Page:Six months in Kansas.djvu/60

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56
SIX MONTHS


from the active, ever-inventive Yankee spirit, where a want is hardly expressed before some ingenious mechanic, with more time than money, and a strong desire to make money, produces the article your necessities, whether real or artificial, demand.

We go out again ; the stove is purchased. Across the street, at a little "shake" shop, we see tubs and pails; we pass over and purchase two cheaply-made tubs, a pail and a broom, all amounting in price to nearly double what you pay at home ; but they are among the necessities; our consciences are at ease. Madam takes the broom, the lad one side of the tubs, which she makes a level by placing her left hand in the handle on the other side. This is our promenade to the cabin. Now we suspend operations, while poor Typhoid receives the remnant of the day in some trifling attentions to her bodily wants. Verily she is a pattern of quiet patience, going through the routine of a fever where people come and go in a common public room; making no complaint nor unreasonable demand.

It is quite amusing to hear travellers make