The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1871-04-14

to camp out, and they had hard time
getting through; they tipped over in the
mud, and left some of their goods on
the ground without shelter. When
they got their government land paid for,
and their little bundle of household
goods into the bark covered shanty, the
whole amount of their earthly posses
sions was thirty dollars 10 cash, and
humble home. They were DESTROYS Of
saving the money with which to pur
chase a cow, and they had scarcely got
into their house, when it was harvest
time, and provisions were very dear
Pork was forty dollars barrel and very
scarce flour, eighteen, dollars a barrel
and salt nine dollars. Mr.. Taylor had
little wheat, earned working in the
mill at Comstock, before he was mar
ried, and bought potatoes at two dollars
bushel. The parlngs and eyes of
these used to cook, they planted between
the logs, in July. These potatoes were
delicious and mealy and, as it now
seems, the best they ever raised. Mr..
Taylor left his home and went to Big
Prairie Ronde to work in harvesting, to
provisions for the winter. His wages
were one dollar a day. The first time
he went to mill, he hired man with
oxen, to 90 to Prairie Ronde after his
wheat and thence to Comstock to mill !;
distance of forty six miles in all
This trip cost him six dollars, and they
were gone from home two weeks-the
wheat not being threshed when he ar
rived there. Mrs. Taylor remained all
that time alone in the shanty, with a
quilt suspended at the corners, which
served the purpose of door and win
dow. She kept a bright fire burning
nights, to keep the wolves away, and it
required half her time during the day
to pick up and carry wood to the shanty
to last all night. The fire was kept
outside by a log heap; and there she
did all her cooking for three months
baking in tin baker before the log
heap.
When cold weather commenced in
the fall, they made "a hearth in one cor
ner of the shanty, with clay and water
made into a mortar and pounded down
flat. The clay they found in knoll
on Judge Monroe's land Mrs. Taylor
helped bring it to the house in pals,
and water in the tea kettle. They
picked up stones from quite distance
around, and built a chimney, half way
only to the roof of the shanty, which
took all the stones they could find. AT
this time MIR. Taylor hired a team at
Breedsville, and hauled three hundred
feet of lurber from Oasteronks mill
near the line of Allrgan county, a dis
lance of fifteen miles; this journey con-
sumed three days. The lumber was
used for floor, door and window frame
for the shanty. The roof was repaired
with Stats OF the pew lumber for strips
to nail "shakes' across Thus our pi
oneers improved their shanty to COM
parative palace, in which they lived
nine years, without we'll Water to
wash with sometimes had to be brought
from slough hole," three quarters of
a mile from the house. An eight quart
pail and teakettlc, were used to carry
the water in, and an iron kettle holding
one pail full was their boiler. Perh APPS
to make this easy, they had but few
clothes to wash. Compensation seems
to be fixed law of nature, but our
modern housekeepers would not ac.
knowledge its justice in this case
Sometimes, while the Taylors lived in
this house, during heavy rains late in
the fall, the bed would be drenched
with water running down the wall, SO
that the bed clothes would be frozen
tight to the side of the house, and could
not be removed for days at time
The bed stead was primitive one,
made stationary. AT such times, water
was plenty and near the house, but not
so always, in dry times, even the slough
would be dry; then they went to Chas
U. Cross after water, distance of a
mile and half. Sometimes they had
the ague, 50 they could not work, and
all the water they had was saved in