If he did not own a horse, he usually made a bargain with some farmer to haul him to his next stopping place in exchange for taking his picture.

When business grew dull in one neighborhood, he moved to another.

He was the true Bohemian of his trade--the gypsy of early photography.
The forward wheels of this one were gone, and its front end was propped up level on a short piece of timber; but otherwise the "saloon" looked as if the "artist" might at that moment be developing a plate inside.
On closer inspection, however, we saw that weeds had sprung up beneath and about it, and I guessed that the wagon had been standing there for at least a month or two; and on peeping in at the little end door we saw that birds or squirrels had been in and out of the place.

All that we could make of it was that the photographer, whoever he was, had come there, left his "saloon" and gone away--with the forward wheels.
We gathered a load of herbs and drove home again, much puzzled by our discovery.

The story of the "daguerreotype saloon" at Dresser's Lonesome soon spread abroad, but no one was able to furnish a clue to its history.