XIII.

MARY DUNLEVY.

Few among the pioneer mothers presented in their lives a more impressive example of the patient perseverance, courage, and energy of character which distinguished the matrons of that day, than the subject of the present brief sketch. The materials have been communicated by one of her family, whose recollections enable him to describe much of her experience in building a home in the wilderness.

Mary Craig was of Scottish parentage, and was born on the voyage from Scotland to America, about the year 1765. The family then came to settle in New York. At the commencement of the Revolutionary struggle, Mary was but ten years old, but she could understand that the people were unjustly oppressed, and her feelings were warmly interested in favor of the patriots. Her father had died soon after reaching the country, and she, with an elder sister and a younger brother, formed the little family under her mother’s care. Their circumstances were comfortable, though they were not wealthy, and but for the outbreak of war, they would probably have remained together. The vicissitudes and dangers to which the inhabitants of the city were subjected by the approach of a hostile force, and the occupation of New York by British troops, caused no little alarm to Mrs. Craig for the safety of herself and children; she had few friends in the strange land, and it therefore can hardly be wondered at that, renewing acquaintance with a gentleman whom she had known in Scotland—now an officer in the British navy—she listened favorably to his addresses, and finally married him. Her husband, of course, was a loyalist, and Mary had by this time become so thoroughly imbued with republican principles, that no kindness on the part of her stepfather could reconcile her to the restraints to which she was subjected in the family, in the expression of political opinions. It was not long before she left her home in the city, and went to reside at the house of Dr. Halstead, in Elizabethtown, New Jersey. This proved to be a final separation from the other members of her family. Her sister soon after married an Englishman, and went to England; and when New York was evacuated by the British, her stepfather, with her mother, brother, and an infant half-sister, went with other refugees to Nova Scotia. Mary bore her part, meanwhile, in the apprehension and dangers to which the inhabitants of Elizabethtown were exposed during the war from the frequent incursions of the enemy. She repeatedly risked her life in endeavors to save the property of her friends from destruction, which she would do by earnest appeals to the invaders, trusting that her youth would ensure her own safety. On one occasion a sword was drawn upon her, with a threat that she should be killed if she did not leave the room; but she persisted, and finally saved the property threatened. She was often occupied during the whole day or night in running bullets, or in attendance upon the wounded or dying. When the better time arrived, she witnessed the triumphal march of Gen. Washington on his way to New York, being one of a number of young girls who strewed the road with flowers as he passed. The disasters of a tedious war were soon forgotten in rejoicings for the establishment of liberty and peace; but for Mary the anxious part of life’s drama was but just commenced. In 1787 she was married to James Carpenter. The Northwest Territory, and especially the Miami country, was at that time much talked about, considerable excitement prevailing on the subject of emigration to the West, and Carpenter had recently returned from a visit of exploration to the Miami purchase in company with Judge Symmes and others. He was so much pleased with the new country that he determined to settle there, and Mary’s inclination corresponded to his own. They left New Jersey with the first little colony of Judge Symmes, reached Limestone, now Maysville, Kentucky, late in the autumn of 1788, and the men, and a few of the stronger among the women, immediately repaired to Columbia, near the mouth of the Little Miami, five miles above the site of Cincinnati. Here they commenced building a log fort and cabins for the different families of the settlers, and laying out fields and gardens for cultivation the next spring, while the feebler members of the company remained in Kentucky during the winter.

