قراءة كتاب Pioneer Life in Illinois

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‏اللغة: English

Pioneer Life in Illinois

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المؤلف:

Perryman F M

دار النشر: Project Gutenberg

الصفحة رقم: 4

people know,—

We would sing to them

Of how we lived,

Just Sixty Years Ago.

When coon-skins was two bits apiece,

And beeswax was a bit,

And eggs four cents a dozen—

That was all that we could get;

And deer-skins always went at par,

And feathers was not slow;

And that’s the money people had

Just Sixty Years Ago.

And, Oh! that big old fire-place.—

It took a sight of wood;

We would haul it on a “lizzard”—

And we would pile on all we could;

We would haul a big long hickory log,

Especially when there was snow;—

For we worked two yoke of cattle then;—

Just Sixty Years Ago.

The school house was of elm logs—

The bark was all left on;

I never saw no other kind

Till I was nearly grown.

The children got some learning,

But, of course, it was rather slow;—

My! how the teacher “licked” the “kids”

Just Sixty Years Ago.

And when it came to raising corn,

We did not get much rest

For the want of tools to work with,

We had to do our best.

We plowed with wooden mouldboard plow

And our lines were made of tow;

And that’s the kind of tools we had

Just Sixty Years Ago.

And when the people went to church

They always wore their best;

They wore their home-made pantaloons—

I hate to tell the rest.

The girls wore striped dresses,

And the boys wore shirts of tow;—

And that’s the way the people dressed

Just Sixty Years Ago.

We did not care for stocks or bonds,

They were not in our line;—

But, if we wanted whiskey,

We got it every time.

The boys could bake the “johnnycake”

And the girls knew how to mow;

Oh! was not we a “jolly set?”

Just Sixty Years Ago.

Traveling in Illinois.

IN traveling over the great fertile prairie State of Illinois, and viewing its many railroads, its many beautiful cities and towns, its school houses, its churches, its broad fields of waving grain, its orchards bending under their load of golden fruit, its vast population of industrious and intelligent citizens, its mills, and its factories, one can hardly realize that nearly all of this great improvement has been made in the last sixty years, but such is the case. Sixty years ago these prairies were an unbroken howling wilderness, where the wolf and deer roamed at will and raised their young unmolested, and where the rattlesnake was in his glory. The pioneer had unknowingly blazed the way for what was to come; he did not seem to know that these wild prairies was soon to become the garden spot of the world.

Names of the Early Settlers.

NO better class of citizens has ever lived in Shelby county, or ever will live in Shelby county, than the early settlers; the Rasey’s, the Hall’s, the Pugh’s, the Corley’s, the Rhoades’, the Wakefield’s, the Small’s, the Middlesworth’s, the Gollier’s, the Yant’s, the Smith’s, the Warren’s, the Whitfield’s, the Neal’s, the Killam’s, the Douthit’s, and many others that we could name, who were just as good. The writer feels proud of the memory of such people, and while the most of them have passed away, we thank God that such men and women have lived in the world to make our pathway brighter, and make the world better. And where you find one of those early settlers you find a man whose love for his friends can hardly be severed; a love so true, so deep, so loyal, so God-like that if they possessed no other good trait that one trait alone makes them noble.

Going Back.

NOTWITHSTANDING the many disadvantages of the pioneer life, there was a charm in it which none can describe; and an old man who was here in early days almost feels like he wants to go back and live his boyhood days over in the wild new country, where everything was so near like nature formed it; he wants to see the wild animals gallop over the hills; he wants to hear the howl of the wolf; he wants to hear the cry of the hounds when pursuing the deer or the wolf; he wants to hear the gobble of the wild turkey in the spring-time; he wants to see the prairies