savages; but she persisted in remaining in her cabin, notwithstanding the remonstrances of her neighbors, and although her home was several hundred yards from the blockhouse. Her wounded heart preferred solitude to society; the more so as in the promiscuous company frequently assembled in the garrison, the rough oaths of the soldiers might frequently be heard, and she resolved to risk living alone, rather than be distressed by associations repulsive to her delicate and sensitive nature. At the same time she planned the measures she would take in the event of danger, leaving the result with Him in whom her trust was placed. Beneath the puncheon floor laid in every cabin, there was generally dug a small cellar in which vegetables might be kept secure from frost. Every night she lifted one of these pieces of timber, and placed her children in a rough bed she had made in the cellar. As soon as they were asleep, the puncheon was laid down, and the mother took her position where she could see the Indians, when approaching, at a considerable distance. Here she would sit during the whole night, engaged, in the hours of wakefulness, in knitting or such housework as could be performed without any other light than from smothered embers not permitted to give out the slightest blaze. When the youngest child waked and required nursing, she would lift the puncheon, and sit on the edge of the opened floor till it was lulled to sleep, then deposit it once more in the secret bed and close the floor over it. Her resolution was taken, should the Indians attack one door, to make her escape by the opposite one to the fort, give the alarm, and bring the men to rescue her children before the foe could discover their hiding-place. Her fears were not groundless; the Indians were often seen by her prowling about the little village, and on several occasions, when all was dark and still, they came to the door of her cabin, and attempted to enter. Finding the door barred, however, they did not, for some reason or other, attempt to force it; so that the widow and her children remained undisturbed, while from other parts of the settlement property was stolen and prisoners taken, and one or two individuals were shot in close vicinity to the fort.

The emigrants who established themselves at Columbia, were men

of energy and enterprise, and the little settlement for two or three years contained more inhabitants than any other in the Miami purchase. The second party destined for the Miami, was formed at Limestone; they landed the 24th of December, 1788, on the north bank of the Ohio, opposite the mouth of Licking river, and laid out a town, to which the name of Cincinnati was given the following year. The third party of adventurers to the purchase, under the immediate direction of Judge Symmes, established a station at 'North Bend,' the most northern bend in the Ohio below the mouth of the great Kanawha. The village has since become distinguished as the home of President Harrison, whose tomb, on one of its hills, can be seen from the river.

These three principal settlements of the Miami country had one general object, and were threatened by one common danger ; yet, says Judge Burnet, there existed a strong spirit of rivalry among them, "each feeling a pride in the prosperity of the little colony to which he belonged. That spirit produced a strong influence on the feelings of the pioneers of the different villages, and an esprit du corps scarcely to be expected under circumstances so critical and dangerous as those which threatened them. For some time, it was matter of doubt which of the rivals, Columbia, Cincinnati, or North Bend, would eventually become the chief seat of business." The establishment of the garrison at Cincinnati, made it the head-quarters and depôt of the army. Fort Washington was the most extensive and important military work in the territory. It was said that the removal of the troops from the Bend, which was strenuously opposed by Judge Symmes, was caused by an attachment on the part of the officer in command, to a beautiful woman, whose departure to reside in Cincinnati opened the eyes of her admirer to its advantages for a military post, and thus made it the commercial emporium and the Queen City of the West.

I shall not hesitate to offer, in different memoirs, descriptions of pioneer life furnished by individuals whose recollections are entirely reliable. Although these may involve occasional repetition, they will enable us to perceive any difference of habits or manners in

