Justice, or rather judgments, are a common article of traffic; and the hapless litigant who has not the means to soften the claws of the alcalde with a "silver unction" is almost sure to get severely scratched in the contest, no matter what may be the justice of his cause, or the uprightness of his character. . . .

The evil consequences arising from mal-administration of justice in New Mexico are most severely felt by foreigners, against whom a strong prejudice exists throughout the South. Of these, the citizens of the United States are by far the most constant sufferers; an inevitable result of that sinister feeling with which the "rival republic views the advancement and superiority of her more industrious neighbors. It is a notorious fact that while the English are universally treated with comparative consideration. and respect, the Americans residing in the southern parts of the republic are frequently taunted with the effeminacy of their government and its want of decision. . . .

Few men, perhaps, have done more to jeopard the interests of American traders, or to bring the American character itself into contempt than Armijo, the present arbitrary governor of New Mexico. .

...

With a view of oppressing our merchants, Gov. Armijo had, as early as 1839, issued a decree exempting all.the natives from the tax imposed on storehouses, shops, etc., throwing the whole burden of imposts upon foreigners and naturalized citizens; a measure clearly, and unequivocally at variance with the treaties and stipulations entered into between the United States and Mexico. A protest was presented without effect; when our consul, finding all remonstrances useless, forwarded a memorial to the American Minister at Mexico, who, although the vital interests of American citizens were at stake, deemed the affair of too little importance, perhaps, and therefore appears to have paid no attention to it. But this system of levying excessive taxes upon foreigners, is by no means an original invention of Governor Armijo. In 1835, the

government of Chihuahua having levied a contribucion de guerra for raising means to make war on the savages, who were laying waste the surrounding country, foreign merchants, with an equal disregard for their rights and the obligations of treaties, were taxed twenty-five dollars each per month while the native merchants, many of whom possessed large haciendas, with thousands of stock, for the especial protection of which these taxes were chiefly imposed, paid only from five to ten dollars each. Remonstrances were presented to the governor, but in vain. In his official reply, that functionary declared, "Que el gobierno cree arreglado el reparto de sus respectivas contribuciones" (the government believes your respective contributions in accordance with justice); which concluded the correspondence and the Americans paid their twenty-five dollars per month.

J. Gregg: Commerce of the Prairies. H. G. Langley, New York, 1844. Vol. I, pp. 32-39, 44-46, 62, 91-93, 109114, 226-7, 232.

QUESTIONS

What made Independence a valuable gateway to the Far West? How did the Santa Fé caravans organize for the passage of the desert? What dangers in the passage of the desert does the story of Captain Smith suggest? Describe the appearance of the town of Santa Fé. What were the Mexican customs duties? How strictly were they enforced? How did officials connive at their evasion? How did corrupt and arbitrary officials annoy American traders? Do you know whether anything of this attitude of Mexicans toward Americans survives in Mexico to-day? What complaints does Gregg make with regard to the laxness with which American officials maintained the rights of American citizens? Would this suggest to you that the attitude of the United States toward Mexico in 1846 was one of wholly unjustified aggression? What sort of goods were in demand in Santa Fé?

XXXI

THE OREGON TRAIL

In 1846, Francis Parkman, better known as the great historian of New France, made a journey along the "Oregon Trail” as a young man in search of adventure. The book recounting his experiences is a valuable record of the life and scenes in the Far West in the days when emigrants, led by the accounts of marvelously fertile lands in the Columbia Valley, were passing over the desolate Great Plains and the Rockies; when the Mormons, driven out of the settled States of the Mississippi Valley were beginning the westward movement that was to take them to Great Salt Lake. Independence, as we have seen in a previous selection, was the headquarters of the Santa Fé trade, which had been going on for some years, as well as of the emigrants just beginning to push over the Rockies in considerable numbers.

