character of the eighteenth century which ultimately blended to
create a typical democracy. The rolling of wave after wave of
settlement westward across the American continent, with a
reversion to primitive conditions along the line of the farthest
frontier, and a marked rise in the scale of civilization at each
successive stage of settlement, from the western limit to the
eastern coast, exemplifies from one aspect the history of the
American people during two centuries. This era, constituting the
first stage in our national existence, and productive of a
buoyant national character shaped in democracy upon a free soil,
closed only yesterday with the exhaustion of cultivable free
land, the disappearance of the last frontier, and the recent
death of "Buffalo Bill". The splendid inauguration of the period,
in the region of the Carolinas, Virginia, Tennessee, and
Kentucky, during the second half of the eighteenth century, is
the theme of this story of the pioneers of the Old Southwest.


CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

I THE MIGRATION OF THE PEOPLES

II THE CRADLE OF WESTWARD EXPANSION

III THE BACK COUNTRY AND THE BORDER

IV THE INDIAN WAR