By the time he was seventy years old, Boone's skill as a hunter had somewhat lessened. His eyes had lost their phenomenal strength; he could no longer perform those nice feats of marksmanship for which in his prime he had attained wide celebrity, and rheumatism made him less agile. But as a trapper he was still unexcelled, and for many years made long trips into the Western wilderness, even into far-off Kansas, and at least once (1814, when eighty years old) to the great game fields of the Yellowstone. Upon such expeditions, often lasting several months, he was accompanied by one or more of his sons, by his son-in-law Flanders Calloway, or by an old Indian servant who was sworn to bring his master back to the Femme Osage dead or alive--for, curiously enough, this wandering son of the wilderness ever yearned for a burial near home. Beaver-skins, which were his chief desire, were then worth nine dollars each in the St. Louis market. He appears to have amassed a considerable sum from this source, and from the sale of his land grant to his sons, and in 1810 we find him in Kentucky paying his debts. This accomplished, tradition says that he had remaining only fifty cents; but he gloried in the fact that he was at last "square with the world," and returned to Missouri exultant. The War of 1812-15 brought Indian troubles to this new frontier, and some of the farm property of the younger Boones was destroyed in one of the savage forays. The old man fretted at his inability to assist in the militia organization, of which his sons Daniel Morgan and Nathan were conspicuous leaders; and the state of the border did not permit of peaceful hunting. In the midst of the war he deeply mourned the death of his wife (1813)--a woman of meek, generous, heroic nature, who had journeyed over the mountains with him from North Carolina, and upon his subsequent pilgrimages, sharing all his hardships and perils, a proper helpmeet in storm and calm. Penniless, and a widower, he now went to live with his sons, chiefly with Nathan, then forty-three years of age. After being first a hunter and explorer, and then an industrious and successful farmer, Nathan had won distinction in the war just closed and entered the regular army, where he reached the rank of lieutenant-colonel and had a wide and thrilling experience in Indian fighting. Daniel Morgan is thought to have been the first settler in Kansas (1827); A. G. Boone, a grandson, was one of the early settlers of Colorado, and prominently connected with Western Indian treaties and Rocky Mountain exploration; and another grandson of the great Kentuckian was Kit Carson, the famous scout for Frémont's transcontinental expedition. [Illustration: NATHAN BOONE'S HOUSE IN ST. CHARLES COUNTY, MISSOURI. Herein Daniel Boone died.]