“The roof, and sometimes the floor, were finished on the same day of the raising.  A third day was commonly spent by a few carpenters in leveling off the floor, making a clapboard door and a table.  This last was made of a split slab, and supported by four round legs set in auger-holes.  Some three-legged stools were made in the same manner.  Some pins stuck in the logs at the back of the house, supported some clapboards which served for shelves for the table furniture.  A single fork, placed with its lower end in a hole in the floor, and the upper end fastened to a joist, served for a bedstead, by placing a pole in the fork with one end through a crack between the logs of the wall.  This front pole was crossed by a shorter one within the fork, with its outer end through another crack.  From the front pole, through a crack between the logs of the end of the house, the boards were put on which formed the bottom of the bed.  Sometimes other poles were pinned to the fork a little distance above these, for the purpose of supporting the front and foot of the bed, while the walls were the supports of its back and head.  A few pegs around the walls for a display of the coats of the women, and hunting-shirts of the men, and two small forks or buck-horns to a joist for the rifle and shot-pouch, completed the carpenter work.

“In the mean time masons were at work.  With the heart pieces of the timber of which the clapboards were made, they made billets for chunking up the cracks between the logs of the cabin and chimney; a large bed of mortar was made for daubing up these cracks; a few stones formed the back and jambs of the chimney.

“The cabin being finished, the ceremony of house-warming took place, before the young couple were permitted to move into it.

“The house-warming was a dance of a whole night’s continuance, made up of the relations of the bride and groom and their neighbors.  On the day following the young couple took possession of their new mansion.”

[Footnote 50:  Perkins.  Peck.]

CHAPTER XIX.

Condition of the early settlers as it respects the mechanic arts—­Want of skilled mechanics—­Hominy block and hand-mill—­Sweeps—­Gunpowder—­Water mills Clothing—­Leather—­Farm tools—­Wooden ware—­Sports—­Imitating birds—­Throwing the tomahawk—­Athletic sports—­Dancing—­Shooting at marks—­Emigration of the present time compared with that of the early settlers—­Scarcity of iron—­Costume—­Dwellings—­Furniture—­Employments—­The women—­Their character—­Diet—­Indian corn—­The great improvements in facilitating the early settlement of the West—­Amusements.

Before having the subject of the actual condition of the early settlers in the West, we take another extract from “Doddridge’s Notes,” comprising his observations on the state of the mechanic arts among them, and an account of some of their favorite sports.