Magaska's band also received baptism. All the morning was taken up in these holy ceremonies. We left the camp toward noon and regained the uplands. Several showers of rain made the road muddy and slippery. After traveling eight miles, we set up our tent on the bank of Louison creek, with a flowing current and clear as crystal. To the traveler fresh from the turbid water of the Missouri, the sight and contrast are very agreeable.
At this place a solitary hostelry, consisting of two wooden shanties, had been erected and was inhabited by a Canadian, his half-breed wife and several of their children. All seemed happy to see me. Several other Canadians, who support themselves by cutting wood along the river to sell to steamboats, having been notified of my presence, had brought their children to meet me. All my hours, until late in the evening, were spent in instructions, for which these men seem hungry; they pay earnest attention to them. Ten children were presented to me for baptism, and a half-breed woman received, with the holy waters of baptism, the nuptial benediction.
May 23d. About ten in the morning I left the banks of the Louison, resuming our march by green and rolling roads. A spring shower brought agreeable freshness to the atmosphere. After a stretch of nineteen miles, we set up our tent on the bank of Pratt creek, alongside the Hamilton hostelry. The proprietor of the latter was an old acquaintance of mine, so he showed me many kindnesses. He put all the products of his farm at my disposition; his henhouse furnished us the necessary eggs to make a pretty good dinner on the following day, which was a Friday. There was a gathering at Hamilton's, like that at his neighbor's on Louison creek; they were waiting for me to confer baptism on two adults and thirteen little children. It was a goodly offering to make to God, on the eve of Our Lady the Auxiliatrice and the feast-day of the martyr of the Society of Jesus, the blessed Andrew Bobola.
May 24th. I offered the holy sacrifice of the mass early in