constitution at the polls. Petitions were presented to the January legislature of 1847, urging the calling of another convention in case the constitution should be rejected. During the discussion of this measure strong speeches were made in opposition to adopting the constitution.

The opponents of the instrument were of no one party, but the Whigs as representatives of the moneyed and business class disapproved of the banking and exemption clauses. Ex-Governor Tallmadge was considered the commander-inchief of the anticonstitutional forces. The Liberty men opposed ratification because negro suffrage was not embodied in the instrument. One faction of the Democrats opposed, apparently because the other faction approved. The entire territory was divided into pro- and anticonstitution groups. The banking clause and the married women's property and exemption clauses raised a storm of opposition. The people were influenced by the impassioned oratory of the leaders. Mass meetings were held by both the "Friends of the Constitution" and the "Anti-Constitution" groups. Songs were written, liberty poles erected, and the populace was stirred to the pitch where blows succeeded words as arguments. Most of the voters had slight understanding of the radical propositions embodied in the constitution, but influenced by party leaders the majority went to the polls April 6, 1847 prejudiced against the instrument and defeated its adoption by a vote of 14,119 for, and 20,233 against.

Before the constitution had been defeated strong influences had been at work to prepare the way for a second convention should the result of the first be rejected. The territorial press agitated for a special legislative session; petitions bearing many signatures requested immediate action. It was much desired that a constitution should be drawn in time to permit Wisconsin to take part in the presidential campaign of 1848. Accordingly on September 27, 1847 Governor Dodge issued a call for an extra session of the

legislature which took place October 18-27. Its sole business was to arrange for a new constitutional convention, and the only difficulty was the apportionment of members. A strong desire was evinced for a smaller convention, so that the number of delegates was finally fixed at sixty-nine, and the date for assembling December 15. These measures met with general approval; nominations were quickly made, and the election of delegates occurred on November 29. A few of the local nominating conventions instructed their delegates; in others candidates were closely questioned on the subjects of banking, married women's rights, and exemptions. Few of the first convention members were nominated a second time. The choice resulted in a larger proportion of Whigs, twentythree of that party being chosen to forty-six Democrats. The convention organized with the election of Morgan L. Martin chairman and Thomas M. McHugh secretary. A new constitution was prepared with some measure of unanimity. The fundamental law was made to rest on general principles, while most of the disputed features of the earlier constitution were omitted. The elective judiciary was retained, exemptions and married women's property rights were left to later legislation, a harmless banking privilege was incorporated.

The convention finished its labors on February 1, and the popular election was set for March 13. The Liberty party was the only opposition element in the territory. All the press advocated the adoption of the new constitution. One of the members of the first convention attempted to secure from the legislature the right for the people to vote for the first constitution as well as for the second, but he was unsuccessful. The election on March 13 gave 16,417 votes in favor of the constitution and 6,174 against it. On April 10 the Governor issued a proclamation declaring the result, and on May 29, 1848 Congress formally admitted Wisconsin to the Union. The constitution adopted in 1848 has stood the test of time and still serves as the fundamental law of the state of Wisconsin.

ANOTHER VIEW OF THE KENSINGTON RUNE

STONE

RASMUS B. ANDERSON

When the so-called Kensington Rune Stone in 1898 was brought forth from its sleep beneath the roots of a tree on a farm near Kensington, Minnesota, it produced but a slight ripple of sensation. A photographic copy of the inscription on this stone was sent to me and to others supposed to be somewhat familiar with the runic alphabet and with Old Norse history, for our opinion, and I think I may safely say that we all agreed in declaring it to be a rather clumsy fraud. As a result the matter received but little further attention, and Mr. Olaf Ohman, on whose farm the stone was found, converted it into a stepping-stone to his granary. In course of time Mr. H. R. Holand, now of Ephraim, Wisconsin, happened to visit Mr. Ohman and got possession of the discarded rune stone, and how he ever since has been exploiting it is presumably well known to my readers. The inscription is a fraud on the very face of it, and the proofs of this fact are most abundant.

I do not at present care to enter into a detailed discussion. of all the evidence against the genuineness of this runic inscription. I will, however, mention three facts that seem to me quite conclusive.

(1) The date at the end of the inscription is 1362. Now it is a well-known fact that the runes were extensively used in the north of Europe before the eleventh century, but with the introduction of Christianity the people got ink, parchment, and the Roman alphabet; the runes very rapidly passed into desuetude, and long before 1362 their use had been wholly abandoned.

(2) In the very beginning of the inscription occurs the word "opdhagelsefærdh," and the word "opdagelse," which means discovery, had not yet been incorporated into any Scandinavian tongue.

(3) In the inscription we also find the word "rise," meaning journey. The word "reisa" is found in the old Scandinavian languages, but there it invariably means to raise, to erect: thus, in phrases stating that a son erects a memorial stone on his father's grave. But "reisa," meaning a journey, is a word of recent importation in Scandinavia.

If an inscription should be brought to the notice of the public with a claim that it was say 200 years old and was found to contain such words as automobile, telephone, bicycle, wireless, aeroplane, and so on ad libitum, the opinion of a learned university professor would not be required to establish its fraudulent origin.

Perhaps I ought to add that the fact that in the very first line of the inscription eight of the supposed explorers are described as Goths, that is, men from Sweden, is sufficient to throw suspicion on its genuineness, for it is well known that those who made voyages to Iceland, Greenland, Vinland, and to the western islands, generally, came not from Sweden or Denmark, but from Norway.

As is well known, Mr. Holand several years ago took this rune stone to Europe and had it examined by experts in Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, but these all declared it to be without any historical value.

And now I have a short story to tell my readers of an incident that occurred to me ten years ago. I made a statement of it in my paper Amerika at the time, but as the interest in the Kensington stone was then generally on the wane, my story did not attract as wide attention as I had hoped. These are the facts:

In 1910, on invitation, I delivered at Stanley, in the northwestern part of North Dakota, an oration on the seventeenth

of May, Norway's Fourth of July. Stanley was then a village of about one thousand inhabitants. The weather was fine; the speaking and music were from a platform erected in the middle of the main street; all business was suspended; and a large number of people had come from the surrounding country and from neighboring villages, so that I was favored with a large audience. In the evening there was a dance in a large hall over a corner drug store. I was asked to attend this ball, but as I was to take an early morning train for St. Paul, I decided to retire early at my hotel. But I stepped into the drug store where ice cream, soda water, and cigars were sold. On entering the drug store I heard a man making a vigorous speech in praise of the orator of the day. He told the people how that gentleman had been a professor at the University of Wisconsin, how he had served a term as United States minister to Denmark, how he had perpetrated book after book extolling the culture of the Scandinavians, and insisted that he was entitled to far more appreciation than was generally accorded him. This advocate of mine was attired in the clothes of a workingman, more or less covered with dry mud, but his speech revealed a man of more than ordinary culture. If he had been an Irishman I should have been sure that he had kissed the Blarney Stone. He could quote Swedish poetry and Latin and Greek phrases with absolute accuracy. He was well up in literature, history, and philosophy. I admired him, not because he had showered compliments on me and handed me a cigar, but because he was a man of wonderful intelligence and of thorough education, and still did not feel above doing common work.

In addressing him I said, "Who in the world are you, anyway?"

He told me that he was a Swede, that his name was Andrew Anderson, that in his younger days he had been a student at the celebrated University of Upsala, and that in 1882 he had quit the University, packed his books, and emi