ed, and their
life as wild, squalid, and lawless; while the next would lay especial
and admiring stress on their enterprise, audacity, and hospitable
openhandedness. Though much alike, different portions of the frontier
stock were beginning to develop along different lines. The Holston
people, both in Virginia and North Carolina, were by this time
comparatively little affected by immigration from without those States,
and were on the whole homogeneous; but the Virginians and Carolinians of
the seaboard considered them rough, unlettered, and not of very good
character. One travelling clergyman spoke of them with particular
disfavor; he was probably prejudiced by their indifference to his
preaching, for he mentions with much dissatisfaction that the
congregations he addressed "though small, behaved extremely bad."
[Footnote: Durrett MSS. Rev. James Smith, "Tour in Western Country,"
1785.] The Kentuckians showed a mental breadth that was due largely to
the many different sources from which even the predominating American
elements in the population sprang. The Cumberland people seemed to
travellers the wildest and rudest of all, as was but natural, for these
fierce and stalwart settlers were still in the midst of a warfare as
savage as any ever waged among the cave-dwellers of the Stone Age.

The opinion of any mere passer-through a country is always less valuable
than that of an intelligent man who dwells and works among the people,
and who possesses both insight and sympathy. At this time one of the
recently created Kentucky judges, an educated Virginian, in writing to
his friend Madison, said: "We are as harmonious amongst ourselves as can
be expected of a mixture of people from various States and of various
Sentiments and Manners not yet assimilated. In point of Morals the bulk
of the inhabitants are far superior to what I expected to find in any
new settled country. We have not had a single instance of Murder, and
but one Criminal for Felony of any kind has yet been before the Supreme
Court. I wish I could say as much to vindicate the character of our
Land-jobbers. This Business has been attended with much villainy in
other parts. Here it is reduced to a system, and to take the advantage
of the ignorance or of the poverty of a neighbor is almost grown into
reputation." [Footnote: Wallace's letter, above quoted.]

The Gentry.

Of course, when the fever for land speculation raged so violently, many
who had embarke