THE REMINISCENCES OF CARL SCHURZ
thought how careful he would be in that place to tone down the Western vigor of his vocabulary, and how difficult he would find it to reduce and adapt it to the diplomatic usage.
I was to speak at a place called by the committeeman instructing me, the “City of Lexington,” the center of a large farming district. It was marked with a big dot on the map. A buggy was assigned to me with a young man as a driver who “knew the road.” I should have to start about daybreak in order to reach my destination in time for the afternoon meeting. There I would meet the Hon. Galusha Grow, the well-known Representative from Pennsylvania in Congress. This was all the committeeman could tell me. It was a glorious sunrise, and soon I found myself on the open prairie, swept by the exhilarating morning breeze. The empty spaces between farms became larger and larger, human habitations scarcer. Now I saw a number of Indian papooses sitting in a row on the fence of a lonesome settlement, and an Indian wigwam near by. Then, before me, the vast plain, apparently boundless and without a sign of human life; here and there a little strip of timber along a water course; the road a mere wagon track. It was delightful to breathe. I heartily enjoyed the bracing freshness of this Western atmosphere. After we had traveled on for two or three hours, it occurred to me to ask my companion whether he had ever been at the “City of Lexington,” and when we would be likely to get there. I was surprised to find that he knew as little of the City of Lexington as I did. He had simply been told to follow “this road,” in a westerly direction, and we should get there sometime.
Presently a buggy hove in sight, coming from the opposite direction. Two men were seated in it, one of whom hailed me with, “Hello, stranger! Please stop a moment!” We stopped. A tall gentleman jumped down from the other vehicle and,
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