The love of adventure, the desire to explore the dark, infested and beautiful forest, the dream of fruitful sunny lands cut with water courses, shored with silver and strewn with gold beyond it--these were the only heritage of their sons and daughters save the strength and courage of the pioneer.

How true was this dream of theirs gathering detail and allurement as it passed from sire to son! On distant plains to the west were lands more lovely and fruitful than any of their vision; in mountains far beyond was gold enough to gild the dome of the heavens, as the sun was wont to do at eventide, and silver enough to put a fairly respectable moon in it.

Yet for generations their eyes were not to see, their hands were not to touch these things.

They were only to push their frontier a little farther to the west and hold the dream and pass it on to their children.
Those early years of the nineteenth century held the first days of fulfillment.

Samson and Sarah Traylor had the old dream in their hearts when they first turned their faces to the West.