Page:History of Goodhue County, Minnesota.djvu/542

 46? HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY hurling curses loud and deep at the heads of our companions for their supposed carelessness, while he was with both hands holding up one leg, and at the same time trying to preserve his equi- librium by hopping and jumping, not quite gravely, upon the other. All feared he was seriously wounded and were at his side with the least possible delay. . He was still grasping and rubbing the calf of his injured leg and obviously suffering intense pain. We placed him gently upon the ground, removed his boots and so much of his clothing as was necessary for a thorough examination, when, to our surprise as well as his, no blood, no wound, no mark, not even a scratch, could be found. Further examination disclosed the fact that a single shot had struck him on the upper lip, had passed through and lodged against the skin upon the inner surface of the lip, and that was the extent of the injury. Two questions were asked : First, w T here did that one shot come from? and second, what is the nervous connection between the lip and the calf of the leg .' ' ' C. -I. K. Smith, in speaking of practically the same years, once said: "In the month of June, 1854, I first set foot in Red Wing. I took dinner at the Red AVing House, then kept by Andrus Durand. The most striking feature of Red Wing was then, as it is now. to one approaching the place on a steamer, the bold, isolated Barn bluff. About the only thing I remember doing on my first visit here were : First, to climb to the summit of that bluff, right up to its precipitous nose, and take a view of the extended landscape, the winding river skirted with timber, the plateau^ ;md bluffs in the distance, all together making an enchanting picture. The next thing I did was to purchase about two, or it may have been twelve, acres of land. The said land was described as being on the side of Sorin bluff and was pointed out to me by a wave of the hand while standing on Bush street, said description being apparently satisfactory to the pur- chaser who was bound to make an investment in the land of promise. Suffice it. to say I have never heard where that land lay, or that the seller has so much as a shadow r of a title. Yet there is no doubt of land being there on the sides of the bluff. "On my next visit I came to stay — on July 3 of the same year — having on board the steamboat from St. Louis a small stock of merchandise, which I persuaded the captain to leave on the upper side of the Jordan, the usual landing being a few rods below. A large number of inhabitants flocked down to the river as the boat drew to the shore. The goods were put into an unfin- ished store which stood at the foot of Broad street, near the ground now occupied by the Milwaukee depot. The doors not being yet hung. I stayed with the stuff that night, which was