In the spring, the fort being completed, all the settlers took up their residence at the locality selected. The families occupied the cabins built for them, but whenever there was an alarm of the approach of hostile Indians, they fled to the garrison, which was defended with all the strength of the colony, and the enemy chased away when not in large parties. Yet, notwithstanding the utmost precaution, the stealthy marauders sometimes succeeded in carrying off property and capturing prisoners, and even in killing several persons in the settlement. Mary, whose childhood had been familiar with the terrors of civil war, and whose heart was stout and resolute, was to be tried by the severest of sorrows. Carpenter’s arduous labors during the first winter and spring in clearing the ground and assisting to raise the buildings, had caused a hemorrhage of the lungs, the effects of which brought on a decline, terminating in his death in less than two years. Mary was thus left with two young children, without a relative to protect her, in the midst of a wilderness, surrounded by savage foes; but her courage and resolution did not falter under accumulated trials. She knew that her children had no dependence except on her care and labors, and trusting in the Providence whose kindness watches over the widow and the fatherless, she determined to lean, with her helpless babes, on His protection and guidance, and perform with untiring energy the duties that lay before her. She was urged to take up her residence in the fort, as she could not otherwise be safe from the frequent assaults of the savages; but she persisted in remaining in her cabin, notwithstanding the remonstrances of her neighbors, and although her home was several hundred yards from the blockhouse. Her wounded heart preferred solitude to society; the more so as in the promiscuous company frequently assembled in the garrison, the rough oaths of the soldiers might frequently be heard, and she resolved to risk living alone, rather than be distressed by associations repulsive to her delicate and sensitive nature. At the same time she planned the measures she would take in the event of danger, leaving the result with Him in whom her trust was placed. Beneath the puncheon floor laid in every cabin, there was generally dug a small cellar in which vegetables might be kept secure from frost. Every night she lifted one of these pieces of timber, and placed her children in a rough bed she had made in the cellar. As soon as they were asleep, the puncheon was laid down, and the mother took her position where she could see the Indians, when approaching, at a considerable distance. Here she would sit during the whole night, engaged, in the hours of wakefulness, in knitting or such housework as could be performed without any other light than from smothered embers not permitted to give out the slightest blaze. When the youngest child waked and required nursing, she would lift the puncheon, and sit on the edge of the opened floor till it was lulled to sleep, then deposit it once more in the secret bed and close the floor over it. Her resolution was taken, should the Indians attack one door, to make her escape by the opposite one to the fort, give the alarm, and bring the men to rescue her children before the foe could discover their hiding-place. Her fears were not groundless; the Indians were often seen by her prowling about the little village, and on several occasions, when all was dark and still, they came to the door of her cabin, and attempted to enter. Finding the door barred, however, they did not, for some reason or other, attempt to force it; so that the widow and her children remained undisturbed, while from other parts of the settlement property was stolen and prisoners taken, and one or two individuals were shot in close vicinity to the fort.

The emigrants who established themselves at Columbia, were men of energy and enterprise, and the little settlement for two or three years contained more inhabitants than any other in the Miami purchase. The second party destined for the Miami, was formed at Limestone; they landed the 24th of December, 1788, on the north bank of the Ohio, opposite the mouth of Licking river, and laid out a town, to which the name of Cincinnati was given the following year. The third party of adventurers to the purchase, under the immediate direction of Judge Symmes, established a station at ‘North Bend,’ the most northern bend in the Ohio below the mouth of the great Kanawha. The village has since become distinguished as the home of President Harrison, whose tomb, on one of its hills, can be seen from the river.

These three principal settlements of the Miami country had one general object, and were threatened by one common danger; yet, says Judge Burnet, there existed a strong spirit of rivalry among them, “each feeling a pride in the prosperity of the little colony to which he belonged. That spirit produced a strong influence on the feelings of the pioneers of the different villages, and an esprit du corps scarcely to be expected under circumstances so critical and dangerous as those which threatened them. For some time, it was matter of doubt which of the rivals, Columbia, Cincinnati, or North Bend, would eventually become the chief seat of business.” The establishment of the garrison at Cincinnati, made it the head-quarters and depôt of the army. Fort Washington was the most extensive and important military work in the territory. It was said that the removal of the troops from the Bend, which was strenuously opposed by Judge Symmes, was caused by an attachment on the part of the officer in command, to a beautiful woman, whose departure to reside in Cincinnati opened the eyes of her admirer to its advantages for a military post, and thus made it the commercial emporium and the Queen City of the West.