Last spring, 1846, was a busy season in the City of St. Louis. Not only were emigrants from every part of the country preparing for the journey to Oregon and California, but an unusual number of traders were making ready their wagons and outfits for Santa Fé. The hotels. were crowded, and the gunsmiths and saddlers were kept constantly at work in providing arms and equipments for the different parties of travellers. Steamboats were leaving the levee and passing up the Missouri, crowded with passengers on their way to the frontier.

In one of these, the Radnor, since snagged and lost, my friend and relative, Quincy Adams Shaw, and myself, left St. Louis on the 28th of April, on a tour of curiosity and amusement to the Rocky Mountains. The boat was loaded until the water broke alternately over her guards. Her upper deck was covered with large wagons of a peculiar form, for the Santa Fé trade, and her hold was crammed with goods for the same destination. There was also the equipments and provisions of a party of Oregon emigrants,

a band of mules and horses, piles of saddles and harness, and a multitude of nondescript articles, indispensable on the prairies..

The passengers on board the Radnor corresponded with her freight. In her cabin were Santa Fé traders, gamblers, speculators, and adventurers of various descriptions, and her steerage was crowded with Oregon emigrants, "mountain men, 1 negroes, and a party of Kanzas Indians who had been on a visit to St. Louis.

Thus laden the boat struggled upward for seven or eight days against the rapid current of the Missouri, grating upon snags, and hanging for two or three hours at a time upon sand-bars. We entered the mouth of the Missouri in a drizzling rain, but the weather soon became clear, and showed distinctly the broad and turbid river, with its eddies, its sand-bars, its ragged islands and forest-covered shores. The Missouri is constantly changing its course; wearing away its banks on one side, while it forms new ones on the other. Its channel is continually shifting. Islands are formed and then washed away, and while the old forests on one side are undermined and swept off, a young growth springs up from the new soil upon the other. With all these changes, the water is so charged with mud and sand that, in spring, it is perfectly opaque, and in a few minutes deposits a sediment an inch thick in the bottom of a tumbler. The river was now high; but when we descended in the autumn it was fallen very low, and all the secrets of its treacherous shallows were exposed to view. It was frightful to see the dead and broken trees, thick-set as a military abattis, firmly imbedded in the sand, and all pointing down stream, ready to impale any unhappy steamboat that at high water should pass over them.

In five or six days we began to see signs of the great western movement that was taking place. Parties of emigrants with their tents and wagons were encamped on open

1 Trappers and fur traders of the Rocky Mountains.

spots near the bank, on their way to the common rendezvous at Independence. On a rainy day near sunset, we reached the landing of this place, which is some miles from the river, on the extreme frontier of Missouri. The scene was characteristic, for here were represented at one view the most remarkable features of this wild and enterprising region. On the muddy shore stood some thirty or forty dark slavish-looking Spaniards, gazing stupidly out from beneath their broad hats. They were attached to one of the Santa Fé companies, whose wagons were crowded together upon the banks above. In the midst of these crouching over a smoldering fire, was a group of Indians belonging to a remote Mexican tribe. One or two French hunters from the mountains, with their long hair and buckskin dresses, were looking at the boat; and seated on a log close at hand were three men with rifles lying across their knees. The foremost of these, a strong, tall figure with a clear, blue eye, and an open, intelligent face, might very well represent that race of restless and intrepid pioneers whose axes and rifles have opened a path from the Alleghanies to the western prairies. He was on his way to Oregon, probably a more congenial field to him than any that now remained on this side of the great plains.

Early on the next morning we reached Kanzas, about five hundred miles from the mouth of the Missouri. Here we landed, and, leaving our equipments in charge of Colonel Chick, whose log house was the substitute for a tavern, we set out in a wagon for Westport, where we hoped to procure mules and horses for the journey.

It was a remarkably fresh and beautiful May morning. The woods, through which the miserable road conducted us, were lighted by the bright sunshine and enlivened by a multitude of birds. We overtook on the way our late fellow travellers, the Kanzas Indians, who, adorned with all their finery, were proceeding homeward at a round pace; 2 See note on the previous selection.