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As for books, McConnell, with true Western generosity, offered to loan such as would be of immediate use. So again Douglass took up his travels. At Meredosia, the nearest landing on the river, he waited a week for the boat upstream. There was no other available route to Pekin. Then came the exasperating intelligence, that the only boat which plied between these points had blown up at Alton.
After settling accounts with the tavern-keeper, he found that he had but fifty cents left. There was now but one thing to do, since hard manual labor was out of the question: he would teach school. But where? Meredosia was a forlorn, thriftless place, and he had no money to travel.
Thus he wrote in a private letter, dated October 30, 1858: "I understand the story is still being told and insisted upon that I have been a Know-Nothing. I repeat what I stated in a public speech at Meredosia, that I am not, nor ever have been, connected with the party called the Know-Nothing party, or party calling themselves the American party.
In November Reverdy and I went to Meredosia to see the locomotive which had been shipped from Pittsburgh for Illinois' first railroad. All of the horses and oxen of the neighborhood were required to pull the huge iron thing up the banks of the river; and scores of men in ant-like activity worked about it to place it upon the rails. Douglas was in the crowd, happy and enthusiastic.
Fortunately, a kind-hearted farmer befriended him, lodging him at his house over night and taking him next morning to Exeter, where there was a prospect of securing a school. Disappointment again awaited him; but Winchester, ten miles away, was said to need a teacher. Taking his coat on his arm he had left his trunk at Meredosia he set off on foot for Winchester.
'The Great Northern Cross, a railroad, is soon to be built starting at Meredosia on the Illinois River and running to Jacksonville. "As to my own affairs, dear grandmama, I have nothing to wish for in the way of material progress. Upon my return from New Orleans, whither I went in order to think down an unfortunate love affair, I found that Zoe had run away.
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