I shall not hesitate to offer, in different memoirs, descriptions of pioneer life furnished by individuals whose recollections are entirely reliable. Although these may involve occasional repetition, they will enable us to perceive any difference of habits or manners in different parts of the country, and to appreciate more fully the spirit of enterprise and power of endurance which made the way so much easier to those who succeeded the early colonists. The densely wooded mountain ranges were a formidable barrier at that period between the old States and the new territories. The difficulties attending any communication can hardly be imagined by those who enjoy the facilities of travelling now, and made the work of the pioneer more arduous and hazardous than in more recent settlements, where the emigrant has the advantage of public conveyances, at least part of the way, and may find the necessaries of life within a distance readily accessible. It was no small undertaking to penetrate the unbroken forest, ascend or descend rivers that had never before been navigated, and carry to a home in the wilderness supplies for a household in a few chests. These usually held the clothing of the pioneer’s family, while a few cooking utensils were added to the stock, and occasionally a table or bureau; though for such articles of furniture, as well as chairs and bedsteads, the settlers generally depended on the rough manufacture of the country. Shelves hewn by the axe supplied the place of bureaus and wardrobes, and two poles fastened in a corner of the cabin, the outer corner supported by a prop, answered the purpose of a bedstead, until better could be had. The pioneer’s cabin was indeed a complete example of domestic economy. It was built of unhewn logs, sometimes in a single day, by the owner and eight or ten of the neighbors, who never refused their assistance. The floor was made of split slabs or puncheons, as they were called, dubbed with an adze, or where the resident was over nice, smoothed with the broad-axe on the upper side. The doors were made of boards riven from a tree of the proper length and thickness, and smoothed with a drawing-knife. The windows, in the earliest settlements, were made by cutting away the under and upper portions of two of the logs of the house, forming thus a square opening of suitable size, in which sometimes upright sticks were placed, covered with white paper, oiled with hog’s fat or bear’s oil, to admit the light in place of glass, a luxury not then to be procured. The fire-place was usually very large, built up on three sides six or eight feet with stone, and then topped with “cat and clay,” as it was termed. The cabin completed, the next thing was to clear a piece of ground for a cornpatch. A shovel-plow was generally used, as most convenient among the roots. The harness consisted mostly of leatherwood bark, except the collar, which was made of husks of corn plaited and sewed together.

Rough and uncouth in appearance as were these primitive cabins, they could be made very comfortable, and for health seemed preferable to many more civilized dwellings. One of them, sometimes containing but a single room, with a rude loft reached by a ladder, was the happy home of a numerous household; the children raised there growing up to usefulness and eminence among their fellow citizens. The children thus raised were generally of powerful frame, and possessed great physical strength; their height and proportions, it is said, being known, as a rule, to surpass those born after the erection of frame and brick dwellings. Sickness also was rare among them.

It is true that these rude habitations had some inconveniences, which might now be considered too formidable to contend with; and it may be thought strange how a female of cultivation and refinement could bring herself to live in one of them. Yet it is certain, that among the early pioneers who came to the Miami country, were some ladies of the highest consideration in New York and New Jersey; and it is no less certain that they readily and cheerfully accommodated themselves to the condition of things around them. The dressing-room and ornamental toilette were lacking; but they were dispensed with for such accommodations as necessity suggested. Each cabin usually contained two beds in the lower room, and these were separated from each other by full and flowing curtains around one at least, answering the purpose of a partition and dressing apartment.

The women of those times, it has been often observed, were of a sturdier nature than at the present day, and encountered both hardships and dangers with a philosophy and a grace which can now be hardly understood. Most of them undertook the labor of the household unassisted, requiring no help except when children were born, till the older ones grew old enough to be useful. There were but few single young women in the early settlement; if any came with friends from the east, they were very soon married and had their own household affairs to attend to. In the summer, besides the ordinary housework, the wife of the pioneer spun the wool which formed the winter’s clothing for the male part of the family, as well as flannel for herself and the girls; in the winter was spun the flax of which clothing was made the ensuing summer. The buzz of the wheel, therefore, was heard at all seasons in the cabins of the early settlers, and often in the winter until the approach of midnight. Yet, with all these laborious duties, which were regularly and faithfully performed, the pioneer mothers found time to arrange their houses with the most scrupulous order and neatness, and were not without their social enjoyments. The afternoons of the long summer’s day were frequently spent in visiting or receiving visits from neighbors within a few miles’ distance. No motive could exist for a profession of friendship where the reality was not felt; and distress in any family never failed to elicit the sympathy and command the aid, so far as it could be rendered, of all the neighbors. Social intercourse was intimate, and the interchange of expressions of good feeling, sincere and constant; and never could one familiar with these associations forget the smooth winding foot paths which led through the deep forest and tall grass or underbrush from the house of one pioneer to that of another, traversed daily on errands of business or friendship, so that every family was kept acquainted with all the occurrences of the day throughout the settlement. If a fat bear or deer was killed by one it was generally divided, and the portions sent round as a token of kindly regard. Game was abundant, and the turkeys, venison and bear’s meat which so frequently loaded the rustic tables, might well have been prized by the most fastidious epicures of advanced civilization.

