Their guns furnished meat, and the cultivation of a very limited amount of the soil, their bread and vegetables.

All the streams abounded with fish.

Trapping would furnish pelts to be brought into the States once a year, to pay for necessary articles which they could not raise--powder, lead, whiskey, tobacco and some store goods.

Occasionally some little articles of luxury would enter into these purchases--a quarter of a pound of tea, two or three pounds of coffee, more of sugar, some playing cards, and if anything was left over of the proceeds of the sale, more whiskey.
Little was known of the topography of the country beyond the settlements of these frontiersmen.

This is all changed now.