Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 9.djvu/382

352, and Edwards Bucknam being the first white men to enter upon the task of clearing this then a wilderness, so that it might be the abode of civilized life.

In the Indian raids upon the settlements in the lower part of the province, some prisoners had been taken and carried up the Connecticut, and notable among them was John Stark, who, it is said, escaped from his captors at or near the head of the Fifteen-Mile falls. Hunters and trappers had visited the forests and streams of the Cohos county for the moose and beaver which abounded in all this region. Some among them had noted the rich alluvial soil of this beautiful valley, and the chances it afforded for easy and profitable cultivation, and had told the stories, somewhat exaggerated, perhaps, to the dwellers south; and to men who had the spirit of adventure born and bred within them, this country seemed a fitting place for the trial of their nerve and endurance, As hunters and trappers have generally discovered the hidden treasures of the earth, and first penetrated into the deep recesses of the forests, and with good judgment formed their estimate of a country's fertility and adaptability to the wants of an increasing and extending population, so in this case. And here came those men whom I have named, the pioneers who opened up to civilization and culture the most beautiful section of our state.

The first years were years of trial; and it called out all the manly fortitude of which these men were possessed to endure the rigors of climate and the various perplexities and embarrassments to which they were subjected. Their corn was destroyed by frost, their cattle browsed in the woods for want of shelter and fodder, and for their sustenance the streams and woods were resorted to. Fortunately moose, the giant of the northern forests, regaled himself in the ponds and partook of the succulent branches of the trees, his favorite grazing grounds being where the mountain ash of the hills and the lily-pads and roots of the shallower ponds afforded him food. Grouse and pigeons were found, and the black bear, stories of whose capture would fill a book,—and then the streams abounded with trout and salmon; and Bucknam being a most expert huntsman and fisherman, their scanty stores of food were kept beyond the limits of starvation.

Year by year a few new comers from the lower part of the province and from Massachusetts were added to their number, clearings in the forests became more extensive, the seasons more propitious, and the soil cultivated yielded of her fruit generously. There was "marriage and giving in marriage," children were born, a school-house of logs was built, and the rude lessons from the crude text-books were taught by the aid of Master Birch.

During the dark period of the Revolution some of the settlers who had penetrated a little farther north, and a few weak souls of the settlement who dreaded the incursions of Indians and who shrunk from the hardships and perils of their exposed position, abandoned the settlement, and sought greater security in the settlements south. But the energy and pluck of Capt. Stockwell prevented a general