex is indeed shaped like a sugar loaf, at that time
a complete oval. I was to look upon it daily years afterward,
though then time and change had touched it with no uncertain
finger. It has also been mutilated in these days by commercial
greed, as it was discovered that the limestone composing it
was good for burning in kilns to make lime with which to build
up the city of Winona. In order to save the noble landmark
the city bought the bluff, but not until it was somewhat mutilated;
and the only ones who can understand the beauty of the
original Sugar Loaf are those who saw it as we did, fifty years
ago. I did not' dream a beautiful summer home would ever
arise there near its foot, which should shelter my Brother
Joseph's one child, but so it was to be.
When we approached the expanse of Lake Pippin we