different parts of the country, and to appreciate more fully the spirit of enterprise and power of endurance which made the way so much easier to those who succeeded the early colonists. The densely wooded mountain ranges were a formidable barrier at that period between the old States and the new territories. The difficulties attending any communication can hardly be imagined by those who enjoy the facilities of travelling now, and made the work of the pioneer more arduous and hazardous than in more recent settlements, where the emigrant has the advantage of public conveyances, at least part of the way, and may find the necessaries of life within a distance readily accessible. It was no small undertaking to penetrate the unbroken forest, ascend or descend rivers that had never before been navigated, and carry to a home in the wilderness supplies for a household in a few chests. These usually held the clothing of the pioneer's family, while a few cooking utensils were added to the stock, and occasionally a table or bureau; though for such articles of furniture, as well as chairs and bedsteads, the settlers generally depended on the rough manufacture of the country. Shelves hewn by the axe supplied the place of bureaus and wardrobes, and two poles fastened in a corner of the cabin, the outer corner supported by a prop, answered the purpose of a bedstead, until better could be had. The pioneer's cabin was indeed a complete example of domestic economy. It was built of unhewn logs, sometimes in a single day, by the owner and eight or ten of the neighbors, who never refused their assistance. The floor was made of split slabs or puncheons, as they were called, dubbed with an adze, or where the resident was over nice, smoothed with the broad-axe on the upper side. The doors were made of boards riven from a tree of the proper length and thickness, and smoothed with a drawing-knife. The windows, in the earliest settlements, were made by cutting away the under and upper portions of two of the logs of the house, forming thus a square opening of suitable size, in which sometimes upright sticks were placed, covered with white paper, oiled with hog's fat or bear's oil, to admit the light in place of glass, a luxury not then to be procured. The fire-place was usually very large, built

up on three sides six or eight feet with stone, and then topped with "cat and clay," as it was termed. The cabin completed, the next thing was to clear a piece of ground for a cornpatch. A shovelplow was generally used, as most convenient among the roots. The harness consisted mostly of leatherwood bark, except the collar, which was made of husks of corn plaited and sewed together.

Rough and uncouth in appearance as were these primitive cabins, they could be made very comfortable, and for health seemed preferable to many more civilized dwellings. One of them, sometimes containing but a single room, with a rude loft reached by a ladder, was the happy home of a numerous household; the children raised there growing up to usefulness and eminence among their fellow citizens. The children thus raised were generally of powerful frame, and possessed great physical strength; their height and proportions, it is said, being known, as a rule, to surpass those born after the erection of frame and brick dwellings. Sickness also was rare among. them.

It is true that these rude habitations had some inconveniences, which might now be considered too formidable to contend with ; and it may be thought strange how a female of cultivation and refinement could bring herself to live in one of them. Yet it is certain, that among the early pioneers who came to the Miami country, were some ladies of the highest consideration in New York and New Jersey; and it is no less certain that they readily and cheerfully accommodated themselves to the condition of things around them. The dressing-room and ornamental toilette were lacking; but they were dispensed with for such accommodations as necessity suggested. Each cabin usually contained two beds in the lower room, and these were separated from each other by full and flowing curtains around one at least, answering the purpose of a partition and dressing apartment.

The women of those times, it has been often observed, were of a sturdier nature than at the present day, and encountered both hardships and dangers with a philosophy and a grace which can now be hardly understood. Most of them undertook the labor of

The

the household unassisted, requiring no help except when children were born, till the older ones grew old enough to be useful. There were but few single young women in the early settlement; if any came with friends from the east, they were very soon married and had their own household affairs to attend to. In the summer, besides the ordinary housework, the wife of the pioneer spun the wool which formed the winter's clothing for the male part of the family, as well as flannel for herself and the girls; in the winter was spun the flax of which clothing was made the ensuing summer. buzz of the wheel, therefore, was heard at all seasons in the cabins of the early settlers, and often in the winter until the approach of midnight. Yet, with all these laborious duties, which were regularly and faithfully performed, the pioneer mothers found time to arrange their houses with the most scrupulous order and neatness, and were not without their social enjoyments. The afternoons of the long summer's day were frequently spent in visiting or receiving visits from neighbors within a few miles' distance. No motive could exist for a profession of friendship where the reality was not felt; and distress in any family never failed to elicit the sympathy and command the aid, so far as it could be rendered, of all the neighbors. Social intercourse was intimate, and the interchange of expressions of good feeling, sincere and constant; and never could one familiar with these associations forget the smooth winding foot paths which led through the deep forest and tall grass or underbrush from the house of one pioneer to that of another, traversed daily on errands of business or friendship, so that every family was kept acquainted with all the occurrences of the day throughout the settlement. If a fat bear or deer was killed by one it was generally divided, and the portions sent round as a token of kindly regard. Game was abundant, and the turkeys, venison and bear's meat which so frequently loaded the rustic tables, might well have been prized by the most fastidious epicures of advanced civilization.

On the whole the life of the pioneer, though one of hardship and danger, was one of stir and excitement, and a perfect freedom so agreeable to the enterprising rover, that it may be questioned