Boone took long hunting excursions toward the West, though nothing is known with exact certainty as to the date when he began them. The Cherokee war which had caused much trouble along the Carolina frontier was ended, and he and others must have turned their thoughts many a time to the boundless forests which stretched for hundreds and thousands of miles towards the setting sun, in which roamed countless multitudes of wild animals and still wilder beings, who were ready to dispute every foot of advance made by the white settlers.
Such a vast field could not but possess an irresistible attraction to a consummate hunter like Boone, and the glimpses which the North Carolina woods gave of the possibilities awaiting him, and the growth of empire in the West, were sure to produce the result that came when he had been married some fifteen or more years and was in the prime of life.
Previous to this date, the well known abundance of game in Tennessee led many hunters to make incursions into the territory. They sometimes formed large companies, uniting for the prospect of gain and greater protection against the ever-present danger from Indians.
It is mentioned by good authority, that among the parties thus venturing over the Carolina border into the wilderness, was one at the head of which was "Daniel Boone from the Yadkin, in North Carolina, who traveled with them as low as the place where Abingdon now stands, and there left them."
Some years ago the following description could be deciphered upon an old beech-tree standing between Jonesboro and Blountsville:
D. BOON
CILLED A. BAR ON
IN THE TREE
YEAR 1760.
This inscription is generally considered as proof that Boone made hunting excursions to that region at that early date, though the evidence can hardly be accepted as positive on the point.
It was scarcely a year after the date named, however, that Boone, who was still living on the Yadkin, entered the same section of the country, having been sent thither by Henderson & Company for the purposes of exploration. He was accompanied by Samuel Callaway, a relative, and the ancestor of many of the Callaways of Tennessee, Kentucky, and Missouri. The latter was at the side of Boone when, approaching a spur of the Cumberland mountains, upon whose slopes they saw multitudes of bisons grazing, the great pioneer paused, and surveying the scene for a moment, exclaimed, with kindling eyes:
"I am richer than He who owned the cattle on a thousand hills, for I own the wild beasts of a thousand valleys."
The sight was indeed one which might have stirred the heart of a hunter who could grasp the possibilities of the future of those favored regions.
Daniel Boone may be considered as having undergone a preliminary training from his earliest boyhood for the work which has identified his name indissolubly with the history of Kentucky. He was what may be called a born pioneer, but there were causes at work in North Carolina which led to his departure for the Kentucky wilderness, of which the general reader is apt to lose sight in studying his character.
The approach of the American Revolution in the former State, as in many others, was marked by social disturbances frequently amounting to anarchy. There were many Scotch traders, who had accumulated considerable wealth without having gone through the labor and perils which the natives underwent in providing for their families.
These foreigners adopted an expensive and showy style of living, altogether out of keeping with the severe simplicity that marked that of the colonists.
Nothing was more natural than that this assumption of superiority in the way of social position should roil and excite resentment among those less favored by fortune.
They were not alone in this offensive course: the officers and agents of the Royal Government were equally ostentatious in display and manner of living, and the exasperating snobbishness spread to the magistrates, lawyers, clerks of court, and tax gatherers, who demanded exorbitant fees for their services. The clergymen of the Established Church became oppressive in their exactions, and, as we have stated, society itself was threatened with revolution before the rattle of musketry at Bunker Hill "was heard around the world."
Petitions were sent to the Legislature for relief by the suffering citizens, who were in much the same distressing situation in which Ireland has been many a time since. These prayers were treated with indifference or open contempt, for there are none more reckless and blind than those who are traveling close to the edge of the political volcano rumbling at their feet.
There is a limit beyond which it is always dangerous to tempt the endurance of a people, who now began meeting together, and formed themselves into associations for correcting the evils around them. It was these people who received the name of "Regulators," and who helped to increase the disturbances in that particular section of the country. They deliberately decided "to pay only such taxes as were agreeable to law, and applied to the purpose therein named, and to pay no officer more than his legal fees."
The history of the State records many acts of violence which were inevitable from this condition of affairs. The final collision between the "Regulators" and a strong force of the royal governor Tryon at Alamanance, in which the rebels were badly defeated, occurred in May, 1771, but the disturbances continued with more or less violence until the breaking out of the Revolution, when the mills of God ground so "exceeding fine," that the grievances were removed forever.
It was in such a community as this that Daniel Boone lived, and he and his family were sufferers. What more natural than that he should cast his eyes longingly toward the West, where, though there might be wild beasts and wild men, he and his loved ones could be free from the exasperating annoyances which were all around them?
The perils from Indians were much less alarming to them than were those of the tax-gatherer. Indeed, in all probability, it lent an additional attractiveness to the vast expanse of virgin wilderness, with its splashing streams, its rich soil, its abundance of game and all that is so enchanting to the real sportsman, who finds an additional charm in the knowledge that the pleasure upon which he proposes to enter is spiced with personal danger.
One day a visitor dropped in upon Boone. He was John Finley, who led a party of hunters to the region adjoining the Louisa River in Kentucky in the winter of 1767, where they spent the season in hunting and trapping. The hunter called upon Boone to tell him about that land in which he knew his friend was so much interested.
We can imagine the young man, with his rifle suspended on the deer-prongs over the fire, with his wife busy about her household duties and his children at play, sitting in his cabin and listening to the glowing narrative of one who knew whereof he was speaking.
Finley told him of the innumerable game, the deer and bison, the myriads of wild turkeys, and everything so highly prized by the sportsman; he pictured the vast stretches of forest in which the hunter could wander for hours and days without striking a clearing; of the numerous streams, some large, some small, and all lovely to the eye, and it needed no very far-seeing vision to forecast the magnificent future which lay before this highly favored region.
It must have been a winsome picture drawn by Finley – aided as it was by the repelling coloring of the scene of his actual surroundings – made so hateful by the oppressive agents of the foreign government which claimed the colonies as her own.
When Finley was through, and he had answered all of his friend's questions, and told him of his many hunting adventures in Kentucky, Boone announced that he would go with him when he should make his next visit. He had already been drawn strongly toward the region, and he wished to see with his own eyes the favored land, before removing his family thither.
The acquisition of such a person was so desirable, that he was sure to be appreciated by those who knew him best, and whether appointed to that position or not, his own matchless resources and natural powers were certain to fix upon him as the leader of the adventurous characters who had decided to explore the dangerous