might have felt justified in the use of a nerve sedative too. It shall be said to their credit, too, that while most of the men of that day used the weed, few of them used it in such beastly excess as is often seen today. But rightly or wrongly, they thought they had to have it. Thus Lars Almen, when he arrived at Yankton, had 50 cents in money left. He started to invest that last mite of the family resources in tobacco. His wife remonstrated, saying it would be more fitting to get a few provisions such as they could all partake of. The ever undaunted Lars replied: "If I have tobacco I know I can do something or other to make us a living, but if I have no tobacco I can do nothing". So he bought tobacco, and he also made good on the "living." Forgetting, then, the last named item in on the list of staple provisions, we find that salt pork, usually fried, corn meal in some form, such as mush or bread, more or less of wheat flour and milk or some dish made out of milk in whole or part, were the resources out of which our pioneer mothers had to provide three palatable meals a day, summer and winter. This is not saying that these materials were always abundant, but rather that it was these or nothing. There were, of course, special occasions when a little pastry in the shape of home made cookies or fried cakes was on the table, but cake and pie and such like luxuries were not often seen the first years. The fuel with which to prepare this food was, for most of them, hay, or in summer cow chips, and later on, when they began to raise corn, corn cobs. But hay was the principal fuel, and huge piles of it were required to do much cooking or for heating. For, as can be readily seen, one had to keep stuffing it into the stove almost continually to get any hot fire. Picture to yourself then a room--sod house, dugout or a frame house about 12 × 14 which was kitchen, sitting room, bedroom, and everything else combined. The hay, as was the case in winter time, would cover a large part of the floor and, of course, raise continual dust. The stove would get full of ashes in a short time, and if the hay was damp would, of course, smoke more or less. In such a place, with such conveniences and out of such materials, our pioneer mothers had to solve the problem of three meals a day and do all their other work besides. In summer, of course, it was not quite so bad, as they usually had a lean to or cook shanty of some sort, for use in warm weather. Is it strange that many of these women who came to find a new and, as they supposed, a better home, found instead an early grave, and what was worse, some even lost their minds? The men could get away, at least to be outdoors a part of the time, but the women had to live and move and have their whole being in these surroundings and conditions. So let us not fail to speak the word of appreciation to those of them who are still living or to cherish the memory of those who have made their final pilgrimage. So let there be