This beautiful city now covers that "Section of land opposite Rock
Island" that was donated by treaty to Antoine LeClair by the Sacs and
Foxes, and also three or four more sections. At that time it was wholly
uninhabited, the Foxes having removed their village from that point
some three years before. As a town site it was regarded by strangers and
travelers on steamboats as the most beautiful west of the Mississippi
between St. Louis and St. Paul, and now, with its twenty-three thousand
inhabitants, elegant residences, magnificent public buildings, fine
churches, schoolhouses, extensive manufactories, and large business
blocks, it Stands unrivalled as a beautiful city. It has ten miles of
street railroads, affording easy access to all parts of the city. It has
two daily papers, the _Gazette_ and _Democrat_, (morning and evening)
both ably conducted; and also a German daily and two weeklies. The river
is spanned by an elegant bridge that was built at the cost of nearly
a million dollars, which is used by the various railroads from East to
West, and has a roadway for teams and pedestrians.