The Prairie Read Online Free PDF

or "effects."
    "I was born on the sea-shore, though most of my life has been passed in
the woods."
    The whole party now looked up at him, as men are apt to turn their eyes
on some unexpected object of general interest. One or two of the young
men repeated the words "sea-shore" and the woman tendered him one
of those civilities with which, uncouth as they were, she was little
accustomed to grace her hospitality, as if in deference to the travelled
dignity of her guest. After a long, and, seemingly, a meditating
silence, the emigrant, who had, however, seen no apparent necessity to
suspend the functions of his masticating powers, resumed the discourse.
    "It is a long road, as I have heard, from the waters of the west to the
shores of the main sea?"
    "It is a weary path, indeed, friend; and much have I seen, and something
have I suffered, in journeying over it."
    "A man would see a good deal of hard travel in going its length!"
    "Seventy and five years have I been upon the road; and there are not
half that number of leagues in the whole distance, after you leave the
Hudson, on which I have not tasted venison of my own killing. But this
is vain boasting. Of what use are former deeds, when time draws to an
end?"
    "I once met a man that had boated on the river he names," observed the
eldest son, speaking in a low tone of voice, like one who distrusted his
knowledge, and deemed it prudent to assume a becoming diffidence in the
presence of a man who had seen so much: "from his tell, it must be
a considerable stream, and deep enough for a keel-boat, from top to
bottom."
    "It is a wide and deep water-course, and many sightly towns are there
growing on its banks," returned the trapper; "and yet it is but a brook
to the waters of the endless river."
    "I call nothing a stream that a man can travel round," exclaimed the
ill-looking associate of the emigrant: "a real river must be crossed;
not headed, like a bear in a county hunt."
[7]
    "Have you been far towards the sun-down, friend?" interrupted the
emigrant, as if he desired to keep his rough companion as much as
possible out of the discourse. "I find it is a wide tract of clearing,
this, into which I have fallen."
    "You may travel weeks, and you will see it the same. I often think the
Lord has placed this barren belt of prairie behind the States, to
warn men to what their folly may yet bring the land! Ay, weeks, if not
months, may you journey in these open fields, in which there is neither
dwelling nor habitation for man or beast. Even the savage animals travel
miles on miles to seek their dens; and yet the wind seldom blows from
the east, but I conceit the sound of axes, and the crash of falling
trees, are in my ears."
    As the old man spoke with the seriousness and dignity that age seldom
fails to communicate even to less striking sentiments, his auditors were
deeply attentive, and as silent as the grave. Indeed, the trapper
was left to renew the dialogue himself, which he soon did by asking
a question, in the indirect manner so much in use by the border
inhabitants.
    "You found it no easy matter to ford the water-courses, and to make your
way so deep into the prairies, friend, with teams of horses and herds of
horned beasts?"
    "I kept the left bank of the main river," the emigrant replied, "until I
found the stream leading too much to the north, when we rafted ourselves
across without any great suffering. The women lost a fleece or two
from the next year's shearing, and the girls have one cow less to their
dairy. Since then, we have done bravely, by bridging a creek every day
or two."
    "It is likely you will continue west, until you come to land more
suitable for a settlement?"
    "Until I see reason to stop, or to turn ag'in," the emigrant bluntly
answered, rising at the same time, and cutting short the dialogue by the
suddenness of the movement. His example was followed by the trapper, as
well as the rest of the party; and then, without much deference to
the presence of their guest,