CATHOLIC MISSION

ELM GROVE.

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sixty miles, attended monthly from this mission. The Catholic population of this district is reported to be between six hundred and seven hundred, and that of the upper country at three thousand. Attached to this mission is a Manual Labor School for boys, under the direction of the Fathers, assisted by the Rev. Theodore Heiman and eight lay brothers, who attend to the farm, gardens and household business. During the past year, thirty-nine Osage boys were admitted, of whom thirty-four were in constant attendance. The school lately received an important accession by the United States government's transferring, in April, 1853, the Quapaw school to this. Of the Quapaw children, eighteen attend at the male department. The latter is under the care of the Sisters of Loretto, eight in number, formerly from Kentucky, Mother Concordia, Superior. The number of girls during the year ending Sept. 1, 1853, was thirty-two, and twenty-four of these attended constantly. The girls have improved very rapidly, and are daily instructed in household business, fine sewing, working on lace and embroidery, painting in oil and water colors, etc.

ELM GROVE, or ROUND GROVE, is a noted campingplace on the Santa Fé road, twenty-five miles from Westport, Mo., in lat. 38° 49′ 41′′ N., and lon. 94° 25′ 31" W. Col. Fremont encamped here May 31, 1843, at the commencement of his second expedition. Traders often locate here, for a season, in the prosecution of their business.

COUNCIL GROVE, a noted stopping-place on the great thoroughfare to Santa Fé, contains some half dozen trading houses, a missionary establishment and school, two blacksmiths' shops, etc.

CHAPTER VI.

Routes of travel - The Pacific railroad-Navigable rivers.

THE territory of Kanzas, from its position, is the great geographical centre of the internal commerce of the United States.

The only overland routes from the Atlantic to the Pacific, which have thus far accommodated emigrants or merchants, either pass through its borders, or along the Missouri river to the valley of the Nebraska, thus passing along on its eastern side.

A southern route through Texas, and another through Arkansas, have been explored, without thus far attracting the travel of any but explorers.

Of the routes really used, the great emigrant track, through the "South Pass," to Oregon and California, is by far the most important.

It must be understood that the "South Pass" is so called only because it is south of the passes of the upper valley of the Missouri, explored by Lewis and Clarke.

It

is more northerly than the pass proposed by Col. Fremont for a railroad, near the line of New Mexico.

The travel along the great emigrant road is equal to that on a considerable turnpike at the east. Settlers leave the river at different places, according as they choose different towns for an outfit. From Independence, Westport, Kanzas City, Weston, St. Mary's, St. Joseph's, and other towns in Missouri and Iowa, are different roads, therefore, leading west or north-west to the valley of the Nebraska, along which is the proper emigrant road. Those of these tracks which pass Fort Leavenworth are accommodated by the military road which the government has completed between that fort and Fort Kearney.

This road, called the "New Military Road," was constructed in 1850, by the government, which caused it to be surveyed, improved and bridged, and, having since kept it in good repair, it is called the best of the emigrant routes, being high, level, dry, with fine grass and convenient water. The old military road, into which the road from St. Joseph enters, was abandoned on account of the large streams, swamps, barrens and hills, and its general crookedness.

At Fort Kearney all these roads-unite, and there is from that place but one road up the valley. Blacksmith shops and ferries are established along this road for the accommodation of travellers.

The great Santa Fé route has been for many years followed by the overland traders to New Mexico. Its history

ROUTES THROUGH KANZAS.

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will be found fully described in Mr. Gregg's "Commerce of the Prairies." It follows, for a short distance, the Kanzas valley, crosses the "divide" to the great bend of the Arkansas, and by that valley proceeds westward to New Mexico. By this route Gen. Kearney's command advanced in 1846. Leaving the Arkansas river at Bent's Fort and soon turning southwards, it keeps along the east flank of the "Spanish Peaks" until a little south of Santa Fé, when, by a series of passes, it crosses into the valley of the Del Norte.

These two great lines of travel are the only two which are used in general by settlers or merchants passing overland to the west. It is by some modification of the one or the other that almost all the projects for a Pacific railroad propose to cross the continent.

In view, however, of the fact that the Missouri river itself gives, far north, the nearest navigable access to the Rocky Mountains, Gov. Stevens, the governor of the territory of Washington, was directed last year to survey the mountains in the neighborhood of the head waters of that stream, with reference to a route for travel through some of their passes.

Meanwhile, since the annexation of New Mexico, several methods of passing the mountains to the north of Santa Fé have been suggested, one of which is that adopted by Col. Fremont in his project for a Pacific railroad.

The following general sketch of the country, through which the various routes to the Pacific must pass, is from