CHAPTER XVIII.
Season of repose—Colonel Boone buys land—Builds a log house and goes to farming—Kentucky organized on a new basis—Colonel Boone surprised by Indians—Escapes—Manners and customs of the settlers—The autumn hunt—The house-warming.
After the series of Indian hostilities recorded in the chapters immediately preceding this, Kentucky enjoyed a season of comparative repose. The cessation of hostilities between the United States and Great Britain in 1783, and the probable speedy cession of the British posts on the Northwestern frontier, discouraged the Indians, stopped their customary incursions on the Kentuckians, and gave them leisure to acquire and cultivate new tracts of land.
Colonel Boone, notwithstanding the heavy loss of money (which has been already mentioned) as he was on his journey to North Carolina, was now able to purchase several locations of land. He had been compensated for his military services by the Commonwealth of Virginia, to which Kentucky still belonged. On one of his locations he built a comfortable log-house and recommenced farming, with his usual industry and perseverance, varying the pursuits of agriculture with occasional indulgence in his favorite sport of hunting.
In 1783 Kentucky organized herself on a new basis, Virginia having united the three counties into one district, having a court of common law and chancery for the whole territory which now forms the State of Kentucky. The seat of justice at first was at Harrodsburg; but for want of convenient accommodations for the sessions of the courts, they were subsequently removed to Danville, which, in consequence, became for a season the centre and capital of the State.[[50]]
A singular and highly characteristic adventure, in which Boone was engaged about this time, is thus narrated by Mr. Peck:
"Though no hostile attacks from Indians disturbed the settlements, still there were small parties discovered, or signs seen on the frontier settlements. On one occasion, about this period, four Indians came to the farm of Colonel Boone, and nearly succeeded in taking him prisoner. The particulars are given as they were narrated by Boone himself, at the wedding of a granddaughter, a few months before his decease, and they furnish an illustration of his habitual self-possession and tact with Indians. At a short distance from his cabin he had raised a small patch of tobacco to supply his neighbors, (for Boone never used the 'filthy weed' himself,) the amount, perhaps, of one hundred and fifty hills.
"As a shelter for curing it, he had built an enclosure of rails, a dozen feet in height, and covered it with cane and grass. Stalks of tobacco are usually split and strung on sticks about four feet in length. The ends of these are laid on poles, placed across the tobacco house, and in tiers, one above the other to the roof. Boone had fixed his temporary shelter in such a manner as to have three tiers. He had covered the lower tier, and the tobacco had become dry, when he entered the shelter for the purpose of removing the sticks to the upper tier, preparatory to gathering the remainder of the crop. He had hoisted up the sticks from the lower to the second tier, and was standing on the poles that supported it while raising the sticks to the upper tier, when four stout Indians, with guns, entered the low door and called him by name. 'Now, Boone, we got you. You no get away more. We carry you off to Chillicothe this time. You no cheat us any more.' Boone looked down upon their up-turned faces, saw their loaded guns pointed at his breast, and recognizing some of his old friends, the Shawanees, who had made him prisoner near the Blue Licks in 1778, coolly and pleasantly responded, 'Ah! old friends, glad to see you.' Perceiving that they manifested impatience to have him come down, he told them he was quite willing to go with them, and only begged they would wait where they were, and watch him closely, until he could finish removing his tobacco."
While parleying with them, inquiring after old acquaintances, and proposing to give them his tobacco when cured, he diverted their attention from his purpose, until he had collected together a number of sticks of dry tobacco, and so turned them as to fall between the poles directly in their faces. At the same instant, he jumped upon them with as much of the dry tobacco as he could gather in his arms, filling their mouths and eyes with its pungent dust; and blinding and disabling them from following him, rushed out and hastened to his cabin, where he had the means of defense. Notwithstanding the narrow escape, he could not resist the temptation, after retreating some fifteen or twenty yards, to look round and see the success of his achievement. The Indians blinded and nearly suffocated, were stretching out their hands and feeling about in different directions, calling him by name and cursing him for a rogue, and themselves for fools. The old man, in telling the story, imitated their gestures and tones of voice with great glee.
Emigration to Kentucky was now rapidly on the increase, and many new settlements were formed. The means of establishing comfortable homesteads increased. Horses, cattle, and swine were rapidly in creasing in number; and trading in various commodities became more general. From Philadelphia, merchandise was transported to Pittsburg on pack-horses, and thence taken down the Ohio River in flat-boats and distributed among the settlements on its banks. Country stores, land speculators, and paper money made their appearance, affording a clear augury of the future activity of the West in commercial industry and enterprise.
