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after years by a dozen or twenty more, as necessity may require—and, in course of time, a sugar-trough for a cradle, complete the furniture of the dwelling. At his leisure, the young man shall arrange a set of buckhorns over the door, as pegs whereon to rest his rifle; and construct a loom, that his wife may prosecute her weaving, for she has brought with her a spinning-jenny as her dower. The "house is warıned" by means of another party, and our newly-married pair start upon the sober jog of wedded life.

Humble indeed were these households of the first settlers. But around these cabin-homes of the wilderness, God's angels came to bestow their benedictions. Here are health and labor, frugality and content, chastity and love. From these darkened fountains in the forest have gushed the waters which, flowing into sunshine, have combined to form the majestic river of our national life.

These men came in obedience to an instinct wellnigh equivalent to a heavenly command to subdue the land and to replenish it. They came with that unerring sagacity to discover and settle choice lands, which may be taken as a characteristic of Saxondom. With stalwart strength, intrepid hearts, high resolves, and unconquerable wills, they came to dispossess the red-skins, and claim this valley world as a heritage for civilization. With unconscious prescience, they came to win from battle, self-denial, and toil, estates for their families, and an empire for coming genera tions. They were here for individual freedom; but they felt with that infallible accuracy inherited from their English ancestry, that individual freedom could not be attained save by social and civil institutions.

Obedience to severe, yet majestic law, must be required; else liberty would degenerate into license, feudalism would have a new inauguration, and the garden of the world become an Alsatia. These hunter-farmers recognized themselves as citizens, and labored long and well to lay the foundations of coming States. Laws were passed at once and duly enforced. Oftentimes it happened that Judge Lynch occupied the bench, and that regulators were the Jury. How could it be otherwise when the nearest constable was five hundred miles away, and the only police officer in the country was the rifle at the saddle-pommel; when the only courthouse was the first tree, and the only jail was a rope thrown over the lowest branch, the culprit's neck in a noose at one end, and strong hands tugging at the other. Some of their laws were odd enough, not a little resembling the early statutes of New England. They had one, for example, that no man should be tolerated in the commonwealth, who had not visible and honest means of support. There came to the town of Washington, Kentucky, a young man, who seemed to have nothing to do but to keep his hands warm in his pocket, and his mouth puckered for a whistle. Strolling about the town from day to day, he was spying out the settlement, that he might, with fitting opportunity, begin his nefarious scheme. his coat-pocket was a pack of greasy cards, into the meaning and use of which he proposed to initiate the young men of the place, and having won their money, and corrupted their morals, to pass to other places as a missionary of the evil one. Some of the old gentlemen of the neighborhood shrewdly suspect

In

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ing his intent, warned him of the prescript upon their statute book. But he, as young gentlemen are apt to do, esteemed the old men a pack of old fogies, and went as before, upon his whistling way. They gave him the notice; he disregarded it; the penalty was upon his own head. A writ was served upon him, and he was deposited for safe keeping in the jail, or, as they figuratively call it, the jug. Advertisement is made, a crowd assembles; he is carried by the sheriff into the middle of the public square, mounted on a horse-block, put up at auction, and knocked down to the highest bidder. The highest bidder is the village blacksmith, who, fastening a chain around his leg, conducts him to the forge, where he keeps him secure, and for three months, from sun to sun, inducts him into the craft of blowing and striking. The law's stern lesson taught him, our gambling gentleman is set at liberty, when he "makes tracks," his back upon Kentucky, swearing it the "meanest country a white man ever got into."

As these hardy adventurers, bent upon perilous enterprise, are thrusting themselves into the occupancy of a new world, I see approaching another class, with many traits in common with them; yet, many differing. They, too, are of large build, and robust strength; they, too, are inured to exposure and privation; they, too, have nerves that never thrill with fear. Sun and storm have bronzed them; hunger, frost, and loneliness are to them familiar acquaintances. Gaunt poverty keeps even pace with them as they ride, and shall accompany them until they reach the last stage of their journey-the house appointed for all living. Wherefore are they in the wilderness-for they have neither rides nor axes?

They are generally on horseback, and when they are, you may accept the fact as prima facie evidence that the beasts they ride are good ones; for they are great judges of horse-flesh. I have ever heard it whispered that they are a little dangerous "at a trade"-but that, of course, is scandal.

Their symbol is the saddle-bags, which go with them in all their wayfarings-beneath them as they ride upon their arm in walking. In the capacious

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pockets is snugly deposited their library, consisting of the Bible, hymn-book, and, probably, the "Pilgrim's Progress," "Paradise Lost," and the "Night Thoughts;" their few changes of what we shall poetically call clean linen; i. e., very coarse cotton-together with such odds and ends as they may chance to own.

These men are here in obedience to the command of him who said, "Go into all the world, and preach my gospel to every creature;" in imitation of him who " came to seek and to save that which was lost," and who went about doing good. They are here to do the work of evangelists, and to make full proof of their ministry, warning "every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom, that they may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus." Another wolf is there than the grey one of the forest. Shall not the flock be fed and folded while the lambs are carried in their bosoms?

Through the instrumentality of these humble men, a cabin, similar to the one already described, but used for a widely different purpose, is reared in many a settlement. It serves as a school-house and a sanctuary-symbol of the country's strength and purity. Unlearned themselves, they were, nevertheless, the first patrons of literature and science-founding academies and colleges. I have known many a man of this class, who could not construct half-a-dozen sentences grammatically, yet bestowing half his slen der yearly stipend to establish an institution of learn ing. Traversing the trackless mazes of the woods, they are not seldom greeted by the crack of a rifle, and a bullet whistling near their ear from an Indian ambuscade. Their journeys take them through