For many years pleasant relations existed between the officers at the post and the civilians. The physician of the garrison willingly responded to calls for his aid made by the people living outside the fort. "I am compelled", wrote Joseph Renville to H. H. Sibley, "to ask you for some assistance in regard to a disease which is very bad here--the whooping cough. I pray you to ask the doctor for some medicine, particularly for some camphor."[511] Many a time Lawrence Taliaferro presided at a frontier wedding, when in one of the rude huts on the reservation the picturesque figure of the fur trader mingled with the glittering uniform of the officer, and dusky faces peered in at the windows awaiting the end of the ceremony when they also could partake of such a feast as only the prairies, lakes, and sutler's store could provide.[512] In the troubles which naturally arose between the settlers and the Indians, the agent was the mediator. Thirty of Peter Musick's cattle were killed by Indians who, wanting only powder horns, left the carcasses to the wolves.[513] On July 13, 1834, Jacob Falstrom came to the agency bringing the feet and hams of an ox which he claimed had been shot by a Sioux Indian at Mud Lake. He claimed thirty-five dollars from the Indian Department for the loss which he had sustained. As he was a poor man and had a large family to support Major Taliaferro was moved to make an effort to aid him. "I proposed", he wrote in his diary the same evening, "to contribute $5 for the benefit of J. Faustram to Several of the Gentlemen of the Post--but not meeting with a corresponding Sentiment--the poor fellow must be informed of my bad success in his behalf".[514] Only a week later Joseph R. Brown asked to be paid for a hog which the Indians had killed.[515] During the summer of 1837 Louis Massy claimed $150; Abraham Perry $50; and Benjamin F. Baker $750 for similar damages.[516] Many years later the agent wrote of these unpleasant duties: "The traders would make a detective of the agent if practicable. All thefts on each other were reported to the agent for justice. Deserting boatmen (fed on corn and tallow) must be forced to proceed up the St. Peter's with their outfits for the trade, right or wrong. Every ox, cow, calf or hog lost by persons on the Indian lands, the agents were expected to find the culprits or pay for these often fictitious losses."[517]