SKETCHES OF WESTERN LIFE.

"The Prairie Schooner."

Just why the prairie schooner wagon body was built boat shape I have never been able to tell or see anybody else that could. That shape came in very handy when we crossed the plains in the early days, with which to cross the rivers, but we had the same kind on the farm in Indiana, where we had no thought to use them as a boat.

Their real history is, this type of wagon was introduced from England, and for a century this form was used because those that had gone before us had used it, and it took a long time to bring about a change.

These, though, as the Westerner would say, "came in mighty handy," when we came to a big river to cross as we were on the road to Oregon sixty-three years ago.

I got into a scrape once in crossing Snake River when I foolishly put my whole running-gear on top of the bed and weighted it down to within an inch of the top; I escaped, as the saying goes, "by the skin of my teeth," but vowed I would never do so again, and I never did. Hundreds crossed over in their wagon beds in 1852, and I never knew of an accident, though when some foolish people started down Snake River they soon got into rapid water, lost all they had, and some their lives.

Just to be a "doing" as the saying goes, and to see how it would look, I concluded to cross a river in my wagon box on this last trip when I drove to Washington, and let the moving picture men take it. It was the Loop Fork of the Platte River and about three-quarters of a mile wide. I have the film and some days I showed it in the Washington State Building at the Panama Exposition at San Francisco and every day the oxen themselves could be seen.

Before I got through I was somewhat like the little boy that went out a hunting and got lost, who said he was sorry he come. We ran onto a sand bar and had to get out on to the quicksand to push off, and then, to cap the climax, the current carried us down past our landing and we had to tow up by main strength and awkwardness, so I concluded there wasn't so much fun in it as there might be and that I didn't want any more like experiences when past eighty years. We got a good picture, though, for when we got into the scrape we forgot to act and got "the real thing."

I have often been amused when asked how I got the oxen over, just as though they thought I could put a two thousand pound live ox into a wagon box. I didn't take these in the picture at all, but came back to the same side of the river from which we started. Not so in '52. We had to cross with the oxen also, and sometimes it was no small job, in fact, more than to cross the outfit and wagon. I was generally able to get all mine to swim over in a bunch, but I knew some that had to tow over each animal separate, and some were drowned on the way. Some streams had quicksand bottoms, and woe betide the wagon that once got stuck. To guard against this many wagons were hitched together (a team though to each wagon) and it was a long, strong pull and a pull altogether. We had to keep moving, else there would be serious trouble.

Some places the sand would disappear so suddenly the wheels would come down with a jolt like as if passing over a rough corduroy road.

Verily the pioneers did have all sorts of experiences.