Page:Six months in Kansas.djvu/45

Rh We dismount, and enter at the only door into the first story of a large building, simply boarded and loosely floored. It is dimly lighted with poor tallow candles in Japan candlesticks, which bear evidence of having been the support of candles before. There is a long table in the floor, and men, in whose faces there is absolutely no mouth to be seen, and only a gleam for eyes,—an entire party of heads, covered with dirty, uncombed, unwashed hair. There were no more chairs. Our baggage was brought in, and we made seats of it. The men ate as though the intricacies from their plates to their mouths had become a perfect slight of hand with them. As they passed out of the room, the dishes were wiped out for us!

Soon we passed up a staircase, in one end of the room, creaking and bending beneath our weight, as though we were not safe. The floor above was of the same stamp as that below,—one thin board of cotton-wood, which is somewhat like willow. In the loft there was a cotton-cloth partition. I was fortunate enough to secure a place for Alice in a good bed, with the wife of a physician, and drew