On the whole the life of the pioneer, though one of hardship and danger, was one of stir and excitement, and a perfect freedom so agreeable to the enterprising rover, that it may be questioned whether it were not, for him at least, the happiest state of society. There was freshness and novelty in the scenery around him and in the adventurous experience of every day; the keen invigorating air of the wildwood, and the constant exercise required, gave energy and activity to body and mind, and sustained and exhilarated the spirits; no forms or ceremonious customs constrained or chilled social manners, and no jealousy or bitterness could arise out of difference in circumstances, distinctions growing out of condition being entirely unknown in those primitive communities. Good faith and honesty in business transactions were taken for granted on both sides, and the lack of them would have been punished by social outlawry. The general prevalence of good health was promoted by the constant exposure which hardened the pioneers to the sudden changes incident to a severe climate, and by their simplicity of diet. The cakes and preserves which nowadays take up so much of the attention of housekeepers in preparing, and are regarded as essential articles of provision in genteel houses, were almost unknown. The Kentucky “hoecake,” or the “johnny” or “journey cake,” of the Miami Valley, formed the favorite winter bread, and was used during a great part of the spring season. The corn was ground, before mills were erected, in a hand-mill, or pounded in a hominy-block, made by burning a hole in one end of a block of wood, the corn being pounded with a pestle made by driving an iron wedge into a stick of suitable size. When sufficiently pounded, it was sifted, and the finer portion made into bread and mush, the coarser being boiled for hominy. The meat was bear, venison, and wild turkey, as it was difficult to raise hogs or sheep on account of the wolves and bears.

The amusements of the men were such as developed physical strength and animated to cheerfulness. The chase, the principal one, served the purpose of an exciting and healthy exercise, while it furnished provision for the family. The women of course took no active part in this sport, except when the bear hunt roused the whole neighborhood, young and old, male and female, to partake in it with intense interest. A bear chase was usually commenced by the sounding of a peculiar note on the horn, which reverberated wildly among the hills and woods. Presently the distant howl of the hunter’s dogs gave notice that the hunters were in pursuit of the enemy. Every man now seized his rifle and mounted his horse to join the chase, while those who could not do this, ran to see what was done. Sometimes the pursuit would continue all day, but generally it happened that in a few hours the bear was compelled to “tree,” as it was called. As soon as the hunted animal had thus taken refuge, the hunter who chanced to be nearest the spot, summoned the others by a different note on his horn, and a few rifle shots usually either brought down the fugitive dead, or forced him to descend to escape the shower of bullets. When the bear found it necessary to leave his retreat, his practice generally was to roll himself into a ball-like shape by placing his head between his hind legs, and throw himself from the height. On striking the ground he would rebound several feet, and the instant he touched the ground again, his back was against the root of the tree, while, raising himself on his hind legs, he stood in an attitude of defiance, ready to do battle with the dogs who by that time were collected and eager for the assault. First with one fore paw and then with the other the bear would despatch the dogs as they rushed upon him. But though he could hold his ground thus bravely, it was not usually long before the fatal shot in the head from the hunter’s rifle would lay the victim low, and end the chase for the day. The meat was then divided among the hunters, and they returned to their homes, weary and hungry, and perhaps wet with the falling rain or snow. At their cabins warm fires and comfortable suppers awaited them, and the incidents of the day afforded material for pleasant conversation during the evening. The excitement a chase of this kind always caused throughout the neighborhood can only be imagined by one who has witnessed such an occurrence.

