Henry Rowe Schoolcraft Book

An important historical event in this region was the tour of Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, an historian and explorer who, in 1818 and 1819 at the age of twenty-five, visited this region to study its features and its occupants. He wrote one of his books in 1853.Scboolcraft found these early white settlers, in the main, were not interested in agricultural pursuits. They cleared out and cultivated only an acre or so of land and grew corn for the family and the horses, and a few vegetables for family use, but hunting and trapping were their main interests. He said that when hunting season arrived, their ordinary labors even in the cornfield fell upon their wives and that "the inhabitants pursue a similar course of life to that of the savages whose love of ease the settlers generally embraced." Among other settlers,Schoolcraft and his party visited Yocum who fed them roast beaver tails. Any impression that all the white settlers in these times were interested only in a life of ease comparable to the Indians in this region would be erroneous. Many other whites, including other Yocums, and Joseph Philibert, a Frenchman, went seriously into agricultural pursuits and the establishment of permanent homes, although in the process of doing so they were obligated to obtain much of their subsistence from the abundant wild life until their agricultural efforts were adequate for support. Such white settlers formed the nucleus of the permanent colonization 

From http://trees.ancestry.com/tree/53261165/person/13770600343/story/2?pg=32817&pgpl=pid

As the shades of night overtook us, a hunter's cabin was descried on the left shore, where a landing was made.  It proved to be occupied by a person of the name of Yochem, who readily gave us permission to remain for the night,  He regaled us hospitably with wild viand, and among other meats, the beaver's tail --  a dish for epicures. 

Scenes and adventures in the semi-alpine region of the Ozark Mountains of Missouri and Arkansas

 by Henry Rowe Schoolcraft  from his journey of 1820