after losing their horses, and
spending two days in recovering them, Mr. Birkbeck and his party took a
hunter, as their guide, and proceeded across the little Wabash, to
explore the country between that river and the Skillet Fork.

The lonely settlers, in the districts north of Big Prairie, are in a
miserable state: their bread-corn must be ground thirty miles off; and
it occupied three days to carry to the mill, and bring back, the small
horse-load of three bushels. To struggle with privations has now become
the habit of their lives, most of them having made several successive
plunges into the wilderness.

Mr. Birkbeck's journey across the little Wabash was a complete departure
from all mark of civilization. Wandering without track, where even the
sagacity of the hunter-guide had nearly failed, they at length arrived
at the cabin of another hunter, in which they lodged. This man, his
wife, his eldest son, a tall, half-naked youth, just initiated in the
hunter's arts; his three daughters, growing up into great rude girls,
and a squalling tribe of dirty brats, of both sexes, were of one pale
yellow colour, without the slightest tint of healthful bloom. They were
remarkable instances of the effect, on the complexion, produced by
living perpetually in the midst of woods.

Their cabin, which may serve as a specimen of these rudiments of houses,
was formed of round logs, with apertures of three or four inches: there
was no chimney, but large intervals were left between the "clapboards,"
for the escape of the smoke. The roof, however, was a more effectual
covering, than Mr. Birkbeck had generally experienced, as it protected
him and his party very tolerably from a drenching night. Two bedsteads,
formed of unhewn logs, and cleft boards laid across; two chairs, (one of
them without a bottom,) and a low stool, were all the furniture
possessed by this numerous family. A string of buffalo-hide, stretched
across the hovel, was a wardrobe for their rags; and their utensils,
consisting of a large iron-pot, some baskets, one good rifle, and two
that were useless, stood about in corners; and a fiddle, which was
seldom silent, except when the inhabitants were asleep, hung by them.

These hunters, in the back-settlements of America, are as persevering as
savages, and as indolent. They cultivate indolence as a privilege: "You
English (they say) are industrious, but we have freedom." And thus they
exist, in yawning indifference, surroun