The idea of becoming a substantial farmer, with broad acres covered with grain and fields alive with stock, soon became predominant in his mind, and he talked of little else at home or abroad.

His wife said nothing, but she thought almost as much on the subject as did her husband.

At length Benjamin Parker determined that he would remove to Northern Indiana, more than a thousand miles away, upon a farm of five hundred acres, that was offered to him at two dollars and a half an acre.

It was government land that had been taken up a year or two before, and slightly improved by the erection of a log hut and the clearing of a few acres, and now sold at one hundred per cent.advance.Instead of first visiting the West and seeing the location of the land that was offered to him, Parker was willing to believe all that was said of its excellence and admirable location, and weak enough to invest in it more than half of all he was worth.
The store at Fairview was sold out, and Mrs.Parker permitted to spend a week with her sisters before parting with them, perhaps, forever.

When the final moment of separation came it seemed to her like a death-parting.