MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS. 279 



through this mountain region, it was next to impossible for travelers 

 to penetrate ; so the rivers furnished the only great highways for the ad- 

 vance of man in this new land, and we see his habitations grow fewer 

 and fewer in number as we recede from the great water-ways, until now 

 and then a single home at their sources marks the limit of a rude civili- 

 zation — just as a single tree or stunted clump of bushes, or a narrow 

 line of verdure, marks the progress of vegetation along the water- 

 courses, from which, as years go by, spread mighty forests over the 

 once naked prairie. At this time it was rarely that a hunter's cabin in 

 the interior broke the monotony of the explorer's journey, and fur- 

 nished the means of replenishing his supplies. The pursuits of civil- 

 ized life but'slowly replaced the habits of the wandering trappers and 

 hunters. Indeed, the agriculturist was not welcomed by the original 

 roving white men of this region; for where the white man comes to 

 live, the buffalo, the elk, the deer and the bear will not stay ; and this 

 state of affairs would soon reduce the hunter to dependence upon the 

 planter, "the only person who has always something to eat." Against 

 this, his spirit rebels. 



In the following strong explanation, one of these settlers, who had 

 never seen a village, gave his reasons for moving on to more remote 

 regions : "I seed the country wasn't a-going to be worth livin' in, and 

 so I left the Gasconade caywnty and comed here, for you'll mind that 

 wherever the lawyers and the court-houses come, the other varmints, 

 b'ars and sich like, are sure to quit." Though averse to polite society, 

 and preferring solitude to civilization, these people are not without 

 many admirable traits of character. This is Schoolcraft's testimony : 



They subsist partly by agriculture and partly by hunting. They raise corn for bread 

 and for feeding their horses previous to the commencement of long jojurneys in the woods, 

 but none for exportation. Gardens are unknown. Corn and wild meats, chiefly bear's 

 meat, are the staple articles of food. In manners, morals, customs, dress, contempt of 

 labor and hospitality, the state of society Is not essentially different from that which exists 

 among the savages. Schools, religion and learning are alike unknown. Hunting Is the 

 principal, the most honorable and the most profitable employment. They are a hardy, 

 brave, independent people, rude in appearance, frank and generous, travel without bag- 

 gage, and can subsist anyw^here in the woods, and would form the most efficient military 

 corps in frontier warfare whicli can possibly exist. Ready trained, they require no disci- 

 pline; inured to danger and perfect in the use of the rifle, their system of life Is, In fact, 

 one continued scene of camp service. Their habitations are not always permanent, having 

 little which is valued or loved to rivet the affections to any one spot, and nothing which Is 

 venerated but wliat they can carry witli them. 



The Sabbath is not known by any cessation of the usual avocations of the hunter In. 

 this region. To him all days are equally unhallowed, and the first and last days of the week 

 flnd him, alike, suQk in unconcerned slotli and stupid ignorance. He neither thinks for 

 himself nor reads the thoughts of others; and if he ever acknowledges his dependence upon 

 the Supreme Being, it must be in that silent awe produced by the furious tempest, when 

 the earth trembles with concussive thunders, and lightning shatters the oaks around his 

 cottage— that cottage which certainly never echoed the voice of human prayer. Children, 

 are wholly ignorant of the knowledge of Ijooks, and have not learned even the rudiments of 

 *heir own tongue. Thus situated, without moral restraint, brought up in the uncontrolled 



