Tom, like many of the young planters, built a cabin upon a tract of land, under the Henderson claim, as purchased from the Cherokee Indians, which claim was subsequently set aside by the State of Virginia. Tom, as we have said, was of a restless disposition, and from a planter he turned to be a boatman. Leaving his family at home in their cabin, he engaged to make a trip to Fort Washington (Cincinnati, then a village) on a keel-boat, descending the Kentucky and ascending the Ohio rivers. On this trip he first beheld the stupendous precipices on the Kentucky river, where the banks in many places are three hundred feet high, of solid limestone, and the beautiful country at he mouth of the Kentucky, on the Ohio river. He was absent from home three months, for prior to steam navigation, the Ohio had been navigated by keel and flat-bottom boats for a quarter of a century, and many of the old boatmen were men of dissipated habits--_bad school for Tom_. When he returned home it was too late in the season to raise a crop. The next winter was long and cold. Tom and his little family keenly felt the grasp of poverty, and many times, in the dead hour of night, when the cold wind made the only audible sound on the outside, the latch-string of the cabin door had been pulled in, and the fire burned down to a bed of coals, Tom and his wife sat quietly and sadly by the dim light of a tallow candle, and told the stories of their families. Tom intended at some future time to return to Virginia and claim an inheritance, although, as he said, he was not the eldest son of his father, and by the laws of Virginia the eldest son is entitled to all of the estate in land, which, as he said, caused him to leave home; but from other sources he hoped in the future to reap the benefit of an inheritance. Tom's wife, in her turn, told the story of her ancestors in the old country, and how she lived in hope of some revival of family fortune, which by the discovery of the necessary papers, would give her the means of rising above the cold grasp of poverty, so keenly felt by them; and many times through the long nights of winter, in that secret chamber where no intruder comes, Tom and his wife, whom he always called by the endearing name of _mother_, with a heart-felt desire to honor his infant children, had many long and interesting interviews upon the subject of the _ups_ and _downs_ of family fortune. The joyous days of spring dawned upon the little household, and with it new ideas in the mind of Tom Fairfield; it was to become a _preacher_; why not? He could read--and must according to the philosophy of the people understand the Scriptures. Whatever may have been the delinquency of the early settlers in Kentucky, they were devotedly a religious people. Ministers of the gospel were not required to study Theology; to be able to _read_ was the only accomplishment, except the _call_; it was thought indispensable that a _preacher_ should have _a divine call_.