The wolf made havoc with the few sheep introduced, and the wild deer; the bear confined himself to hogs. His practice was to spring suddenly upon his victim, grasp him in his fore legs with irresistible force, erect himself upon his hind legs like a man, and make off in an instant with his load; the piercing squeal of the hog being the first warning to the owner. A large bear, meeting with no obstruction, would make his way through the woods in this manner, with a hog of good size, faster than a man on foot could follow.

The establishment of schools and places for stated religious meetings was coeval with the formation of every settlement, or at least attended to as soon as the pioneers had secured themselves from the savages and provided their families with the means of daily subsistence. The schoolhouses, like the primitive cabins, were roughly constructed, but in some of them men whose mental endowments and ripe scholarship have raised them to eminence in after life, received the first rudiments of education. It happened in some neighborhoods, it is true, that no schools were established; but the evil effects of such neglect were discernible long afterwards, and in some instances the want of general intelligence is still evident in those portions of the country. The privilege of hearing the gospel preached regularly every Sabbath, could not often be enjoyed, as different and distant neighborhoods had to be supplied, and there were but few pastors; but service was held, and sermons were read when no clergyman could attend, and the announcement that there was to be preaching would bring the settlers together from many miles around. The strength of their attachment to the Sabbath services is shown by the fact that they were not prevented, even when threatened with Indian incursions, from meeting in large numbers, to hear the word preached whenever an opportunity presented itself. While the danger was imminent it was usual for all the men to carry fire-arms and ammunition, as the law among them required every one to do; sentinels being placed on the watch while service was going on. It was not till after the peace which followed Wayne’s treaty at Greenville that the necessity for carrying arms to religious meetings no longer existed, and in the outer settlements the custom was kept up for some years after. It was not an unusual sight to see a file of riflemen with their shot pouches, and arms at rest, stationed around the large congregations which in warm weather were accustomed to assemble in the woods for religious worship. When the necessity for this strict guard became less apparent, and the Indians had removed to a greater distance, these forest assemblages on the Sabbath were very large, different neighborhoods gathering in one place. It was not in the least uncommon for men and women to ride on horseback eight and ten miles to meeting, and the doing so was far from being considered a task or hardship.

One of the first schools established in the Northwestern Territory was in the settlement where Mrs. Carpenter lived. The young man who took charge of it, Francis Dunlevy, had served in many Indian campaigns, having, at the early age of fourteen, offered himself for military service, and been received in place of one of his neighbors who had been drafted, but who had a family dependent on him for support, and was unwilling to go. This was in 1777, and from that time to his coming to Columbia, he had been on service in occasional excursions against the savages. He served at the time of the disastrous defeat of Crawford at the Sandusky Plains in 1782, and after that time had travelled over those portions of the Northwest Territory which now constitute Ohio, Western Virginia, and the northern part of Kentucky. He was not only a man of great courage, spirit, and enterprise, but of such industry and perseverance, that in the midst of the labors and vicissitudes of numerous campaigns, and the privations to which he was subject in a forest life, he employed the intervals of leisure from military occupations in study, and acquired a classical education.

Having made up his mind to reside for the future in the Northwest Territory, he came to Columbia as teacher of the school in the latter part of the year 1792. He heard the story of Mrs. Carpenter’s trials, and the fortitude with which she bore them; he sought her acquaintance, and finding in her a kindred spirit, in due time offered his hand and was accepted. They were married in January, 1793. Mr. Dunlevy was afterwards a highly respected member of the legislature of the North-west Territory, and of the convention which formed the constitution of Ohio. He also occupied, for fourteen years, the station of presiding judge in the Court of Common Pleas.

