The First White Man of the West: Life and Exploits of Col. Dan'l. Boone, the First Settler of Kentucky;; Interspersed with Incidents in the Early Annals of the Country.Flint, Timothy
History
The First White Man of the West: Life and Exploits of Col. Dan'l. Boone, the First Settler of Kentucky;; Interspersed with Incidents in the Early Annals of the Country.
The peace which followed the defeat of the northern tribes of Indians by
General Wayne, was most grateful to the harassed settlers of the west.
The news of it was received every where with the most lively joy. Every
one had cause of gratulation. The hardy warriors, whose exploits we have
recounted, felt that they were relieved from the immense
responsibilities which rested upon them as the guardians and protectors
of the infant settlements. The new settlers could now clear their wild
lands, and cultivate their rich fields in peace--without fearing the
ambush and the rifles of a secret foe; and the tenants of the scattered
cabins could now sleep in safety, and without the dread of being wakened
by the midnight war-whoop of the savage. Those who had been pent up in
forts and stations joyfully sallied forth, and settled wherever the soil
and local advantages appeared the most inviting.
Colonel Boone, in particular, felt that a firm and resolute perseverance
had finally triumphed over every obstacle. That the rich and boundless
valleys of the great west--the garden of the earth--and the paradise
of hunters, had been won from the dominion of the savage tribes, and
opened as an asylum for the oppressed, the enterprising, and the free of
every land. He had travelled in every direction through this great
valley. He had descended from the Alleghanies into the fertile regions
of Tennessee, and traced the courses of the Cumberland and Tennessee
rivers. He had wandered with delight through the blooming forests of
Kentucky. He had been carried prisoner by the Indians through the
wilderness which is now the state of Ohio to the great lakes of the
north; he had traced the head waters of the Kentucky, the Wabash, the
Miamies, the Scioto, and other great rivers of the west, and had
followed their meanderings to their entrance into the Ohio; he had stood
upon the shores of this beautiful river, and gazed with admiration, as
he pursued its winding and placid course through endless forests to
mingle with the Mississippi; he had caught some glimmerings of the
future, and saw with the prophetic eye of a patriot, that this great
valley must soon become the abode of millions of freemen; and his heart
swelled with joy, and warmed with a transport which was natural to a
mind so unsophisticated and disinterested as his.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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