Beadle's Dime Novels No. 35: East and West — page 7: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A SQUATTER’S CABIN. 7 three—let’s play for Willard’s Mill. If you and your partner win, we'll give the old fellow a fair chance—if I and my part- ner win, we'll take the mill without consulting the owner.” A pack of cards, like a drink of whisky, are always at hand in a new western town; the four men drew their chairs, to- “gether, with a shingle between them for a table; others gath- ered about to watch the progress of the game, tlie stake of which belonged to neither party—and so they played for the fate of Willard’s Mill. The fate of the mill! There were human destinies locked _ up in its fortunes, and the gamesters played the game of life and death, in their carousal on that dark night. CHAPTER II. THE FAWN’S COVERT. THERE is no romance about a squatter’s cabin, whatever story-writers may have taken the liberty to say to the con- Here is a picture of one, which may stand as 4 sample for thousands of others. A square log-hut, with a door in the middle of one side, a single sash of window in the opposite wall, a large open fire-place at one end. Facing this, in the inte- rior, will stand the bed or beds of the family. Usually, in a corner near the fire-place is standing a ladder, with its upper end reaching up through a square hole in the floor of the “ loft,” which is simply the narrow space between the * joists” and the roof, and is floored with loose boards. Whatever of the family effects can not be hung on pegs or hooks fastened into the joists underneath, or stored away in chests shoved “under the beds, are consigned to this “loft”—even an occa- sional visitor. Quite frequently there is a shed or “ lean-to” built on to that end of the house opposite the chimney, a3 a receptacle for barrels of meat, flour, corn, stores of vegetables, et cetera. Some insignificant out-houses, of a size and pattern corresponding with the family residence, are scattered about comiclooks.coihn