For many years after her removal, Mrs. Dunlevy heard not a word from any member of her mother’s family. In 1804 she received a letter from her brother, directed to her “in the Miami country,” by which she was informed of her mother’s death, and that her brother had returned to the United States, and was then living near Lake Champlain. In 1806, her sister and her husband came from Liverpool to New York for the purpose of finding the scattered members of the family, but they learned on their arrival that the brother had died the same year, and that Mary was living in the “far west.” A correspondence was held between the sisters, and a meeting appointed at Pittsburg, the elder sister insisting that she could not venture to encounter the dangers of entering an Indian country, as she considered Western Ohio; but before she left New York to proceed that far, she was seized with yellow fever and died.

The two children of Mrs. Dunlevy by her first marriage attained to womanhood and were married. Besides these, she had three sons and three daughters, all of whom lived to maturity. The mother’s affection for her children was one which absorbed every faculty of her nature. With a resolution that to the last would never give way before difficulties, she was delicate and susceptible in all her feelings, gentle, retiring, and affectionate, and clinging with absolute dependence to those in whom her devoted affections were centred. The death of her eldest daughter, therefore, though she had been married, and lived at a distance for some six years, was a blow from which she never recovered. Her life was afterwards secluded, and her social intercourse entirely confined to her children. A second daughter in five years followed the first to the grave, and four years afterwards, her youngest son having been called to a distant part of the country, was attacked by sudden illness and died far from home. Under these accumulated afflictions the spirit which had never faltered in the presence of danger, nor shrunk from trial in every other form, sank in the prostration of grief. Mrs. Dunlevy’s health failed after the death of her eldest child, and slowly declined till 1828, when, without any particular disease, but a gradual failure of nervous energy, she departed this life, at Lebanon, Ohio, in the sixty-third year of her age. Judge Dunlevy survived her nearly twelve years, and was laid beside her in the burial-ground of the Baptist church, of which they had both long been members.

******

The following sketch of life in the woods is extracted from an article written by John S. Williams, the Editor of the American Pioneer:

“Emigrants poured in from different parts, cabins were put up in every direction, and women, children and goods tumbled into them. Every thing was bustle and confusion, and all at work that could work. Our cabin had been raised, covered, part of the cracks chinked, and part of the floor laid when we moved in, on Christmas day! We had intended an inside chimney, for we thought the chimney ought to be in the house. We had a log put across the whole width of the cabin for a mantel, but when the floor was in we found it so low as not to answer, and removed it. We got the rest of the floor laid in a very few days; the chinking of the cracks went on slowly, but the daubing could not proceed till weather more suitable, which happened in a few days; door-ways were sawed out and steps made of the logs, and the back of the chimney was raised up to the mantel, but the funnel of sticks and clay was delayed until spring.

“In building our cabin it was set to front the north and south, my brother using my father’s pocket compass on the occasion. We had no idea of living in a house that did not stand square with the earth itself. This argued our ignorance of the comforts and conveniences of a pioneer life. The position of the house, end to the hill, necessarily elevated the lower end, and the determination to have both a north and south door, added much to the airiness of the domicile, particularly after the green ash puncheons had shrunk so as to leave cracks in the floor and doors from one to two inches wide. At both the doors we had high, unsteady, and sometimes icy steps, made by piling up the logs cut out of the wall. We had a window, if it could be called a window, when perhaps it was the largest spot in the top, bottom or sides of the cabin at which the wind could not enter. It was made by sawing out a log, placing sticks across; and by pasting an old newspaper over the hole, and applying some hog’s lard, we had a kind of glazing which shed a most beautiful and mellow light across the cabin when the sun shone on it. All other light entered at the doors, cracks and chimney.

“Our cabin was twenty-four by eighteen. The west end was occupied by two beds, the centre of each side by a door, and here our symmetry had to stop, for opposite the window, made of clapboards supported on pins driven into the logs, were our shelves. Upon these shelves my sister displayed in order a host of pewter plates, basins, dishes, and spoons, scoured and bright. A ladder of five rounds occupied the corner near the window. By this, when we got a floor above, we could ascend. Our chimney occupied most of the east end; pots and kettles were opposite the window under the shelves, a gun on hooks over the north door, four split-bottom chairs, three three-legged stools, and a small eight by ten looking-glass sloped from the wall over a large towel and combcase. These, with a clumsy shovel and a pair of tongs with one shank straight, completed our furniture, except a spinning-wheel and such things as were necessary to work with. It was absolutely necessary to have three-legged stools, as four legs of any thing could not all touch the floor at the same time.

