This satisfaction of station—­as said—­grew out of the slight exertion necessary for all the wants of life, with unlimited choice of the finest land on the continent; the waters alive with fish and aquatic fowl; rabbits and prairie fowl at times by actual cart-load; elk not far, and countless buffalo behind,—­furnishing meat, bedding, clothing and shoes to any who could muster a cart or go in search; the woods and plains in season, ripe with delicious wild fruit, for present use or dried for winter,—­the whole backed by abundant breadstuffs.  The quota of the farmers along the rivers, whose fertile banks were dotted by windmills, whose great arms stayed the inconstant winds, and yoked the fickle couriers to the great car of general plenty.

A LAND OF PEACE.

Poverty in one sense certainly existed; age and improvidence are always with us, but it was not obtrusive, made apparent only towards the close of the long winter, when some old veteran of the canoe or saddle would make a “grand promenade” through the Settlement, with his ox and sled, making known his wants, incidentally, at his different camps among his old friends, finding always before he left his sled made the heavier by the women’s hands.  This was simply done; few in the wild country but had met with sudden exigencies in supply, knew well the need at times of one man to another, and, when asked for aid, gave willingly.  Or it may be that some large-hearted, jovial son of the chase had overrated his winter store, or underrated the assiduity of his friends.  His recourse in such case being the more carefully estimated stock of some neighbor, who could in no wise suffer the reproach to lie at his door, that he had turned his back, in such emergence, upon his good-natured, if injudicious countryman.

This practical communism—­borrowed from the Indians, among whom it was inviolable—­was, in the matter of hospitality, the rule of all,—­a reciprocation of good offices, in the absence of all houses of public entertainment, becoming a social necessity.  The manner of its exercise hearty, a knitting of the people together,—­no one was at a loss for a winter camp when travelling.  Every house he saw was his own, the bustling wife, with welcome in her eyes, eager to assure your comfort.  The supper being laid and dealt sturdily with, the good man’s pipe and your own alight and breathing satisfaction,—­a neighbor soul drops in to swell the gale of talk, that rocks you at last into a restful sleep.  How now, my masters!  Smacks not this of Arcady?

Early and universal marriage was the rule.  Here you received the blessings of home in the married life, and the care of offspring.  There were thus no defrauded women—­called, by a cruel irony, “old maids”; no isolated, mistaken men, cheated out of themselves, and robbed of the best training possible for man.  This vital fact was fraught with every good.