BOLD STRATEGEM OF BOONE
Most of the settlers came from the interior of North Carolina and Virginia; and brought with them the manners and customs of those States. These manners and customs were primitive enough. The following exceedingly graphic description, which we transcribe from "Doddridge's Notes," will afford the reader a competent idea of rural life in the times of Daniel Boone.
"HUNTING.—This was an important part of the employment of the early settlers of this country. For some years the woods supplied them with the greater amount of their subsistence, and with regard to some families, at certain times, the whole of it; for it was no uncommon thing for families to live several months without a mouthful of bread. It frequently happened that there was no breakfast until it was obtained from the woods. Fur and peltry were the people's money. They had nothing else to give in exchange for rifles, salt, and iron, on the other side of the mountains.
"The fall and early part of the winter was the season for hunting deer, and the whole of the winter, including part of the spring, for bears and fur-skinned animals. It was a customary saying that fur is good during every month in the name of which the letter R occurs.
"The class of hunters with whom I was best acquainted, were those whose hunting ranges were on the eastern side of the river, and at the distance of eight or nine miles from it. As soon as the leaves were pretty well down, and the weather became rainy, accompanied with light snows, these men, after acting the part of husbandmen, so far as the state of warfare permitted them to do so, soon began to feel that they were hunters. They became uneasy at home. Every thing about them became disagreeable. The house was too warm. The feather-bed too soft, and even the good wife was not thought, for the time being, a proper companion. The mind of the hunter was wholly occupied with the camp and chase.
"I have often seen them get up early in the morning at this season, walk hastily out, and look anxiously to the woods and snuff the autumnal winds with the highest rapture, then return into the house and cast a quick and attentive look at the rifle, which was always suspended to a joist by a couple of buck horns, or little forks. His hunting dog, understanding the intentions of his master, would wag his tail, and by every blandishment in his power express his readiness to accompany him to the woods.
"A day was soon appointed for the march of the little cavalcade to the camp. Two or three horses furnished with pack-saddles were loaded with flour, Indian meal, blankets, and every thing else requisite for the use of the hunter.
"A hunting camp, or what was called a half-faced cabin, was of the following form; the back part of it was sometimes a large log; at the distance of eight or ten feet from this, two stakes were set in the ground a few inches apart, and at the distance of eight or ten feet from these, two more, to receive the ends of the poles for the sides of the camp. The whole slope of the roof, was from the front to the back. The covering was made of slabs, skins, or blankets, or, if in the spring of the year, the bark of hickory or ash trees. The front was entirely open. The fire was built directly before this opening. The cracks between the logs were filled with moss. Dry leaves served for a bed. It is thus that a couple of men, in a few hours will construct for themselves a temporary, but tolerably comfortable defense, from the inclemencies of the weather. The beaver, otter, muskrat and squirrel are scarcely their equals in dispatch in fabricating for themselves a covert from the tempest!
"A little more pains would have made a hunting camp a defense against the Indians. A cabin ten feet square, bullet proof, and furnished with port-holes would have enabled two or three hunters to hold twenty Indians at bay for any length of time. But this precaution I believe was never attended to; hence the hunters were often surprised and killed in their camps.
"The site for the camp was selected with all the sagacity of the woodsman, so as to have it sheltered by the surrounding hills from every wind, but more especially from those of the north and west.
"An uncle of mine, of the name of Samuel Teter, occupied the same camp for several years in succession. It was situated on one of the southern branches of Cross Creek. Although I lived for many years not more than fifteen miles from the place, it was not till within a very few years ago that I discovered its situation. It was shown me by a gentleman living in the neighborhood. Viewing the hills round about it I soon perceived the sagacity of the hunter in the site for his camp. Not a wind could touch him; and unless by the report of his gun or the sound of his axe, it would have been by mere accident if an Indian had discovered his concealment.
"Hunting was not a mere ramble in pursuit of game, in which there was nothing of skill and calculation; on the contrary, the hunter, before he set out in the morning, was informed, by the state of the weather, in what situation he might reasonably expect to meet with his game; whether on the bottoms, sides or tops of the hills. In stormy weather, the deer always seek the most sheltered places, and the leeward side of the hills. In rainy weather, in which there is not much wind, they keep in the open woods on the highest ground.
"In every situation it was requisite for the hunter to ascertain the course of the wind, so as to get the leeward of the game. This he effected by putting his finger in his mouth, and holding it there until it became warm, then holding it above his head, the side which first becomes cold shows which way the wind blows.
"As it was requisite too for the hunter to know the cardinal points, he had only to observe the trees to ascertain them. The bark of an aged tree is thicker and much rougher on the north than on the south side. The same thing may be said of the moss: it is much thicker and stronger on the north than on the south side of the trees.