“The completion of our cabin went on slowly. The season was inclement, and laborers were not to be had. We got our chimney up breast high as soon as we could, and our cabin daubed as high as the joists outside. It never was daubed on the inside, for my sister, who was very nice, could not consent to ‘live right next to the mud.’ My impression now is, that the window was not constructed till spring, for until the sticks and clay were put on the chimney we could possibly have no need of a window; the flood of light which always poured into the cabin from the fireplace would have extinguished our paper window, and rendered it as useless as the moon at noonday. We got a floor laid over head as soon as possible, perhaps in a month; but when it was laid, the reader will readily conceive of its imperviousness to wind or weather, when we mention that it was laid of loose clapboards split from a red oak, so twisting that each board lay on two diagonally opposite corners, and a cat might have shaken every board on our ceiling.

“The evenings of the first winter did not pass off as pleasantly as evenings afterwards. We had no corn to shell, no turnips to scrape, no tow to spin into rope-yarn, nor straw to plait for hats, and we had come so late we could get but few walnuts to crack. We had, however, the Bible, George Fox’s Journal, Barkley’s Apology, and to our stock was soon after added a borrowed copy of the Pilgrim’s Progress, which we read twice through without stopping. The first winter our living was truly scanty and hard; but even this winter had its felicities. We had part of a barrel of flour which we had brought from Fredericktown. Besides this we had a part of a jar of hog’s lard brought from old Carolina; not the tasteless stuff which now goes by that name, but pure leaf lard taken from hogs raised on pine roots and fattened on sweet potatoes, and into which, while trying, were immersed the boughs of the fragrant bay tree, that imparted to the lard a rich flavor. Of that flour, shortened with this lard, my sister every Sunday morning made short biscuit for breakfast.

“The winter was open, but windy. While the wind was of great use in driving the smoke and ashes out of our cabin, it shook terribly the timber standing almost over us. We were sometimes much and needlessly alarmed. We were surrounded by the tall giants of the forest, waving their boughs and knitting their brows over us, as if in defiance of our disturbing their repose, and usurping their long uncontested pre-emption rights. The beech on the left often shook his bushy head over us as if in absolute disapprobation of our settling there, threatening to crush us if we did not pack up and start. The walnut over the spring branch stood high and straight; no one could tell which way it inclined, but all concluded that if it had a preference it was in favor of quartering on our cabin. We got assistance to cut it down.

“The monotony of the time for several of the first years was enlivened by the howl of wild beasts. The wolves howling around us seemed to moan their inability to drive us from their long and undisputed domain. The bears, panthers and deer but seldom troubled us. When spring was fully come and our little patch of corn, three acres, put in among the beech roots, which at every step contended with the shovel-plough for the right of soil, and held it too, we enlarged our stock of conveniences. As soon as bark would peel off we could make ropes and bark boxes. These we stood in great need of, as such things as bureaus, stands, wardrobes, or even barrels were not to be had. Sometimes boxes made of slippery elm bark, shaved smooth, and the inside out, were ornamented with drawings of birds, trees, etc.

“We settled on beech land, which took much labor to clear. We could do no better than clear out the smaller stuff and burn the brush, &c., around the beeches which, in spite of the girdling and burning we could do to them, would leaf out the first year, and often a little the second. The land, however, was very rich, and would bring better corn than might be expected. We had to tend it principally with the hoe, that is, to chop down the nettles, the water-weed, and the touch-me-not. Grass, lamb’s-quarter, and Spanish-needles were reserved to pester the better prepared farmer. We cleared a small turnip patch, which we got in about the 10th of August. We sowed timothy seed, which took well, and next year we had a little hay besides. The tops and blades of the corn were also carefully saved for our horse, cow, and the two sheep. The turnips were sweet and good, and in the fall we took care to gather walnuts and hickory nuts, which were very abundant. These, with the turnips which we scraped, supplied the place of fruit. I have always been partial to scraped turnips, and could now beat any three dandies at scraping them. Johnny-cake, also, when we had meal to make it of, helped to make up our evening’s repast. The Sunday morning biscuit had all evaporated, but the loss was partially supplied by the nuts and turnips. Our regular supper was mush and milk, and by the time we had shelled our corn, stemmed tobacco, and plaited straw to make hats, etc., our appetites were sharp again. To relieve this difficulty, my brother and I would bake a thin johnny-cake, part of which we would eat, and leave the rest till morning. At daylight we would eat the rest as we walked from the house to work.

