I had traversed this same country in 1838, when I was going for the first time among the Potawatomies at Council Bluffs, with Father Verreydt, to open our first Indian mission. All that region, then in its primitive condition, was in peaceable possession of the Indians; it was a grazing ground for the numerous herds of wild animals that ranged it. I shall always recall, with interest, the impression made on my mind by the first sight of these interminable plains and lovely prairies, enameled with flowers and plants that were perfectly unknown to me; surrounded by forests and fringes of woods, which seemed to frame them and the lines of which one could follow into the distance. The axe of the woodman had not yet penetrated thither. The whole face of the country, for hundreds of miles in length and breadth, from the Missouri to the Mississippi, has been changed, within the last twenty-five years, under the influence of civilization and the labor of an industrious people. One beholds with astonishment and admiration a succession of towns and villages in full prosperity, several of which already contain over io,ooo souls, like Leavenworth and St. Joseph. They are surrounded with vast and beautiful farms and immense pastures, where innumerable cattle are
raised without trouble. Everywhere is heard the sound of the hammer on the anvil, and the puffing of steam in save and gristmills. In all this region the soil is of extraordinary fertility.
I reached the city of Omaha on the 25th of April. This time, fortunately, I had gotten ahead of the steamboat. Monseigneur O'Gorman, the vicar apostolic for Nebraska, since May 8, 1859, received me with the greatest benevo
lence and the most paternal charity. I had time, until the 28th, to recover from my fatigues and to resume the religious practices prescribed by our rules. This important point requires a particular effort in an American stage, where nine or ten persons find themselves shut up, crowded and squeezed as in a small boat, and this for two days and a night. Presently I took farewell of Monseigneur the Bishop,