The Pioneers (The World's Classics) by James Fenimore Cooper

The character of Natty Bumppo here makes his first appearance in print as an older man, who has witnessed the coming of civilization to the wilderness. The story takes place in upper New York State ... The central conflict in the book concerns the opposition between the laws of nature, upheld by Natty, and the laws of civilization. Symbolic of this opposition are two incidents: in the first, Natty kills a deer for food, in Indian fashion. The white settlement seeks to punish him for failing to respect the seasonal hunting laws it has established. On the other hand, there is the wholesale slaughter of pigeons by the civilized inhabitants of ... [the town] with no purpose but sport ... [in the end, Natty] heads for the far West to escape confining civilization.