“The methods of eating mush and milk were various. Some would sit around the pot, every one taking therefrom for himself. Some would sit at table and have each his tin cup of milk, with a pewter spoon, taking just as much mush from the dish or the pot as he thought would fill his mouth, then lowering it into the milk and taking some to wash it down. This method kept the milk cool, and by frequent repetitions the pioneer would contract a faculty of correctly estimating the proper amount of each. Others would mix mush and milk together.

“To get grinding done was often a great difficulty, by reason of the scarcity of mills, the freezing in winter and the droughts in summer. We had often to manufacture meal in any way we could get the corn to pieces. We soaked and pounded it, we shaved it, we planed it, and, at the proper season, grated it. When one of our neighbors got a hand-mill, it was thought quite an acquisition to the neighborhood. In after years, when we could get grinding by waiting for our turn no more than one day and a night at a horse-mill, we thought ourselves happy. To save meal we often made pumpkin bread, in which, when meal was scarce, the pumpkin would so predominate as to render it next to impossible to tell our bread from that article, either by taste, looks, or the amount of nutriment it contained. Salt was five dollars per bushel, and we used none in our corn bread, which we soon liked as well without it. What meat we had at first was fresh, and but little of that, for had we been hunters we had no time for the chase.

“We had no candles, and cared but little about them except for summer use. My business was to ramble the woods every evening for seasoned sticks, or the bark of the shelly hickory, for light. ’Tis true that our light was not as good as candles, but we got along without fretting, for we depended more upon the goodness of our eyes than we did upon the brilliancy of the light.”

Howe relates an anecdote of one Henry Perry, who in the fall of 1803, after getting up his cabin near Delhi, left his two sons and returned to Philadelphia for the remainder of his family, but finding his wife ill, and afterwards being ill himself, could not get back till the next June. These two little boys, Levi and Reuben, only eleven and nine years old, remained there alone, eight months, fifteen miles from any white family, and surrounded by Indians, with no food but the rabbits they could catch in hollow logs, the remainder of one deer that the wolves killed near them, and a little corn meal that they occasionally obtained of Thomas Cellar, by following down the “Indian trace.” The winter was a severe one, and their cabin was open, having neither daubing, fire-place, nor chimney; they had no gun, and were wholly unaccustomed to forest life, being fresh from Wales, and yet these little fellows not only struggled through but actually made a considerable clearing! Jacob Forst, at an early day, when his wife was sick and could obtain nothing to eat that she relished, procured a bushel of wheat, and throwing it upon his shoulders, carried it to Zanesville to get it ground, a distance of more than seventy-five miles by the tortuous path he had to traverse, and then shouldering his flour retraced his steps home, fording the streams and camping out nights.”

Dr. Hildreth says that for many years after the first settlement of Ohio, salt had to be brought across the mountains on pack-horses. “Those immense fountains of brine that now are known to exist deep in the rocky beds below, were not then dreamed of; it was supposed that the west would always be dependent on the Atlantic coast for salt, and deeply deplored as a serious drawback on the prosperity of this beautiful region. Although springs of salt water were known in various places, they were of so poor and weak a quality as to require from four to six hundred gallons of the water to make a bushel of salt; and when made, it contained so much foreign matter as to render it a very inferior article. Yet as it could be used in place of the imported salt, and saved the borderer’s money, at that day not very plenty, it was occasionally resorted to by the settlers, who, assembling in gangs of six or eight persons, with their domestic kettles, pack-horses and provisions, camped out for a week at a time in the vicinity of the saline. These springs were generally discovered by hunters, and were at remote points from the settlements.”