a roof sloping inward. A very few of these cabins had puncheon* floors; the greater number had earthen ones. Where the cabins did not extend, pickets were firmly let into the earth to complete the fortification. In all this work not a nail nor a spike of iron was used, for "such things were not to be had." "Block-houses were built at the angles of the fort. They projected about two feet beyond the outer walls of the cabins, and the stockade. Their upper stories were about eighteen inches every way larger in dimension than the under one, leaving an opening at the commencement of the second story, to prevent the enemy from making a lodgment under their walls. In some forts, instead of block-houses, the angles of the fort were finished with bastions. A large folding gate, made of thick slabs, nearest the spring, closed the fort. The stockades, bastions, cabins, and block-houses were furnished with port holes, at proper heights and distances. The whole of the outside was made completely bullet proof." The attachment of the people to their separate cabins on their farms, was so great, the privacy, the room, in fine, all the comforts of home were so preferable there, to the crowded, cramped, and noisome fort, that the people seldom moved into the forts until the spring; or when some murder committed by the Indians, shewed too plainly there was no longer safety out of the station. When this was found to be the case, the terrors of the people and the precautions used to guard against their effects, may be well judged from the following natural account by an actort in these early scenes of western danger and privation. "I remember that, when a little boy, the family were sometimes waked up in the dead of night by an express with a report that the Indians were at hand. The express came softly to the door or back window, and by a gentle tapping, waked the family. This was easily done, as habitual fear made us ever watchful and sensible to the slightest alarm. The whole family were instantly in motion. My father seized his gun and other implements of war. My step-mother wiked up and dressed the children as well as she could; and being myself the oldest of the children, I had to take my share of the burthens to be carried to the fort. There was no possibility of getting a horse in the night to aid us in removing to the fort. Besides the little children, we caught up what articles of provision and clothing we could get hold of in the dark, for we durst not light a candle or stir the fire. All this was done with the

* A thick sort of slabs, or flat split logs.—Doddridge's Notes, 116. + Dr. Joseph Doddridge, brother to the late distinguished Philip Doddridge, and the author of the lively and graphic Notes that have been quoted.-118.

utmost despatch, and with the silence of death. The greatest care was taken not to awaken the youngest child. To the rest it was sufficient to say Indian, and not a whimper was said afterwards. Thus it often happened that the whole number of families belonging to a fort, who were in the evening at their homes, were all in their little fortress before the dawn of the morning. In the course of the succeeding day, their household furniture was brought in by parties of men under arms."

5. THE FURNITURE OF THE CABIN.

Let us now look into the interior of the primitive cabins to which their owners were so much attached, amidst such appaling dangers. The furniture was appropriate to the habitation; the table was composed of a slab roughly hewn with an axe, and stood on legs prepared in the same manner. This latter instrument was the principal tool in all mechanical operations; and with the adze, the auger, and above all the rifle, composed the richest mechanical assortment of Western Virginia. Stools of the same material and manufacture with those of the table, filled the place of chairs. When some one more curiously nice than his neighbors chose to elevate his bed above the floor (often as has been related the naked ground) it was placed on slabs laid across poles, which were again supported by forks driven into the floor. If, however, the floor happened to be so luxurious, as to be made of puncheons, the bedstead became of hewed pieces let into the sides of the cabin by auger holes in the logs. Nor ought the cradle of these times to be omitted; it was a small rolling trough, much like what is called a sugar trough, which is used to receive the sap of the maple sugar when tapped.* "The table furniture for many years after the settlement of the country, consisted of a few pewter dishes and plated spoons; but more generally of wooden bowls, trenchers and noggins. When these were scarce, gourds and hard-shelled squashes made up the deficiency. The iron pots, knives and forks were brought from the east side of the mountains, along with the salt and iron, on pack-horses." These luxuries could only be acquired, however, where the new settlements were in some degree contiguous to the older ones. In the remoter west, nature most bountifully supplied the people with salt from the springs of salt water scattered by Divine Providence over the whole western country. It is amusing to record, that the introduction of delft ware was, at first con

The writer recollects a distinguished public character, of Kentucky, the late Chief Justice Logan, boasting before the people that he had been born in a canebrake and rocked in a sugar-trough.

sidered by the old settlers as a culpable innovation-some of the wasteful ways, as Leatherstockings would have said. It was too easily broken, and what was a much more serious objection, it dulled the edge of the knives; too appropriately called scalping knives, in the hands of white; as well as red men. *A tin cup was an article of delicate luxury, almost as rare as an iron fork."

