At the extreme borders of the Confederate States, upon the confines of society and of the wilderness, a population of bold adventurers have taken up their abode, who pierce the solitudes of the American woods, and seek a country there, in order to escape that poverty which awaited them in their native provinces.

As soon as the pioneer arrives upon the spot which is to serve him for a retreat, he fells a few trees and builds a loghouse.

Nothing can offer a more miserable aspect than these isolated dwellings.

The traveller who approaches one of them towards nightfall, sees the flicker of the hearth-flame through the chinks in the walls; and at night, if the wind rises, he hears the roof of boughs shake to and fro in the midst of the great forest trees.

Who would not suppose that this poor hut is the asylum of rudeness and ignorance?
Yet no sort of comparison can be drawn between the pioneer and the dwelling which shelters him.