Yance Caywood longed to go hunting, but he didn't even dream of buffalo. To catch one was something a man could be proud of, but Tennessee in the year 1810 was certainly not the place to do it. The great herds that had roamed there had moved west, and few, if any, stragglers remained. Instead of buffalo, Yance would settle for a deer, or even a squirrel.

Ever since Pa had died, Yance's older brother Pleas had done the plowing and hunting, and Yance had been confined to fetching and carrying for Ma. Here he was, eleven years old and tied to his mother's apron strings like a young'un, though he could shoot as well as any man. He was willing to do his share of the work, but nevertheless the feeling of rancor grew big inside him. The buffalo tracks were found on the mountain, and at Pleas's urging Yance was allowed to go with the hunting party, taking along his hound dog Blue.

William Steele tells of Yance's ordeal with remarkable understanding of a boy's yearning to take a man's part, and with vivid sense of the early settlers' continual struggle for survival in wild and untamed country.