Colonel May built him a fine "mansion house," thirty-six feet by
eighteen, and fifteen feet high, with a good cellar underneath, and in
the windows panes of glass he had brought all the way from Boston. He
continued to enjoy the life in all its phases, from hunting in the woods
to watching the sun rise, and making friends with the robins, which, in
the wilderness, always followed the settlements. In August he went up
the river, without adventure, and returned to his home. [Footnote:
Journal and Letters of Colonel John May; one of the many valuable
historical publications of Robert Clarke & Co., of Cincinnati. VOL
III--18]
Contrasts with Travels of Early Explorers.
Such a trip as either of these was a mere holiday picnic. It offers as
striking a contrast as well could be offered to the wild and lonely
journeyings of the stark wilderness-hunters and Indian fighters, who
first went west of the mountains. General Rufus Putnam and his
associates did a deed the consequences of which were of vital
importance. They showed that they possessed the highest attributes of
good citizenship--resolution and sagacity, stern morality, and the
capacity to govern others as well as themselves.
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