We took leave of H.S. Allen and Company in the fall of 1855, at the land sale. Every interest and movement of settlement, business, and social relation of the entire county were more or less dependent upon, or identified with this company, and affect by the heavy losses it sustained. In the summer of 1856, the surrounding country received large accessions of farmers; the village of Chippewa Falls was laid off; a dam was thrown across the Chippewa River at a point nearer the mill; a large three story hotel was erected on the site of the Tremont House (lately burned); the Presbyterian Church was commenced as a mission church under the indefatigable labors of Reverend W.W. McNair. Early in the spring of this year, Thaddeus and Albert Pound were employed by H.S. Allen and Company, as clerks in the same establishment, who in the succeeding fall, in company with Frederic Bussy, started the first store not connected with the mill, at the Falls. As indicating the opportunities presented by a new, and especially a lumbering country, and as evidence that merit and ability will be discovered and appreciated, no matter how obscure their possession, I will give an account of this last named person. Frederick Bussy was born in Prussia, emigrated to the United States just as this country became involved in war with Mexico, and immediately enlisted in one of our New York regiments, in which he served as a private until the close of war and was severely wounded in one of the terrible charges made by our troops at Molino Del Ray. After his discharge from the hospital at New Orleans, to which he had been removed until his recovery, he found his way up to St. Louis, where in the fall of 1848, Mr. Willis employed him, with sever other also returned soldiers from Mexico, and sent them up to Chippewa Falls to do such work as they were able. As the writer was running a logging camp at Bob's Creek, and needed men, Bussy was sent up to him. He could speak scarcely a word of English, and never had had an axe in his hands, was utterly ignorant of the work I had for any man to do, and after trying his hand at several kinds without success, he said he could cook, and wanted to try his hand at that. The cook I had required an assistant, so Fred took the place, and soon made me understand that if the wood was cut for him he could manage the business alone. This enabled me to put the former cook at some other business. Little did I think that this obscure and almost helpless soldier (Bussy) possessed business qualifications that would soon elevate him to positions of trust, and the management and control of extensive operations. But having mastered out language, he was found to be a good accountant, which secured him a position with the aforesaid company, and in 1856, commenced business with J.A. Taylor, as before stated. He was married the same year to Miss Galloway, a very estimable lady, and was elected county treasurer in 1858. The firm of Bussy and Taylor erected, or rather completed the Gravel Island steam mill, which was managed with considerable ability until its destruction by fire in 1862. Mr. Bussy died in 1866, at Winona Minnesota. Of the other emigrants to Chippewa County this year, the most prominent were Rodman Palmer, Elijah Pound (father of Thaddeus and Albert), James Woodruff, and Mr. Waterman, Mr. Fuller, Mr. Vanloon, I.P. Sheldon, A. Walker, Stephan Brown, Bonneville and Loveland, all well-known citizens who came with their families. As this year marks a new era in the social condition of this valley, it may be interesting before taking leave of the old regime, to speak more at length of its peculiar aspects. Without schools, churches, and literary culture, the elements of social intercourse are very much restricted in a neighborhood, especially where several races and nationalities are represented; balls being the only available resource from which all distinctions of race, color, language, family or worldly position was utterly banished. Every winter several of these were given at different localities, some of which were grand affairs, and having frequently attended with my family these gatherings, I will try to describe a grand ball of that period. It required about all the women in the valley to afford an opportunity, by keeping them constantly on the floor, for every young man to get a partner for a single cotillion set, and accordingly, having sent out invitations to every settlement and family, the party giving the ball would send two men and team with conveyance to every lady whose presence was considered doubtful, and to these it was no use to make excuses, she was considered doubtful, and to these it was no use to make excuse, she must go, and nothing short of illness would induce them to leave the house without her. One of the long dining halls at the mill company was cleared of tables and most of its benches, and a motley group assembled, many of whom are the dark haired daughters of the forest, more, a shade lighter, are from Her Majesty's domain of Canada, a few from the Red River of the North, (now Manitoba), and the rest from all parts of this country, and wile the company are assembling greetings are heard in half a dozen different languages, while an invitation to drink awaits every new comer of the men, and by the time tie music strikes up several are too far gone to take part in the enjoyments. A survey of the room discloses about three gents to one lady, so there is no danger of anyone of the ladies drooping as a 'wall flower.' It also discloses some half-dozen hard-visaged men, mostly from the South, with revolvers and bowie knife carried conspicuously about their person, and who are ready to rope in and fleece some unsuspecting newcomer, or to pick a quarrel with someone against whom an old grudge exists. For several years, Dan McCann, "Old Dan," as he is called, was the only hope of any terpsichorean assembly in this valley, as it was to the touch of his fiddle bow that every light, fantastic tow must yield active or passive obedience. He knew nothing of music as a science, but could play a number of marches, cotillions and one waltz, very well by rote, and woe to the hapless ball or party that failed to secure his indispensable services. A marked feature of all such gatherings was the perfect equality manifested between all parties, their perfect freedom from envy and petty heart-burning on account of dress, family or other distinctions; in fact they were perfect free-and-easies, and being about the only social recreation, were regarded with much favor by all parties, and exerted a