rass listening to Mr. Boone's talk. It did not at first flow in a
steady stream, for he was not a garrulous man, but my father's questions
presently fired his enthusiasm. I recall but little of it, being so
small a lad, but I crept closer and closer until I could touch this
superior being who had been beyond the Wall. Marco Polo was no greater
wonder to the Venetians than Boone to me.

He spoke of leaving wife and children, and setting out for the Unknown
with other woodsmen. He told how, crossing over our blue western wall
into a valley beyond, they found a "Warrior's Path" through a gap across
another range, and so down into the fairest of promised lands. And as
he talked he lost himself in the tale of it, and the very quality of his
voice changed. He told of a land of wooded hill and pleasant vale, of
clear water running over limestone down to the great river beyond, the
Ohio--a land of glades, the fields of which were pied with flowers of
wondrous beauty, where roamed the buffalo in countless thousands, where
elk and deer abounded, and turkeys and feathered game, and bear in the
tall brakes of cane. And, simply, he told how, when the others had left
him, he stayed for three months roaming the hills alone with Nature
herself.

"But did you no' meet the Indians?" asked my father.

"I seed one fishing on a log once," said our visitor, laughing, "but he
fell into the water. I reckon he was drowned."

My father nodded comprehendingly,--even admiringly.

"And again!" said he.

"Wal," said Mr. Boone, "we fell in with a war party of Shawnees going
back to their lands north of the great river. The critters took away all
we had. It was hard," he added reflectively; "I had staked my fortune
on the venter, and we'd got enough skins to make us rich. But, neighbor,
there is land enough for you and me, as black and rich as Canaan."

"'The Lord is my shepherd,'" said my father, lapsing into verse.
"'The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. He leadeth me into green
pastures, and beside still waters.'"

For a time they were silent, each wrapped in his own thought, while the
crickets chirped and the frogs sang. From the distant forest came the
mournful hoot of an owl.

"And you are going back?" asked my father, presently.

"Aye, that I am. There are many families on the Yadkin below going, too.
And you, neighbor, you might come with us. Davy is the boy that would
thrive in that country."

My father did not answer. It wa