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A SETTLERS HOME
A SKETCH OF PIONEER LIFE IN CENTRAL NEW YORK
[from an Old Manuscript- Nov. 10,1910 paper].
As I was traveling through the county on horseback
on a
summer day in an early year of settlement, I fell
in company, with two gentlemen who were going in the same direction. One
of then, was the Land Agent from Bath, who was going to the Genesee River,
the other was a foreigner on his way from Easton, in Pennsylvania to Preque
Isle, (now Erie) on Lake Erie. We had followed in Indian file a mere path
through the woods for several miles, passing at long intervals a log house
where the occupants had just made a beginning; when having passed the outskirts
of settlement and penetrated deep into the woods, our attention was attracted
by a cow bell, and the sound of an ax in chopping. We soon saw a little
break in the forest, and a log house. As we were approached we heard the
loud barking of a dog, and as we got near the clearing were met by him
with an angry growl as if he would said, Yon can come no further without
my masters permission.” A shrill whistle from within called off the dog
We proceeded to the house. A short distance irons it, standing on the fallen
trunk of a large hemlock tree, which be had just chopped once in two. He
was a fine looking young man four or five and twenty years of age, with
an ax in his hand. He was dressed in a tow frock and trousers with his
head and feet bare. The frock, open at The top, showed that he wore no
shirt, and exhibited the muscular shoulders and full chest of a very athletic
and powerful man. When we stopped our horses he stepped off the log, shook
hands with the Agent. and saluting us frankly, asked us as to dismount
and -----ourselves----------------------
with nothing but marked tree to guild us a part of
the way, that it was nearly noon, and although he could not promise
us anything very good to eat, yet the could give us something to prevent
us from suffering with hunger. He had no grass growing yet, but he
would give the horses some green oats. We conducted to accept
the invitation and dismounted and went into the house.
‘Before describing the house I will notice the appearance
of things around it, premising that the settler had begun his improvements
in the spring before our arrival. A little boy about three
years old was playing with the dog which that so resolute
at our approach, now permitted the child to push him over and sit
down upon him. A pair of oxen and a cow with a bell on, were lying in the
shade of the woods; two or three hogs were rooting in the leaves near the
cattle, and a few fowls were scratching the soil. There was a clearing.
or rather chopping around the house of about four acres, half of which
had been cleared off and sowed with oats which had grown very rank and
good. The other half of the chopping had been merely burnt over and then,
planted with corn and potatoes, a hill being planted wherever there was
room between the logs. The corn did not look very well. The chopping was,
enclosed with a log fence. A short distance from the house a fine spring
of water gushed out of the gravel bank, from which a small brook ran down
across the clearing, along the borders of which a few geese were feeding.
“When we entered the house the young settler said,
"Wife, here is the Land Agent and two other men, and turning to us said,
This is my wife." She was a pretty looking young woman dressed in a coarse
linen dress, and bare footed. When her husband introduced us, she was a
good, deal embarrassed, and the flash of her dark eyes and the crimson
glow that passed over her countenance, showed that she was vexed at our
intrusion. The young settler observed her vexation and said, ‘Never mind
Sally, the Squire (so so called the Agent) knows how people have to live
in the woods. She regained her composure in a moment and greeted us hospitably,
and without any apologies for her house or her costume. After a few minutes
conversation, on the settlers suggesting that he had promised these men
something to eat to prevent their getting hungry. She began to prepare
the frugal meal. When we first entered the house she sat near the door,
spinning flax on a little wheel, and a baby was lying near her in a cradle
formed of the bark of a birch tree which resting like a trough on rockers,
made a very smooth, neat little cradle: While the settler and his other
guests were engaged in conversation, I took notice of the house and furniture.
‘‘The house was about 20 by 60 feet, constructed of sound logs chinked
with pieces of split logs, and plastered on the outside with clay.
The floors were made of split logs with the flat side up; the door
of thin pieces split out of a large log and the roof of the same.
The windows were holes unprotected by glass or sash; the fire place was
made of stone and the the chimney of sticks and clay, On one side of the
fireplace was a ladder leading to the chamber. There was a bed in one corner
of the room, a table and five or six chairs and on one side a few shelves
of split boards on which were a few articles of crockery and some tin ware,
and on one of them a few books. Behind the door was a large
spinning wheel and a reel, and overhead on wooden hooks fastened to the
beams were a number of things, among which were a nice rifle, powder horn,
bullet pouch, tomahawk and hunting knife. The complete equipment of the
hunter and the frontier settler. Every thing looked neat and tidy even
the rough stones which had been laid down for a hearth