The Colfax chronicle., 1890-12-20
A NIGHT UNDER GROUND.
How q Fire Hole Afforded Protec-
ton for Helpless People.

and was then but little girl, yet the
incidents of one memorable afternoon
are still as fresh in my mind as the
events of last week. My parents had
lived in the city of New York, and were
well-to-do, for those days. But the old
story of rascality and robbery. by a
friend whom he had trusted changed
every thing, and father resolved to re-
move to the West
1t is unnecessary to tell the story of
our removal. 1t was very wonderful
thing to me-that journey to the shores
of Lake Michigan, but it would not in
terest you. Finally we had done with
cars and steamboats, and even stage
coaches, and made the last three days
of our journey in an old cart
On the afternoon of the third day of
our travel in this conveyance we came
suddenly into little clearing, where
was q new log cabin. At the door stood
q solitary backwoodsman.
.sWhat are you doing here?" ex-
claimed my father, who, more and more
gloomy as he got further away from
civilization, resented the presence OF the
settler.
.'Waal, stranger, reckon I'm alvin
here" was the reply.
"You don't mean to tell me that you
intend to reside here!" said my father.
"Yer abaout k'rect; stays the word. T"
'sWhat do you intend to do?' my ia
ther demanded.
''Waal, seems haow yer amt no ways
inquisitive, don't mind tellin' yer thet
I'm goin' ter make farm yere."
But" demonstrated my father, in
credulous, where Is your farming
land?"
s.Mister, / never seed trees yit but
had land under 'em, N l reckon I'll
find. nuffon't yere, arter awhile,
was the smiling rejoinder of the sturdy
pioneer.
Mother was tired and disinclined to
travel further, and when we had gone
half a mile further, we pitched our
tent in the woods, beside the spotted
trail" The next day thinking we
could do no better-we formally took up
our abode there.
In the ncxt two weeks my father,
with only his two hands-long unused
to such labor-cleared an acre of ground
and built small log house. So Sc
cluded did this tiny opening in the
lofty forest seem that when some lum-
bermcn came along by chance one day,
they asked my father il he had cut a
hole in the woods and let his house
down into it
There was no other human habitation
within many miles save that of the SOL
itary settler whom we had seen on the
day of our arrival. On every side were
trees, nothing but trees and under.
brush. Without doubt my parents found
it very lonely, and were not easily rec
onciled to the change from city life.
My mother was often in tears, but we
were children and enjoyed the wild.
ness and freedom.
remember that in our childish i'm.
aginations the tops of the trees seemed
to reach to the very clouds, and that the
deeper woods-into which we we're not
allowed to venture lest we should ''ge,
lost"--were strange, enchanted land
to us.
Wild deer and smaller game abound
ed, and vague suspicious fioated in ouI
youthful minds that bears, wolves and
panthers lurked in the dense, dark re-
cesses of the forest
Two years of this backwoods life
transformed us children from white
faced citylings to little brown savages
Father was almost as brown as our settler
neighbor, Mr.. Donley. Our former
friends in New York would have failed
to recognize US. Some of them, I sup
pose, would no longer have recognized
us in any case. Father used never now
to speak of his former business, or oi
the city, but worked hard as farmer te
procure livelihood from such crops as
he could cultivate in the little clearing
which he bad made.
The third year Of our life in the
woods was & very memorable one
Throughout Ja.A July ard Aueps!
So - & II . ~ - ~ ~ &. p