A History of Southern Missouri and Northern Arkansas. William Monks
thought nothing of buying a horse or a yoke of oxen, or to make any other common debt on the promise of discharging the same in beeswax and peltry in one month's time.
The immigration consisted mostly of farmers and mechanics. Among the mechanics were coopers who would make large hogsheads for the purpose of holding the honey after it was separated from the beeswax, and a man then had his choice to use either candied honey or fresh honey. I knew whole hogsheads that were full of candied honey. When men would make a contract to deliver any amount or number of pounds of beeswax, and within a given time, especially in the fall of the year, they would either take a yoke of cattle or two horses and a wagon and with their guns and camp equipage go out from the settlements into what was then termed the "wilderness," and burn bee comb. In a short time the bees would be working so strong to the bait that they could scarcely course them. In the morning they would hunt deer, take off pelts until the deer would lie down, then they would hunt bees and mark the trees until the deer would get up to feed in the afternoon, when they would again resume their hunt for deer. After they had found a sufficient number of bee trees and marked them, the morning following they would go out and kill nothing but large deer; case-skin them until they had a sufficient number of hides to contain the honey that they expected to take from the trees, take the hides to the camp, tie a knot in the fore legs of the hide, take dressed buckskin and a big awl, roll the hide of the neck in about three folds, run two rows of stitches, draw it tight, then go to their wagons with ridgepole and hooks already prepared, knot the hind legs of the skins, hang them over the hooks, take their tub, a knife and spoon, proceed to the trees, stop their team a sufficient distance from the tree to prevent the bees from stinging the animals, cut the tree, take out the honey, place it in the tub, and when the tub was filled carry it to the wagon where the hides were prepared, empty their tubs into the deer skins, return again to another tree and continue cutting until the hides were all filled with honey; then they would return home, take the hides from the hooks on the ridge pole on the wagon, hang them on hooks prepared for the purpose in the smokehouse and then the men's work was done.
The labor of the women then commenced. They would proceed to separate the honey from the beeswax, pouring the honey into hogsheads, kegs or barrels prepared for it, and running the beeswax into cakes ready for the market, while the men were stretching and drying the deerskins. As soon as the deerskins were dried and the honey was separated from the beeswax, they were ready for the market and took their place as currency, while the flesh of the deer, sometimes, when bread was scarce, took the place of both bread and meat, with a change, whenever the appetite called for it, to turkey and other wild game.
At night they would hunt for fur animals, such as raccoon, fox and mink, and stretch their hides; a first-class raccoon hide would sell for 40 to 50 cents; fox, 25 and 30 cents; mink, from 65 to 75c. I have often known the people to pay their taxes, when the collector came around, with fur skins, such as raccoon and fox. The collector would take the hides right at the house and give them a clear receipt for their taxes, both state and county. I have seen collectors leading a horse for the purpose of carrying his fur skins. I have seen the horse completely covered with fur skins, so you could see no part of him but his head and his hoofs and tail—one could not have told there was a horse beneath the load unless he had known it.
The people then had many advantages that they are deprived of now, in the way of wild meat, abundance of honey and fine range. A man could raise all the stock in the way of horses and cattle that he could possibly look after; the only expense was salting and caring for them—didn't have to feed, winter nor summer, except the horses in use and the cows used for milking purposes. While, on the other-hand, they labored under a great many disadvantages, in the way of schools and churches. During the residence of my father in the state of Illinois, we had a very good common school system, and we had three months of school every fall. My father being a farmer, sent me only the three months' term in the fall. I had acquired a limited education before his removal to Arkansas, yet he was interested in giving his children an education. At that time there were no free schools, only subscription schools; teachers generally were incompetent and employed through favoritism, and not upon their qualifications to teach. In a year or two after my father located, the settlement got together and located a school-house site, took their teams, hauled round logs, built them into walls, made a dirt floor, cut out a large window in the side, split a tree and made a writing desk, split small trees, hewed them and made benches for seats, cut a hole in one end of the house, erected a wooden chimney, what was then known as a stick and clay chimney, chinked and daubed the cracks, made a clapboard roof, hung the door with wooden hinges, then the house was considered ready for the school and had the name of teaching a three-months' subscription school; and very often half of the pupils were better scholars than the teachers. All they gained in their education was by attention to study. As the country improved in population, the people improved in the erection of school-houses and church-houses and constructed, in place of the round log school-house and dirt floor, hewed log school-houses with puncheon floors, stick and clay chimneys.
Those pioneer settlers took a great interest in each other's welfare, and the different settlements met together from a distance of 15 to 40 miles and adopted rules and customs binding each other to aid and assist in helping any person who met with any misfortune in the way of sickness, death or other causes that might occur, and I must say that there was more charity and real religion practiced among those pioneer settlers, although many of them were looked upon as being crude and unlettered. There was a great deal of sickness along the streams, especially chills and fever. Immigrants came in, generally in sufficient numbers to form a settlement; and I have known them, very often, after they had located and opened out 10 to 15 acres and put it in cultivation and broke the ground and planted their corn, for the whole family to be taken down at one time with chills and fever, not able even to help each other or administer to their wants. As soon as the information reached the other settlements for a distance of 15 miles or more, the different settlements would set a day to meet at the place with their horses, plows, hoes, wagons, etc.; also provisions, such as bread-stuff and salt. On meeting, they would ascertain the condition of the family or families and learn what they needed in the way of provision, medicine, nursing, etc.; they would then and there agree that the different settlements should divide up the time, set the day for each one to furnish waiters to wait upon them in their sickness, such medicine as they needed, provisions and everything that was necessary to render comfort, and in the morning before breakfast they would go out and kill a deer and as many turkeys as they needed, dress them, prepare them for the cook, who had been brought with them, go into the field after breakfast, plow and hoe the corn, clean out the garden, leave the families in charge of nurses and return again to their respective settlements. Those families, as soon as they were well, not being acquainted with the customs and rules, would meet them and inquire as to what amount they owed them for what they had done for them during their sickness. They would be readily informed, "Nothing. You are not acquainted with our rules and customs. Now, we have obligated and pledged ourselves together not to let any sick or other disabled person suffer for the want of necessary attention, and the only thing we require of you is, if any other person should move into the country and locate, and should be taken down and confined through sickness or any other cause, that you help in furnishing such aid and necessaries as they may need until they are able to again take care of themselves." Now, I have just remarked that there was more real charity and religion practiced among pioneers than there is in the present day. The people then all appeared to be interested in bettering the condition of society.
As soon as it was possible, the different settlements erected church-houses built of hewed timber, floored with puncheons, hewed seats, size of house generally from 18 by 20 to 22 by 25 feet, chinked and daubed. The churches or denominations then were Baptists and Methodists. There didn't appear to be any antagonism or hatred existing between the denominations; the doors were thrown wide open for any minister that might travel through and they all turned out, and you heard nothing said then in regard to "my church" or "your church." They appeared to recognize the fact that it was the Lord's church and that they were the Lord's people. In going to church, sometimes from 1 to 10 miles, they would see flocks of turkeys and herds of wild deer, both going and coming. As soon as the crops were laid by, they would agree among the different settlements as to where a camp-meeting should be held; they would then erect camps or huts, make boards to cover them, erect an arbor, fill the center of it with