SETTLERS FIEST STABT. 67 



wheat, and had his little crop of " sod " corn gathered and 

 stacked out of harm's way, close to his dwelling. The first 

 care of an American settler on the prairie is to provide for the 

 first winter. If he starts in May he ploughs a few acres up, 

 and very commonly plants the Indian corn on it by making a 

 slit with his axe on the tough upturned sod, into which he drops 

 the seed. Eude though this preparation appears, it is gener- 

 ally followed by a crop, sometimes a very good one. Having 

 thus started his " sod " corn, he constructs his house, and spends 

 the rest of the summer in "breaking" the prairie in prepara- 

 ration for a wheat crop, and in cutting and making some prai- 

 rie hay for the winter provender of his live stock. He also 

 plants a few culinary vegetables and potatoes. In the end of 

 August he sows his wheat, and, when that is completed, he 

 harvests his "sod" corn. This keeps him out of the market 

 the very first winter, as it is often made to suffice for the food 

 both of the family and the live stock. " Hog and Hominy" is 

 not infrequently the only food that the settler has to set before 

 his guest during the first year of his possession. And though 

 homely it is wholesome. When the crop of Indian corn is se- 

 cured, there is time to begin making fences. The neighbours 

 have a mutual interest in this and assist each other. The fences 

 are made of posts and sawn pine timber ; the posts of cedar, 

 seven feet long, cost 3d. each, and both posts and rails are pre- 

 pared in the forest, so that the settler buys them ready for his 

 purpose, at either the nearest railway station or grove of tim- 

 ber, whichever happens to be most convenient. The holes for 

 the posts are not dug out as with us, but are bored with an 

 auger made for the purpose, and the work of fencing thus goes 

 on with much neatness and regularity, and the fences, being 

 all made in the same manner and with timber of the same di- 

 mensions, are very uniform and substantial. At this settle- 

 ment we found the owner with four of his neighbours all busy 



