The Mississippi Flows Through Corn Land 115 



pany, and against its own citizens, that it handed over the tea 

 trade to one, and for the benefit of the other decreed that 

 British colonists should not spread westward beyond the Back 

 Woods and the rivers' fall line? Did Parliament think to keep 

 the good land beyond the Alleghenies and running to the 

 French frontier on the Mississippi for a fur preserve, pro- 

 hibiting American farmers from settling on it? And what did 

 King George mean by granting to Quebec the territory from 

 Lake Erie to the Ohio River? 



Meetings in Boston, in Philadelphia, in New York; meetings 

 in Williamsburg and Richmond. Patrick Henry thumping his 

 clenched fist on the railing of the church pew, "If this be 

 treason . . ." Farmer George Washington riding over to 

 Gunston Hall to talk gravely with his friend and fellow 

 farmer, George Mason: "Think you, sir, it will come to war?" 



Israel Putnam, plowing his Connecticut cornfield with a 

 musket slung from his shoulder, stopping in the furrow at 

 sound of a horse's galloping hooves on the hard road beyond 

 the stone wall: 'The British are marching on Boston. The 

 militia is called out. Follow as fast as you can." 



Old Put, unharnessing the horse, leaving his plow there in 

 the field to follow that call to Bunker Hill and a major- 

 generalship. 



And in Dedham, Massachusetts, Mary Draper heating the 

 deep ovens in her kitchen chimney; kneading dough in a great 

 wooden trough two parts corn, one part wheat and rye flours 

 shaping the loaves and laying them carefully on the hot 

 bricks. And while the sweet smell of their baking filled the 

 house, standing at the kitchen door, shading her eyes to look 

 down the road that wound to Concord and Lexington. 



Soon there would be farmers coming back along that road, 

 farmers with blood-stained scythes and with muskets in place 

 of the hay-rakes they threw down when the call for the militia 

 came. And Mary Draper, standing at her gate, cutting off gen- 

 erous slices of fresh-baked bread: 



"Here, eat this. You're hungry, ain't you? You can't fight the 