very healthful influence, the only drawback being the presence of the blacklegs, who sometimes made things lively by promiscuous shooting amongst the dancers and into a crowd whenever a dispute arose at the gaming table and the opposite party took refuge among them. Such is the picture of the highest social enjoyment in the good old time. When John R. Jewett, the English blacksmith, found himself safe and sound on board the good ship Boston, at Nootka Sound, Vancouver's Island, where for three and a half years he had been held a prisoner by Maquinuy, an Indian Chief, who, with his savage follower, had, by treachery in an unguarded moment, slain the captain and crew of a Newburyport, northwest coast trading ship, saving only Jewett and one other man, which they plundered and destroyed, preserving all the iron about her forge, tools and her blacksmith, whom they compelled to do their work and to marry a chief's daughter, by who he had two children - he bad bade goodbye to Maquinuy and all his chiefs, but not one word of regret at parting with his children. When a mere lad I read Jewett's narrative, and could never refrain from denouncing him for the heartless, inhuman conduct, so destitute of paternal regard that he makes no reference to either his children or their mother. In a preceding number I have stated that many of the earlier settlers took to themselves wives of the native population. The influx of white women during this and the previous year, 1855-6, induced almost everyone to discard these women, with a view to new, and socially more advantageous, attachments; but in no instance were the children forsaken, or their welfare neglected; ample provision, according to their means, being provided for their sustenance and education, and in most instances the mother also was cared for, indicating a higher appreciation of paternal responsibility than the English blacksmith entertained in 1800. The moral aspect of such connections, formed and dissolved as they were at the pleasure of one party, will present itself to every one according to their respective ideas of marriage, but no one will withhold their approval and highest commendation of the very few men whose family ties were strong enough to induce them to forego all social considerations and cleave unswervingly to the mother of their children. Taking its rise in the timbered regions far to the north, where the chilling winds of Lake Superior prevent the melting of snow on the upper branches until the ice is dissolved in the river at this point, the Chippewa has seldom broken up with an ice freshet capable of inflicting much damage to piers, booms, and other improvements placed in its bed, but the spring of 1858 was an exception to former precedents I this respect, the ice breaking up for many miles above before it winter force and volume and abated, and coming down in jams of such crushing power that everything in its path was swept away; the new dam, several piers, a large share of the booms, and vast amount of logs were mingled with the ice in one common ruin. To a successful business man whose integrity has for long years never been suspected, or his ability to meet his obligations questioned, when on surveying his affairs he, for the first time, sees bankruptcy staring him in the face, is about as wretched a piece of humanity as the worlds affords. Innumerable expedients are conjured up to obtain relief, some, perhaps, not very honorable; in constant dread of some sudden disruption in his plans, his ideas become confused as to what will be right and honorable; at one moment he resolves to pay every claim as long as there is a dollar to pay with, and at the next, his wife and children engrossing his thoughts, he can not see them suffer; come what will, his first and last duty is to provide for them. But how shall it be done? Is there any war by which he can save his honor, and something that shall shield his children from want? Such were the gloomy foreboding of Mr. Allen when in the winter of 1856-7, he saw the tide of adversity bearing down upon the house of which he was the head, and threatening to bury every hope. Hitherto the company had met it obligations with reasonable promptness, but now note after note must go to protest, and soon judgments would nail every foot of land, and not a dollar could be saved for the little ones. The company was now composed of H.S. Allen, Jacob Wills, Moses Rines, and E.A. Galloway. Rines held in is own rights the title to a quarter section of land on which the city is now built, and considered if any game was to be played, he had a pretty good hand. He was a drunken, worthless fellow, who never ought to have been in that position; he had kept sober long enough to marry a beautiful and accomplished woman, and might have been happy but for his abandoned habits, but in self-defense she was soon compelled to leave him and Mr. Allen also determined to rid the firm of such a burden. That "there is a tide in the affairs of men" is so old that it need not be repeated here, but is very applicable, and no doubt H.S. Allen thought that for him it was fast on the ebb when bought Moses Rines' interest in the firm for ten thousand dollars, and borrowed fifteen hundred to make the first payment, but whether he could discern through the darkening vista of coming events, the gleam of brighter skies beyond, is know only to himself, but to this single stroke of luck, tact, or good management, is due his present easy, perhaps I may say opulent circumstances. Of the many expedients to afford relief from the present pressure, one was resolved upon. A common stock company was organized, and one thousand shares of one hundred dollars each represented the property. Various parties from aboard were induced to take stock, which relieved the old firm in some measure, and in the summer or fall of 1857 the new company commenced operations under the name of Chippewa Falls Lumber Company, H.S. Allen, President; one Jordon, Vice-President; a lumber merchant of Dubuque, Treasurer; John Judge, Secretary. The old company went into liquidation, its liabilities being assumed by the new - a vast accumulation of interest bearing debt. John Judge was a thorough business man, but was appalled by this immense burden; with a sound currency and hopeful times, he would have raised the company credit and gone one, but after one summer's fair trial, the officers met by agreement at some place in the interior of Illinois, divided the earnings amongst them, and the poor stockholders were nowhere.

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