About this time Lewis Abbott arrived with his family from Kirtland, and having sent some money by me, partly to aid in my expenses, and partly for the purpose of making improvements, he became dissatisfied and demanded the utmost farthing. This took everything I had done;--my wheat on the ground, my hay, my cows all but one, and left me entirely destitute, after all my laborious exertions. At this brother Abbott seemed satisfied, and thought he had got quite rich, and turned his money to good advantage; but the curse of God rested upon all his property as was soon manifest. The next winter I took a mission in company with Elder William E. McLellin down through the State of Missouri and into Illinois, crossing the Mississippi at Clarksville. As we approached Clarksville, we were told by several of the inhabitants near, not to attempt a meeting or any religious instruction there, for they were a hardened and irreclaimable set of blasphemers and infidels, given to gambling, drinking and cursing, etc.; and that many different orders of the clergy had attempted in vain to reclaim them, or even to get a hearing. Before entering the town we ascended a mountain and cried mightily unto the Lord that He would open our way, and move upon the hearts of the people to receive us and hear the Word. We then entered the town and called at a hotel. We told the landlord that we had come in the name of Jesus Christ to preach the gospel to the people, being sent by him without purse or scrip. "Well," said he, "you are welcome to my house and such fare as we have; and we will meet together and hear your religion, and if it proves to be better than ours we will embrace it; for we confess that our religion is to fiddle and dance, and eat and drink, and be merry, and gamble and swear a little; and we believe this is better than priestcraft." We replied that we would try them anyhow. So a meeting was convened; we preached, had good attention, and much of a candid spirit of inquiry was manifest, and we were treated with hospitality and friendship, and even ferried over the river free; and this was more than those religious sectaries would do, who had warned us against them. Passing over the river, the next day we came to Green County, Illinois; and as the day drew to a close we began to circulate an appointment as we travelled along a thick settlement of thrifty farmers, for preaching in a school house in the neighborhood that evening. As we sat by the highway side to rest ourselves, an old farmer rode past on horseback, and halted to ask if we were travellers. We replied that we were travelling to preach the gospel, and had an appointment that evening at the school house just ahead, and invited him to come and hear. "No," said he, "I have not attended a religious meeting this five years; I have long been disgusted and tired of priestcraft and religious ignorance and division, and have concluded to stand aloof from it all."