Thus was made "the new
West," "the great West," which was pushed ever onward, and endured along
each successive frontier for about a generation. An eternal movement, a
tireless coming and going, pervaded these men; they passed hither and
thither without pause, phantasmagorically; they seemed to be forever
"moving on," some because they were real pioneers and natural rovers,
others because they were mere vagrants generally drifting away from
creditors, others because the better chance seemed ever in the newer
place, and all because they had struck no roots, gathered no
associations, no home ties, no local belongings. The shopkeeper "moved
on" when his notes became too pressing; the schoolmaster, after a short
stay, left his school to some successor whose accomplishments could
hardly be less than his own; clergymen ranged vaguely through the
country, to preach, to pray, to bury, to marry, as the case might be;
farmers heard of a more fruitful soil, and went to seek it. Men
certainly had at times to work hard in order to live at all, yet it was
perfectly possible for the natural idler to rove, to loaf, and to be
shiftless at intervals, and to become as demoralized as the tramp for
whom a shirt and trousers are the sum of worldly possessions. Books were
scarce; many teachers hardly had as much book-learning as lads of
thirteen years now have among ourselves. Men who could neither read nor
write abounded, and a deficiency so common could hardly imply much
disgrace or a marked inferiority; many learned these difficult arts only
in mature years.
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