Page:The Souvenir of Western Women.djvu/101

Rh Mother Medcalf and her son John met me at the river with an ox cart. John walked in the mud up to his knees and we had to lie down in the cart to keep the brush from pulling our heads off.

After my husband returned from the mines we concluded lo take a homestead up the river. My husband and his brother-in-law had been "baching" in a little log cabin on the place. When my husband came to visit me in our old home I said I was going up with him. He told me the house was too small. "That makes no difference," I said; "where you live, I can live, and I am going," and I did. So on the 3d day of July we reached our new home. We put our things in the house, ate our dinner, then my husband returned to bring the cattle. I was left alone in the woods for three days, and a never-to-be-forgotten experience I had, with no lock on the door and holes in the chimney. Darkness coming on, I put the children to bed and sat down to read a chapter in the Bible. All at once the wild cats began to screech, the owls to whoo-whoo, and the wolves to howl. I jumped into bed almost frightened to death. I believe that was the only time in my life I wished to die. I just asked the Lord to take me and the dear little ones straight up to heaven before we were all eaten up by wild animals. Away in the night something began to pat, pat on the floor and make a squeaking noise. I just lay still, afraid to breathe. Next morning I looked to see if my hair was white. The next night I had the same experience. On the third day—Sunday morning— I looked out and saw a young man and a young woman coming. I said, "The Lord surely sent you," and I told them of my experience of the two nights before.

I proposed to sell my gold watch and chain for lumber to build a house. My husband seriously objected, but I said I would never wear a gold watch and chain and have no house. Soon after a man came along who had a sawmill, and 1 asked him if he would give we lumber to build a house for my watch. He said he would. We built a house and started to make a home, and were happy working and waiting.

People say to me, "What did you do for a doctor?" We worked hard, ate hearty, and slept sound. When we felt indisposed we took a tea, made of wild cherry and dogwood bark, and rested a while. The first doctor that came to the county was Dr. Casto. Then the people began to get sick, and they have wanted a doctor ever since.

I love pioneering. I look back to those days as being my happiest days. When I hear the newcomers growling about the old mossbacks not doing so-and-so I feel like Josiah Allen's wife: "I want to set down on 'em." I don't know how they would have gotten here if it were not for the mossbacks. God bless the old pioneers, and may they all go to heaven when they die. There are few of them left to tell the story. Some of us are left to see the wilderness blossom as the rose. I know it is evening time with me, my work is almost done. I am watching and waiting.