Transcriber’s Notes: Text enclosed by underscores is in italics. Additional Transcriber’s Notes are at the end. * * * * * TWENTY-FIVE YEARS IN THE WEST. BY ERASMUS MANFORD CHICAGO: E. MANFORD, PUBLISHER. 1867. * * * * * TO MY CHRISTIAN FRIENDS IN THE WEST, _WITH WHOM I HAVE LIVED_ AND LABORED MANY YEARS, THIS VOLUME IS DEDICATED THE AUTHOR. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGE 9. Parentage and Childhood; “Lord” Timothy Dexter; At School; In Haverhill; Shoemaking; Early Aspirations; Converted; Must be a Minister; On a Plank; Attend School; A Long Walk; Studies with J. C. Waldo and Dr. Cobb; First Preaching; With W. S. Balch; First Tour; First Debate; Came out Second Best; Talk with an Englishman about American Coarseness; Conversation on Slavery; In Maryland; Talk with an Episcopal Clergyman concerning Endless Woe not being Taught in the Old Testament; Traveling and Preaching on the Eastern Shore; Return to Baltimore; A Storm; Where Truth Flourishes and Where it Does Not; Another Location; Self and Faith Abused; Preach in Harper’s Ferry, Charleston, Winchester, Va.; A Hard Battle; Cross the Alleghany Mountains. CHAPTER II. PAGE 33. In Pittsburg; S. A. Davis, Wife and Daughter; The West; Preach in Pennsylvania and Ohio; Western Reserve; Talk with a Bigot; Conversation on a Steamboat; Forbidden to Preach; Grave Creek; A Mound; My Study; What is Salvation? Proceedings in Bainbridge; Mud; In Cincinnati; General Harrison; In Rising Sun; Patriot; Preach in Louisville, Ky.; E. M. Pingree; On the Mississippi River; Preach in a Steamboat; In New Orleans; Battle Ground. CHAPTER III. PAGE 47. A Sea Voyage; A Meeting at Sea; Tornado; Strange Vessel; In Texas; Travel to Houston; Hard Fare; The Country; Sleeping on the Ground; Very Thirsty; Must have Water; Colorado River; Sound Asleep on its Banks; Cross the River on Logs; Corn Cake; A Surprise; In Houston; General Houston; The Attorney-General of Texas; San Jacinto Battle Ground; A Pandemonium; Buck Wheat Cakes; Embark for New Orleans; A Condemned Vessel; On Allowance; In New Orleans; A Contrast; Ague and Fever; Up the Mississippi. CHAPTER IV. PAGE 55. Labors of E. B. Mann; N. Wadsworth; Owner of a Horse; Preach in Indiana and Kentucky; A Profane Life; General Clarke; Atheism; The Eyeless Fish; A Presbyterian Minister’s Wisdom; No Hell, No Heaven; Travel in Ohio; Another Preacher Replies; Labors in Dayton; D. R. Biddlecom; George Messenger; R. Smith’s Somersault; J. A. Gurley; George Rogers; Start for Indiana; Battle in Harrison; Universalism an Old Doctrine, and of God; Partialism an Old Doctrine, but of Satan; Grove Meeting; Father St. John: Badly Treated; John O’Kane on his Creed; In Indianapolis; A. Longley; A Horse; Questioned by a Methodist; In Terre Haute; Very Unpopular. CHAPTER V. PAGE 74.