How forcibly the contrast of this simple furniture with that of a country more advanced in the arts, must have struck the least observant, is related by Dr. Doddridge in the graphic sketches of western manners which principally form this account. This gentleman, when seven years old, was sent into Maryland, to a relation there, in order to go to school. On his journey, he says, "At Col. Brown's in the mountains, at Stony creek glades, I for the first time saw tame geese; and by bantering a pet gander, I got a severe biting by his bill, and beating with his wings. I wondered very much that birds so large and strong, should be so much tamer than the wild turkies. At this place, however, all was right, except the geese, The cabin and the furniture were such as I had been accustomed to see in the back woods, as my country was then called. At Bedford (Pa.) every thing was changed. The' tavern at which my uncle put up, was a stone house, and to make the change still more complete, it was plastered on the inside, both as to the walls and ceiling. On going into the dining room, I was struck with astonishment, at the appearance of the house. I had no idea that there was any house in the world, that was not built of logs; but here I looked round the house and could see no logs, and above I could see no joints; whether such a thing had been made by the hands of man, or had grown so of itself, I could not conjecture. I had not the courage to inquire any thing about it. When supper came on "my confusion was worse confounded." A little cup stood in a bigger one, with some brownish looking stuff, which was neither milk, hominy nor broth; what to do with these little cups and the little spoon belonging to them, I could not tell; and I was afraid to ask any thing concerning the use of them. It was in the time of the war (revolutionary) and the company were giving accounts of catching, whipping, and hanging the tories. The word jail frequently occurred: this word I had never heard before; but I soon discovered it, and was very much terrified at its meaning, and supposed that we were in much danger of the fate of the tories: for I thought as we had come from the back woods, it was *H. Marshall, Sen. 1-123.

altogether likely that we must be tories too. For fear of being discovered, I durst not utter a single word. I therefore watched attentively what the folks would do with their little cups and spoons. I imitated them, and found the taste of the coffee nauseous, beyond any thing I ever had tasted in my life. I continued to drink as the rest of the company did, with tears streaming from my eyes; but when it was to end, I was at a loss to know, as the little cups were filled immediately after being emptied. This circumstance distressed me very much, as I durst not say I had enough. Looking attentively at the grown persons, I saw one man turn his little cup up and put his little spoon across it. I observed after this, his cup was not filled again; I followed his example, and to my great satisfaction the result as to my cup was the same." Nor ought this account by a most veritable author, to subject him to the slightest suspicion of exaggeration; when the houses, the furniture, and the diet by which he had been constartly surrounded from early youth are remembered.

6. DIET.

"Hog and hominy" constituted a dish of proverbial celebrity, when those animals had sufficiently increased in number, "Jonny-cake* or pone was at the outset of the settlements of the country,† the only form of bread in use for breakfast and dinner. At supper, milk and mush‡ were the standard dish. When milk was not plentiful, which was often the case, owing to the scarcity, or the want of proper pasture for cows, the substantial dish of hominy had to supply the want of it; mush was often eaten with sweetened water, molasses, bear's oil, or the gravy of fried meat. Every family, besides a little garden for the few vegetables which they cultivated, had another small enclosure containing from half an acre to an acre, which they called a truck-patch, in which they raised corn for roasting ears, pumpkins, squashes, beans and potatoes. These, in the latter part of the summer and fall, were cooked with their pork, venison, and bearmeat for dinner, and made very wholesome and well tasted dishes." "Tea and coffee were only slops," which in the adage of the day, "did not stick by the ribs." The idea was, that they were designed only for people of quality, who did not labor, or the sick. A genuine backwoodsman would have thought himself disgraced by showing a fondness for slops. Indeed many of them have to this day, (1824,) but little respect for them."

* Sometimes written journey-cake, perhaps from the rapidity with which it is cooked or toasted before a fire, in time for a speedy journey.

+ North-Western Virginia.

The meal of maize, boiled.

7. DRESS.

From the meals and food of our pioneers we will pass to their dress. The hunting shirt which so much delighted Col. Bouquet,* when he saw it on Col. Washington's men in the French war, was universally worn. It was a kind of loose frock, reaching half way down the thighs, with large sleeves, open before, and so wide as to lap over a foot or more when belted. The cape was large and sometimes handsomely fringed with a ravelled piece of cloth of another color from that of the hunting-shirt itself. The bosom of this dress served as a wallet to hold a chunk of bread, cakes, tow for wiping the barrel of the rifle, or any other necessary for the hunter or the warrior. The belt, which was always tied behind, answered several purposes besides that of holding the dress together. In cold weather, the mittens and sometimes the bullet bag occupied the front part of it. To the right side was suspended the tomahawk, and to the left, the scalping knife in its leathern sheath. The hunting shirt was generally made of linsey; sometimes of coarse linen and a few of dressed deer skins. These last were very cold and uncomfortable in wet weather. The shirt and jacket were of the common fashion. A pair of drawers or breeches and leggins were the dress for the thighs and legs; a pair of moccasons answered for the feet much better than shoes. The former were made of dressed deerskin, and mostly of a single piece, with a gathering seam along the top of the foot, and another from the bottom of the heel without gathers, as high as the ankle-joint, or a little higher. These were nicely adapted to the ankles and lower part of the leg, by thongs of deer-skin; so that no dirt, gravel, or snow could get within the moccason. The moccasons in ordinary use cost but a few hour's labor to make them. This was done by an instrument denominated a moccason awl, which was made of the back-spring of an old clasp-knife. This awl, with its buck-horn handle, was an appendage to every shotpouch, together with a roll of buck-skin for mending the moccasons. This was the labor of almost every evening. They were sewed together, and patched with deerskin thongs or whangs, as they were commonly called. In cold weather, the moccasons were well stuffed with deers' hair or dry leaves, so as to keep the feet comfortably warm; but in wet weather, it was usually said that wearing them was a "decent way of going barefoot;" and such was the fact, owing to the spongy texture of the leather, of which they were made. Owing to Sparks, vol. II-294.

+