to numerous uses. The commonest drinking utensil was a
long-handled gourd.

The dress of the pioneer long remained a curious cross between that
of the Indians and that of the white people of the older sections. In
earlier times the hunting-shirt--made of linsey, coarse nettle-bark
linen, buffalo-hair, or even dressed deerskins--was universally worn by
the men, together with breeches, leggings, and moccasins. The women and
children were dressed in simple garments of linsey. In warm weather they
went barefooted; in cold, they wore moccasins or coarse shoes.

Rarely was there lack of food for these pioneer families. The soil was
prodigal, and the forests abounded in game. The piece de resistance of
the backwoods menu was "hog an' hominy"; that is to say, pork served
with Indian corn which, after being boiled in lye to remove the hulls,
had been soaked in clear water and cooked soft. "Johnny cake" and
"pone"--two varieties of cornbread--were regularly eaten at breakfast
and dinner. The standard dish for supper was cornmeal mush and milk. As
cattle were not numerous, the housewife often lacked milk, in which case
she fell back on her one never-failing resource--hominy; or she served
the mush with sweetened water, molasses, the gravy of fried meat, or
even bear's oil. Tea and coffee were long unknown, and when introduced
they were likely to be scorned by the men as "slops" good enough perhaps
for women and children. Vegetables the settlers grew in the garden plot
which ordinarily adjoined the house, and thrifty families had also a
"truck patch" in which they raised pumpkins, squashes, potatoes, beans,
melons, and corn for "roasting ears." The forests yielded game, as well
as fruits and wild grapes, and honey for sweetening.

The first quality for which the life of the frontier called was untiring
industry. It was possible, of course, to eke out an existence by
hunting, fishing, petty trading, and garnering the fruits which Nature
supplied without man's assistance. And many pioneers in whom the roving
instinct was strong went on from year to year in this hand-to-mouth
fashion. But the settler who expected to be a real home-builder, to gain
some measure of wealth, to give his children a larger opportunity in
life, must be prepared to work, to plan, to economize, and to sacrifice.
The forests had to be felled; the great logs had to be rolled together
and burned; crops of maize, tobacco, oats, and cane needed to be
planted, cu