The things we do!

"If caught and attached to a plough," says the governor, who spoke
truthfully but with little knowledge of this wild animal, "it would move
it at a speed superior to that of the domestic ox." I do not know how
appealing this harnessing of the original motive power of the prairie to
the uses of agriculture was, and it is not of importance now. The buffalo
has long since gone. Even the ox and the Norman horse, so long in use
there, have been largely supplanted by that mysterious force, electricity,
which Franklin was discovering on the other side of the Alleghany
Mountains at the very time that this suggestion was being made to the
minister of Louis XV. It is known, however, that the king took thought of
the little Illinois colony, for the fort of wood was transformed under the
direction of Chevalier de Macarty into a fortress of stone and garrisoned
by nearly a regiment of French troops. A million crowns it cost the king,
but this could not have distressed his Majesty, engaged in "throwing dice
with piles of Louis d'or before him" and princes about him.


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