"The whole business of the hunter consists of a succession of intrigues. From morning till night he was on the alert to gain the wind of his game, and approach them without being discovered. If he succeeded in killing a deer, he skinned it, and hung it up out of the reach of the wolves, and immediately resumed the chase till the close of the evening, when he bent his course toward the camp; when he arrived there he kindled up his fire, and together with his fellow hunter, cooked his supper. The supper finished, the adventures of the day furnished the tales for the evening. The spike buck, the two and three-pronged buck, the doe and barren doe, figured through their anecdotes with great advantage. It should seem that after hunting awhile on the same ground, the hunters became acquainted with nearly all the gangs of deer within their range, so as to know each flock of them when they saw them. Often some old buck, by the means of his superior sagacity and watchfulness, saved his little gang from the hunter's skill, by giving timely notice of his approach. The cunning of the hunter and that of the old buck were staked against each other, and it frequently happened that at the conclusion of the hunting season, the old fellow was left the free uninjured tenant of his forest; but if his rival succeeded in bringing him down, the victory, was followed by no small amount of boasting on the part of the conqueror.
"When the weather was not suitable for hunting, the skins and carcasses of the game were brought in and disposed of.
"Many of the hunters rested from their labors on the Sabbath day; some from a motive of piety; others said that whenever they hunted on Sunday, they were sure to have bad luck on the rest of the week.
"THE HOUSE-WARMING.—I will proceed to state the usual manner of settling a young couple in the world.
"A spot was selected on a piece of land of one of the parents, for their habitation. A day was appointed shortly after their marriage, for commencing the work of building their cabin. The fatigue-party consisted of choppers, whose business it was to fell the trees and cut them off at proper lengths. A man with a team for hauling them to the place and arranging them, properly assorted, at the sides and ends of the building; a carpenter, if such he might be called, whose business it was to search the woods for a proper tree for making clapboards for the roof. The tree for this purpose must be straight-grained, and from three to four feet in diameter. The boards were split four feet long, with a large frown, and as wide as the timber would allow. They were used without planing or shaving Another division were employed in getting puncheons for the floor of the cabin; this was done by splitting trees, about eighteen inches in diameter, and hewing the faces of them with a broad-axe. They were half the length of the floor they were intended to make. The materials for the cabin were mostly prepared on the first day, and sometimes the foundation laid in the evening. The second day was allotted for the raising.
"In the morning of the next day the neighbors collected for the raising. The first thing to be done was the election of four corner men, whose business it was to notch and place the logs. The rest of the company furnished them with the timbers. In the meantime the boards and puncheons were collecting for the floor and roof, so that by the time the cabin was a few rounds high, the sleepers and floor began to be laid. The door was made by sawing or cutting the logs in one side so as to make an opening about three feet wide. This opening was secured by upright pieces of timber about three inches thick, through which holes were bored into the ends of the logs for the purpose of pinning them fast. A similar opening, but wider, was made at the end for the chimney. This was built of logs, and made large, to admit of a back and jambs of stone. At the square, two end logs projected a foot or eighteen inches beyond the wall, to receive the butting poles, as they were called, against which the ends of the first row of clapboards was supported. The roof was formed by making the end logs shorter, until a single log formed the comb of the roof, on these logs the clapboards were placed, the ranges of them lapping some distance over those next below them, and kept in their places by logs, placed at proper distances upon them.
"The roof, and sometimes the floor, were finished on the same day of the raising. A third day was commonly spent by a few carpenters in leveling off the floor, making a clapboard door and a table. This last was made of a split slab, and supported by four round legs set in auger-holes. Some three-legged stools were made in the same manner. Some pins stuck in the logs at the back of the house, supported some clapboards which served for shelves for the table furniture. A single fork, placed with its lower end in a hole in the floor, and the upper end fastened to a joist, served for a bedstead, by placing a pole in the fork with one end through a crack between the logs of the wall. This front pole was crossed by a shorter one within the fork, with its outer end through another crack. From the front pole, through a crack between the logs of the end of the house, the boards were put on which formed the bottom of the bed. Sometimes other poles were pinned to the fork a little distance above these, for the purpose of supporting the front and foot of the bed, while the walls were the supports of its back and head. A few pegs around the walls for a display of the coats of the women, and hunting-shirts of the men, and two small forks or buck-horns to a joist for the rifle and shot-pouch, completed the carpenter work.
"In the mean time masons were at work. With the heart pieces of the timber of which the clapboards were made, they made billets for chunking up the cracks between the logs of the cabin and chimney; a large bed of mortar was made for daubing up these cracks; a few stones formed the back and jambs of the chimney.
"The cabin being finished, the ceremony of house-warming took place, before the young couple were permitted to move into it.
"The house-warming was a dance of a whole night's continuance, made up of the relations of the bride and groom and their neighbors. On the day following the young couple took possession of their new mansion."