The Oak Openings Or The Bee Hunter

Reproduction of the original: Oak Openings by James Fenimore Cooper

One of his lesser known works, Oak Openings or The Bee Hunter is one of Cooper's last novels. The book opens with the meeting of four men, Elksfoot, Pigeonswing, Benjamin Boden, and Gershom Waring. Boden is a bee-hunter, who searches for natural bee hives and harvests the honey. Waring is a down-on-his-luck alcohol trader. And the lives of the two Indians are a source of intrigue. As the four settle into Boden's house for dinner and conversation, they begin talking about the politics of the day, including the impending war between the Americans and the British. The men part ways in the morning, but murder and danger soon follow them all. Elksfoot turns up dead, and Boden and Waring must escape a deadly band of Pottawattamie Indians. Along the way, they pick up new travelers, all trying to find a way out of Pottawattamie territory and certain death. Anyone with an interest in frontier fiction will enjoy this classic book from one of America's most renowned authors. Popular American novelist JAMES FENIMORE COOPER (1789-1851) is best remembered for his 1826 epic The Last of the Mohicans, considered his masterpiece.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1860.

There is nothing imaginary in the fertility of the West. Personal observation has satisfied us that it much surpasses anything that exists in the Atlantic States, unless in exceptions, through the agency of great care and high manuring, or in instances of peculiar natural soil. In these times, men almost fly. We have passed over a thousand miles of territory within the last few days, and have brought the pictures at the two extremes of this journey in close proximity in our mind's eye. Time may lessen that wonderful fertility, and bring the whole country more on a level; but there it now is, a glorious gift from God, which it is devoutly to be wished may be accepted with due gratitude and with a constant recollection of his unwavering rules of right and wrong, by those who have been selected to enjoy it.