ile the forests supplied the table with game. Thus the
family, occupying the double position of the farmer and the hunter,
lived in the enjoyment of all the luxuries which both of those callings
could afford. Here Daniel Boone grew up to manhood. His love of solitude
and of nature led him on long hunting excursions, from which he often
returned laden with furs. The silence of the wilderness he brought back
with him to his home. And though his placid features ever bore a smile,
he had but few words to interchange with neighbors or friends. He was a
man of affectionate, but not of passionate nature. It would seem that
other emigrants were lured to the banks of the Yadkin, for here, after a
few years, young Boone fell in love with the daughter of his father's
neighbor, and that daughter, Rebecca Bryan, became his bride. He thus
left his father's home, and, with his axe, speedily erected for himself
and wife a cabin, we may presume at some distance from sight or sound of
any other house. There "from noise and tumult far," Daniel Boone
established himself in the life of solitude, to which he was accustomed
and which he enjoyed. It appears that his marriage took place about the
year 1755. The tide of emigration was still flowing in an uninterrupted
stream towards the west. The population was increasing throughout this
remote region, and the axe of the settler began to be heard on the
streams tributary to the Yadkin.

Daniel Boone became restless. He loved the wilderness and its solitude,
and was annoyed by the approach of human habitations, bringing to him
customs with which he was unacquainted, and exposing him to
embarrassments from which he would gladly escape. The mode of life
practiced by those early settlers in the wilderness is well known. The
log-house usually consisted of but one room, with a fire-place of stones
at the end. These houses were often very warm and comfortable,
presenting in the interior, with a bright fire blazing on the hearth, a
very cheerful aspect. Their construction was usually as follows:
Straight, smooth logs about a foot in diameter, cut of the proper
length, and so notched at the ends as to be held very firmly together,
were thus placed one above the other to the height of about ten feet.
The interstices were filled with clay, which soon hardened, rendering
the walls comparatively smooth, and alike impervious to wind or rain.
Other logs of straight fiber were split into clap-boards, one or two