Minnesota and Dacotah

Excerpt

ST. CLOUD TO ST. PAUL.

Importance of starting early— Judge Story's theory of early rising— Rustic scenery— Horses and mules— Surveyors— Humboldt— Baked fish— Getting off the track— Burning of hay stacks— Supper at St. Anthony— Arrival at the Fuller House.

ST. PAUL, October, 1856.

I WAS up by the gray dawn of the morning of yesterday, and after an early but excellent breakfast, crossed the river from St. Cloud, in order to meet the stage at Sauk Rapids. As we came up on the main road, the sight of a freshly made rut, of stage-wheel size, caused rather a disquieting apprehension that the stage had passed. But my nerves were soon quieted by the assurance from an early hunter, who was near by shooting prairie chickens while they were yet on the roost, that the stage had not yet come. So we kept on to the spacious store where the post office is kept; where I waited and waited for the stage to come which was to bring me to St. Paul. It did not arrive till eight o'clock. I thought if every one who had a part to perform in starting off the stage from Watab (for it had started out from there that morning), was obliged to make the entire journey of 80 miles to St. Paul in the stage, they would prefer to get up a little earlier rather than have the last part of the trip extended into "the dead waist and middle of the night." I remarked to the driver, who is a very clever young man, that the stage which left St. Paul started as early as five o'clock, and I could not see why it was not as necessary to start as early in going down, inasmuch as the earlier we started the less of the night darkness we had to travel in. He perfectly agreed with me, and attributed his inability to start earlier to the dilatory arrangements at the hotel. When jogging along at about eleven at night between St. Anthony and the city, I could not help begrudging every minute of fair daylight which had been wasted. The theory of Judge Story, that it don't make much difference when a man gets up in the morning, provided he is wide awake after he is up, will do very well, perhaps, except when one is to start on a journey in the stage.

I took a seat by the driver's side, the weather being clear and mild, and had an unobstructed and delightful view of every object, and there seemed to be none but pleasant objects in range of the great highway. Though there is, between every village, population enough to remind one constantly that he is in a settled country, the broad extent yet unoccupied proclaims that there is still room enough. Below Sauk Rapids a good deal of the land on the road side is in the hands of speculators. This, it is understood, is on the east side of the Mississippi. On the west side there are more settlements. But yet there are many farms, with tidy white cottages; and in some places are to be seen well-arranged flower-gardens. The most attractive scenery to me, however, was the ample corn-fields, which, set in a groundwork of interminable virgin soil, are pictures which best reflect the true destiny and usefulness of an agricultural region....