"Wait until you learn what
frontier life means. You are young here yet; you are flushed with
the success of your teaching; you have lived a short time in this
quiet village, where, until the last few days, all has been serene.
You know nothing of the strife, of the necessity of fighting, of the
cruelty which makes up this border existence. Only two years have
hardened me so that I actually pant for the blood of the renegade
who has robbed me. A frontiersman must take his choice of succumbing
or cutting his way through flesh and bone. Blood will be spilled; if
not yours, then your foe's. The pioneers run from the plow to the
fight; they halt in the cutting of corn to defend themselves, and in
winter must battle against cold and hardship, which would be less
cruel if there was time in summer to prepare for winter, for the
savages leave them hardly an opportunity to plant crops. How many
pioneers have given up, and gone back east? Find me any who would
not return home to-morrow, if they could. All that brings them out
here is the chance for a home, and all that keeps them out here is
the poor hope of finally attaining their object. Always there is a
possibility of future prosperity. But this generation, if it
survives, will never see prosperity and happiness. What does this
border life engender in a pioneer who holds his own in it? Of all
things, not Christianity.
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