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

264 ANNALS OF OUR ANCESTORS
planted a large garden near the house, making our bright plans
all over again, and feeling that we were going to have a real
outcome of our labor this year.
The day our boys sowed spring wheat it rained enough to
lay the dust, and then it never rained a single drop until the
day they cut and brought in the poor yield of grain. This
season so discouraged Brother William that he made up his
mind to return to Ohio. The Civil War was still keeping the
country terrorized. The oft-occurring battles with their
cannonading were supposed to be a real cause of our drought;
after every battle there were copious showers in the vicinity of
the battle-grounds, but away up north no clouds were precipi-
tated. Where we had chosen our home the rainless condition
worked disastrously for the marsh lands. In former years
about where we lived was a great cranberry country; the immense
peat bogs produced fine crops of this wild fruit. In
those awful days of drought these marshes caught fire and
destroyed both the cranberries and the peat. There was
not only this destruction, but the people who had depended on
the marsh lands for hay lost all their crop, even after they had
cut and stacked the hay on the ground. For weeks the sun
was but a great copper-colored ball which cast a mournful
shadow upon the scene of a burning country, and we could but
feel the depression of those dim, smoky days.
The Indians were still scouting about, stealing horses and
keeping the settlers in terror, but as we had suffered so much
loss by the flight of the year before we all thought we would
risk it at home. The government armed the settlers and
furnished ammunition. I can yet hear how Brother Joe would
bring the muskets down on the upper landing, making the
whole house ring and my nerves quake. There he stood guard
all night, or reclined with at least one eye open. The horses
were brought into the dooryard and hay was fed to them under
our bedroom window. Well we knew that if Indians came
about the horses would give warning, acting like mad.
One evening when we were feeling particularly depressed,
Julia and Will brought their bed into our room and laid it on
the floor, that we might be near each other. In the night