to this, a remnant of my last month's pay--
in truth, not enough to provide me with that much coveted article, a
_civilian's suit_: in proof of which, my old undress-frock, with its
yellow spread-eagle buttons, clung to my shoulders like a second shirt
of Nessus. The vanity of wearing a uniform, that may have once been
felt, was long ago threadbare as the coat itself; and yet I was not
wanting in friends, who fancied that it might still exist! How little
understood they the real state of the case, and how much did they
misconstrue my _involuntary_ motives!

It was just to escape from such unpleasant associations, that I held on
to my "scrip." Most of my brother-officers had sold theirs for a
"song," and spent the proceeds upon a "supper." In relation to mine, I
had other views than parting with it to the greedy speculators. It
promised me that very wilderness-home I was in search of; and, having no
prospect of procuring a fair spirit for my "minister," I determined to
"locate" without one.

I was at the time staying in Tennessee--the guest of a campaigning
comrade and still older friend. He was grandson of that gallant leader,
who, with a small band of only forty families, ventured three hundred
miles through the heart of the "bloody ground" and founded Nashville
upon the bold bluffs of an almost unknown river! From the lips of their
descendants I had heard so many thrilling tales of adventures,
experienced by this pioneer band, that Tennessee had become, in my fancy
a region of romance. Other associations had led me to love this
hospitable and chivalric state; and I resolved, that, within its
boundaries, I should make my home. A visit to the Land-office of
Nashville ended in my selection of Section Number 9, Township --, as my
future plantation. It was represented to me as a fertile spot--situated
in the "Western Reserve"--near the banks of the beautiful Obion, and not
far above the confluence of this river with the Mississippi. The
official believed there had been some "improvement" made upon the land
by a _squatter_; but whether the squatter still lived upon it, he could
not tell. "At all events, the fellow will be too poor to exercise the
_pre-emption right_, and of course must move off." So spoke the land
agent. This would answer admirably. Although my Texan experience had
constituted me a tolerable woodsman, it had not made me a woodcutter;
and the clearing of the squatter, however small it might