Some years ago the author of this book was enabled to gratify an ambition to record in artistic form something of the scenes and something of the incidents of the memorable pilgrimage, The Westward March, from the once borders of civilization to the Great American Desert—“An Old Sketch Book,” Boston. S.E. Cassino, 1892. His purpose was not to publish a guide-book to the plains and mountains, for which there has been no occasion within the present generation, but rather a summary, a poetic-prose narrative of a typical journey, as seen through the memory and devoid of commonplaces, the more salient features only looming through the past.

When the Jubilee Celebration of the strange journey—for it is that, and those who made it that we are this year honoring and commemorating—was decided upon, it was suggested in consideration of the singular fitness of “An Old Sketch-Book” as a souvenir to be presented during the Jubilee to the Pioneers yet living, that letters were addressed to the Pioneer Jubilee Celebration Commission that speak for themselves. Many of the names appended to the letters were recognized as belonging to the honored band of Pioneer men and women, while the others were of those who think that in this Jubilee Year those who crossed the plains and mountains in ox-teams would appreciate the receiving, and their descendants the giving of a work of this character.

“An Old Sketch-Book,” however, was a large and costly volume of a limited edition, and hardly manageable for the present purpose. The author therefore decided to place the sketches and descriptive matter in the form now used, under the title of “The Old Journey.” The prompting to undertake the work was not merely encouraging but was made almost a duty by the commendations of the original volume, and had there been no other result from his labors, the author would have felt fully repaid for them by the expressions of approbation from the press as well as from those who saw the birth of the State and who watched its growth to the present hour.

The author is one of those who “crossed the plains.” As the years have gone and time has not only cast a sort of glamor over the event, but has given also to men an opportunity to reflect seriously and in calmness and intelligence, that same Journey assumes greatness in our eyes, both in its inception and in its achievement. It finds a prominent place in the History of the West, and will ever stand forth among events. Indeed the world had heretofore seen nothing like it, and in the very nature of things its repetition is improbable, if not impossible. It must now be read; it cannot be experienced.

In presenting this edition there are no excuses to offer. The author has been true to nature and to history, and the publishers have done their part in a manner that must excite wonder and commendation when one thinks of what has been achieved in the wilderness, the advance that has been made in the art of the printer within the few years that have elapsed since the sketches appearing in the book were made.

It hardly needs intuition to foretell success for this little volume.

BYRON GROO.

May, 1897.