On the crust men and wolves could travel with ease, but the deer's sharp hoofs pierced through and made him defenseless.

Wolves and dogs destroyed great quantities of deer caught in this way; and men who shot deer under these conditions were considered no huntsmen.

There was, indeed, a practical side to this chivalry of the chase, for meat and pelt were both poor at this season; but the true hunter also obeyed the finer tenet of his code, for he would go to the rescue of deer caught in the crusts--and he killed many a wolf sliding over the ice to an easy meal.
The community moral code of the frontier was brief and rigorous.

What it lacked of the "whereas" and "inasmuch" of legal ink it made up in sound hickory.

In fact, when we review the activities of this solid yet elastic wood in the moral, social, and economic phases of Back Country life, we are moved to wonder if the pioneers would have been the same race of men had they been nurtured beneath a less strenuous and adaptable vegetation! The hickory gave the frontiersman wood for all implements and furnishings where the demand was equally for lightness, strength, and elasticity.