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Title: The Passing of the Frontier
A Chronicle of the Old West, Volume 26 in The Chronicles
Of America Series

Author: Emerson Hough

Editor: Allen Johnson

Posting Date: February 21, 2009 [EBook #3033]
Release Date: January, 2002

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PASSING OF THE FRONTIER ***

Produced by The James J. Kelly Library of St. Gregory's
University, and Alev Akman

THE PASSING OF THE FRONTIER

A CHRONICLE OF THE OLD WEST

By Emerson Hough

New Haven: Yale University Press

Toronto: Glasgow, Brook & Co.

London: Humphrey Milford

Oxford University Press

1918

CONTENTS

I. THE FRONTIER IN HISTORY
II. THE RANGE
III. THE CATTLE TRAILS
IV. THE COWBOY
V. THE MINES
VI. PATHWAYS OF THE WEST
VII. THE INDIAN WARS
VIII. THE CATTLE KINGS
IX. THE HOMESTEADER

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

THE PASSING OF THE FRONTIER

Chapter I. The Frontier In History

The frontier! There is no word in the English language more stirring,
more intimate, or more beloved. It has in it all the elan of the old
French phrase, En avant! It carries all of the old Saxon command,
Forward!! It means all that America ever meant. It means the old hope of
a real personal liberty, and yet a real human advance in character and
achievement. To a genuine American it is the dearest word in all the
world.

What is, or was, the frontier? Where was it? Under what stars did it
lie? Because, as the vague Iliads of ancient heroes or the nebulous
records of the savage gentlemen of the Middle Ages make small specific
impingement on our consciousness today, so also even now begin the tales
of our own old frontier to assume a haziness, an unreality, which makes
them seem less history than folklore. Now the truth is that the American
frontier of history has many a local habitation and many a name. And
this is why it lies somewhat indefinite under the blue haze of the
years, all the more alluring for its lack of definition, like some ol