When I opened my eyes a young man was surveying the clearing through a chink above the door. This morning vigilance was customary in every cabin along the frontier and revealed the settler’s realization of the ever present danger. No wonder those first men grew to hate the dark forest and the cover it afforded the red raiders. A reconnaissance made through a peephole could at the best satisfy one that no stump in the clearing concealed an Indian.
It was with this unsatisfactory guarantee that the settler unbarred his door. He could never be sure that the fringe of the woods was not alive with the enemy. And yet young men fell in love and amorously sought their mates, and were married, and their neighbors made merry, and children were born. And always across the clearing lay the shadow of the tomahawk.
Now that I am older and the blood runs colder, and the frontier is pushed beyond the mountains, I often wonder what our town swains would do if they had to risk their scalps each time a sweetheart was visited!
The man at the door dropped back to the puncheon floor, announcing: “All clear at my end.”
A companion at the other end of the cabin made a similar report, and the door was opened. Two of the men, with their rifles ready, stepped outside and swiftly swung their gaze along the edge of the forest. The early morning mists obscured the vision somewhat. A bell tinkled just within the undergrowth. Instantly the fellows outside dropped behind stumps, while we inside removed the plugs from loopholes.
“All the cattle is in,” murmured a youth to me, so young his first beard had barely sprouted. “Injun trick to git us out there.”
Several minutes passed, then Davis loudly called from the fort:
“It’s all right! Hodge’s critter wa’n’t fetched in last night.”
Even as he spoke the cow emerged from the bushes.
Smoke began issuing from the cabin chimneys and the women came from the fort to warm up the remains of the pot-pies, to bake corn bread and prepare mush. The men scattered through the clearing. Some chopped down bushes which might mask a foe’s stealthy advance, others cleared out logs which might serve as breastworks for the raiders.