Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 13.djvu/249

 just as he got in reach, the butt of the old gent's blacksnake gave him a clip on the lug of the ear which dropped him in the beautiful snow over a foot deep. That and the blacksnake, or both together, seemed to cool the young officer off. So he got up and begged the old gent's pardon. Grandfather helped him get the rig all straightened out, and told him he had got him so he thought he could take care of himself, and each one went his own way. To grandfather's surprise, that was the last he ever heard of the affair.

My own grandfather, William Barlow, for whom I was named, followed Daniel Boone to Kentucky, and had to contend with numerous tribes of Indians. Kentucky was not claimed by any particular tribe of Indians, but held as mutual hunting ground by all the surrounding tribes. The climate and blue grass production of the soil made it a great resort and home for all the carnivorous and herbaceous wild animals of the forest that were found east of the Mississippi River. Among these were bear, panther and wolves, buffalo, elk and deer, besides all the little fry, such as foxes, coons, oppossums, hogs, hedgehogs, squirrels, rabbits and wild turkeys, in unlimited quantities.

So all the first settlers had to do was to get in a little patch of corn for bread. This was pounded in a mortar, burnt out in a big stump, with a big wooden pestle. This pestle swung from a natural spring pole, by bending down a young hickory tree and tying a rawhide made of buffalo skin to the top of the little hickory sapling that was stout enough to raise the big pestle above the mortar so the corn would roll to the center of the big stump whenever the pestle went up. Thus one could have a bushel of cornmeal in a very short time. Of course, it had to be sifted through a rawhide deerskin sieve, that was made at home and equally as good as the best wire ones that we use today.

Grandfather said the way they protected themselves from the numerous tribes of Indians, who made desperate efforts to keep the whites off their happy hunting ground, was by building their log houses in straight rows right opposite each other,