This young man was James Robertson, of Wake County, North Carolina, and, as he was to become a principal agent in the settlement of the Southwest, he requires here a few words of description. He was at this time about twenty-seven years of age, a little above the medium height, and of a well-knit, robust, manly frame. He had prominent features, and thick dark hair falling loosely over a square, full forehead which rose in the coronal region into an almost abnormal development. His eyes were large, of a light blue, and shaded by heavy dark eyebrows; and they had an habitual look of introspection, showing a mind of more than common thoughtfulness. He was grave, earnest, self-contained, with the quiet consciousness of power which is natural to a born leader of men. And yet there was in his manner no self-assumption or arrogance. On the contrary, he was courteous and conciliatory, and had that rare blending of self-respect and deference for others which, while it repelled undue familiarity, put the rudest at his ease, and extracted from an old Cherokee chieftain, who all his life had been the enemy of the white race, the unwilling praise, "He has winning ways, and he makes no fuss."
Though clad in homespun, and too much absorbed in things of greater moment to be over-careful of his personal appearance, he was a man of so marked a character that he would have attracted attention in almost any assemblage. Cautious, careful of consequences, and watchful of danger, he was at the same time bold, fearless, and ever ready to undertake enterprises which would stagger men of fewer mental resources. So exactly was he fitted to the time and the circumstances in which he was placed, that the conclusion is irresistible that he was a providential man, especially appointed to his work by a Higher Power.
This was his own conviction, but he came to it at a later time, when experience had shown that he bore a charmed life, and he had realized what his single arm and brain might accomplish. But now, in his own eyes, as in those of others, he was a simple countryman, able to "read, write, and cipher" and to do small jobs of surveying, but with little knowledge of any book except the Bible, though in that so deeply versed that it moulded his speech and regulated his every action. His nature was deeply religious, but he had, as yet, no higher aim in life than to make a home for himself, his wife and child in some new region, where he might acquire a competence, and rise, perhaps, to a station of some little influence and consideration.
And now, merely stating that he was born in Brunswick County, Virginia, of Scotch-Irish parentage, on the 28th of June, 1742, and that at the age of twenty-five he had married Charlotte B. Reeves, a woman nine years younger than himself, but everyway worthy to be his wife, I will go on with him and Boone in his first journey over the Alleghanies.
His equipment was a horse, a blanket, a hatchet, and a hunting-knife. Over his shoulder were slung a long Deckard rifle, a powder-horn, and a bag of bullets; and on the horse behind him were balanced a sack well filled with parched corn, a package of salt, and a tin cup for drinking purposes. This was his entire outfit. On the parched corn and the game to be procured by his rifle he was to subsist on his journey.
There were half a dozen in the party, and they followed the trail hitherto taken by Boone, for there was no road, nor even a bridle-path. After leaving the settlements their way lay through an almost unbroken forest; but there was no difficulty in keeping the trail, for it had been carefully blazed by Boone on his previous journeys. At night they encamped under some spreading tree, and, tethering their horses among the timbers, lighted a fire with the extra flint which each one carried in his bullet-pouch. Their mode of lighting a fire is peculiar to the backwoodsman. A handful of dry grass or leaves is gathered, then twisted into a nest, in which is placed a piece of ignited punk; then the grass is closed over the punk, and the ball is waved, in the air till it breaks into a blaze, when it readily ignites the bundle of dry sticks with which the fire is kindled. Then the limbs of dead trees are heaped upon the blaze, and one of the travellers sets about preparing supper for the whole party. It is probably of venison, for there are plenty of deer in that region. As soon as the burning logs have deposited a good bed of ashes, a hole is scooped in them, and in it is deposited the haunch or other portion. When sufficiently done, it is taken out, the ashes are knocked away, and then—no civilized man, whose appetite has never been sharpened by open-air exposure in the woods, can understand the keen avidity with which the delicious viand is consumed.
Supper over, each traveller lights his pipe of fragrant "Honey-Dew," or still more fragrant "Kinnikinnick"; and the evening is most likely whiled away in pleasant talk and narrative of "moving accidents" by field and forest. Boone was a good narrator, and, though but five years the senior of Robertson, had already a large experience of thrilling adventure. At last, heaping fresh logs upon the fire, to keep up the blaze till morning and scare away the wolves and panthers that might be attracted by the scent of the venison, the travellers would spread their blankets upon the ground, turn their feet to the fire, and sink into slumber.
Thus they encamped by night and journeyed by day, till they reached the summit of the Stone Mountains, the northerly portion of the long range which is now the boundary between Tennessee and North Carolina. And here a view broke upon them such as Robertson, accustomed as he was to the comparatively tame scenery of Wake County, had never beheld. Spread out at their feet was a beautiful valley, some thirty miles in length by twenty in width, and covered by a luxuriant forest, broken here and there by grassy openings, one of which, larger than the rest, was the "Watauga Old Fields" of the Pioneers. Some twenty miles away, two small rivers united their currents and flowed together to the west through a gap in the encircling mountains. Tracing their courses up among the hills, the explorers would catch glimpses of numerous smaller streams, which feed the larger ones and water the whole of this enchanting region.
The valley, which is itself two thousand feet above the sea, is hemmed in by huge mountain-ranges,—the Holston on the north and west, and the Iron and Stone Mountains on the south and east,—which break into peaks—the White-Top, the Bald, and the Roan—the lowest of which towers more than a mile into the air. These mountains protect the valley from the chill winds of winter, and temper the summer breezes to a delicious coolness, making the atmosphere the most delightful that can be imagined. The bottoms along the rivers are wide and productive, bearing then a thick crop of tall grass, on which multitudes of deer, elk, and buffalo were browsing. The soil of the bottoms is a deep, dark loam, capable of yielding immense crops of wheat and Indian corn, while the higher and less fertile land along the base of the mountain will produce fruits of the most delicate flavor and in astonishing abundance.
Altogether, the scene is picturesque beyond description,—a charming valley, threaded by limpid streams, and dotted with dense forests of oak, pine, poplar, cherry, and walnut, the whole encircled by huge sandstone ridges, their loftier peaks capped by the clouds, and standing there grim, silent, and sublime, like giant sentinels guarding the gates of an earthly paradise. Years afterward, speaking of the scene as it then broke upon him, Robertson said, "It seemed to me the Promised Land."