The Indian Wars, 1784-1787 305 



backwoods all these, and others too, were familiar 

 sights to every traveler who descended the Missis 

 sippi from Pittsburg to New Orleans, 7 or who 

 was led by business to journey from Louisville to 

 St. Louis or to Natchez or New Madrid. 



The fact that the river commerce throve was 

 partly the cause and partly the consequence of the 

 general prosperity of Kentucky. The pioneer days, 

 with their fierce and squalid struggle for bare life, 

 were over. If men were willing to work, and es 

 caped the Indians, they were sure to succeed in 

 earning a comfortable livelihood in a country so 

 rich. "The neighbors are doing well in every sense 

 of the word," wrote one Kentuckian to another, 

 "they get children and raise crops." 8 Like all other 

 successful and masterful people the Kentuckians 

 fought well and bred well, and they showed by their 

 actions their practical knowledge of the truth that 

 no race can ever hold its own unless its members 

 are able and willing to work hard with their hands. 



The general prosperity meant rude comfort every 

 where; and it meant a good deal more than rude 

 comfort for the men of greatest ability. By the 

 time the river commerce had become really consid 

 erable, the rich merchants, planters, and lawyers 

 had begun to build two-story houses of brick or 

 stone, like those in which they had lived in Vir 

 ginia. They were very fond of fishing, shooting, 



1 John Pope's "Tour," in 1790. Printed at Richmond in 

 1792. 



8 Draper MSS., Jonathan Clark Papers, O' Fallen to Clark, 

 Isles of Ohio, May 30, 1791. 



