30th. Left our camping ground and traveled 14 miles to St. Joseph.
Weather very cold and windy--no grass nor hay. We have traveled 200
miles without grass or hay, but have cut dry prairie grass where we
could find it. Camped in a ravine half a mile north of St. Joseph. St.
Joseph is quite a village, and doing a great deal of business at this
time. But the way they fleece California emigrants is worth noticing. I
should advise all going the overland route to take every thing along
with them that they can of small weight, as every little thing costs
three or four times as much here as at home. The markets are filled
with broken down horses jockeyed up for the occasion, and unbroken
mules, which they assure you are handy as sheep. It is the greatest
place for gambling, and all other rascality that I was ever in. We have
to stand guard over our horses as much as if we were in the Indian
country. It is said that one or two men have been shot by the emigrants
while in the act of stealing horses. Here let me before leaving the
State of Missouri say one word in relation to the country. We traveled
about one hundred and eighty miles through the north-west part of the
State which is mostly unsettled. We found the country the best I had
ever seen in the great Mississippi Valley, and I had seen a great share
of it. It is a perfect paradise for the agriculturist, the manufacturer
and the hunter. The soil is warm and fertile, the wild prairie grass
growing as high as a man's waist on the uplands. An abundance of good
timber skirts the streams. The land is rolling, approaching the hilly,
and well watered by rivers, brooks, and springs of pure clear water,
running over gravelly or rocky beds in clear banks, free from sloughs
or marshes. The streams furnish an abundance of the best water power
suitable for driving all kinds of machinery. The prairies and woods are
filled with abundance of deer, wild turkeys and other game, and of wild
honey. The river bottoms are covered with endless quantities of plums,
sweet grapes, and various other wild fruits in the greatest abundance.
Nature has seemed to lavish her best gifts on this country in the
greatest profusion; yet with all it remains a wilderness, only
inhabited by a few straggling squatters whose whole aim is to raise
what corn and bacon they can consume, and kill a sufficiency of game to
supply their daily wants. Why is it so? Is it because it is one or 200
miles back from the Mississippi? This cannot be the reason, for
thousands are now emigrating farther back into the wilds of Minesota.
Is it not owing to, and one of the fruits of, the blighting curse of
slavery?--the driving of free men of the northern states to emigrate to
more uncongenial soil and climate, rather than settle in a slave state.
This is a question which all Missourians who love their State should
investigate. The west, and north-west part of Missouri is capable of
supporting a population larger than the whole present population of the
State. It is a country superior in soil, climate, water, timber and
other natural advantages, to any portion of the great Mississippi
Valley, yet it is unsettled, and apparently will be for a long time,
the current of emigration being turned into Iowa, Minesota and
Wisconsin, simply because men raised in free states do not like the
idea of settling in slave states. Would it not be better for Missouri
to abolish slavery, and thereby cause her millions of acres of rich
lands to be settled by intelligent farmers, with villages springing up
on every water course, than to retain her few thousands of slaves, the
profit of which to the owner is really questionable? But I do not
intend to write a lecture on slavery, but these thoughts would intrude
themselves upon me as I was traveling through this beautiful wilderness
country; for I can say with the greatest sincerity that I know of no
part of the world that it is so desirable to locate in as this, but
with this objection the country never will be settled densely, for the
simple reason that emigrants from the South prefer going to a more
southern climate, where their negroes can be made more profitable
raising cotton and sugar, to going into the west part of Missouri, and
emigrants from the North object to settling in a slave state.
May 1st. Remained encamped as before. Weather more moderate but too
cold for grass to grow.
2d. Remain camped as before. Sent down the river five miles and got 30
bushels of corn in the ear at 90 cents per bushel; bought 11 bushels of
shelled corn at the camp for one dollar per bushel, which we got ground
into meal. Commenced raining in the afternoon, and rained all night; we
had a very disagreeable time of it.
3d. Got our stores mostly on board and crossed the Missouri, and drove
six miles to the Bluffs, and camped. We found the whole six miles a
camping ground, and a good sized city of tents at the Bluffs, probably
six thousand men. Weather still cold.