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Show 144 EMIGRANT'S GUIDE .. St. Ferdinand stands upon a rising ground near a fine brook of deaf water. fourteen miles northwest of St. Louis. The lands adjacent, particularly the prairies, are extremely fertile. The lanus in the entire district of St. Louis are mor~ fertile, and }ess broken, than are those of St. Genevieve. Between the Merrimack and St. Loui. the banks of the Mis ·issippi are high and rocky : a short distance auove St. Louis an alluvial bottom commences, which extends above the mouth of the Mi souri. Upon both rivers the bottoms are extensive, level, and fertile soil, covered wrth large timber. Prairies are extensive near both St. Louis and St. Ferdinanu ; tlJat near the latter is twelve miles long and two wide. Extensive s ettle~ mcnts are made upon its border. It lies nearly parallel to tiH! Mis· souri, and from one to two miles from that stream. '"rhe settlements made on this prairie are similar to those formeJ in like places in other parts of Louisiana and Missouri. The pl::mtations are extended into both the prairie and woodland, embraci11g a due proportion of each. The farms are many of them large and well cultivated, ami their proprietors wealthy. The settlements are every where eKtending: the fertility of the lands, and the hea1th enjoyed by the inhabitants, contribute to gi.,·e unusual property to the country near St. Louis. . The richness and variety of its mineral and vegetable productions; Its lead, !>alt, flour, beef, pork, flax, and hemp, afford inexhaustible sources of wealth, and secures to this country a rank amongst the most eligible spots in the United States. The population of this district, in 1804, amounted to about two thousand eight hundred persons ; by the census of 1810, the inhabi· tants were five thousand six hundred and sixty-seven. The population is, no doubt, now ( 1817) nearly, or altogether double the latter number. Attached to. St. Louis, is the flourishing settlement of St. Andrew's, hyen.ty-five mtle? southwest of that town. Like all other parts of tbe d1stnct, the l~nds of St. Andrew's exhibit a mixture of prairie and woodland; htll, dale, aad soil, every where fertile. The farms are large and skilfully conducted. . ~h~ timber of the district of St. Louis, except pine and cypress, IS stmtlar to that of St. Genevieve: its exports have been mentioned. . ST · CJ:lAR~E~' district occupies the peninsula between Mis issip· P~ a?d M1ssoun nvers ; the settlements extending along both. This d1stnct may b~ termed an expanse of soil, unexcelled perhaps on earth. Exclusive of the two great rivers which bound the district on theN. E. and S. W. sides, it is intersected with a number of smaller streams,. atfor~ing partial inlanu navigation and mill-seats. The co.untry Is rollmg but not mountainous ; the soil is Jeep and strong. Timber and good and wholesome water are abunuaut. The prairie lands along the Mis~issippi are 1he only exceptions where these advantages ~re not enjoyed by the inhabitants. sm Extenst~e bottor~s are fouuJ ski:ting ~ll the large and many of the aller slle~~ns. fhose on the M1ssoun are clothed with wooJ, and but. r~rel.y mundated. .Commencing at the mouth of the Missouri a pra1ne hes along the nght shore of the l\1ississippi, which extenJs '~xty-five or seventy miles in len~th, from one to ten miles wide. The settlf'!ments are formed along the margin. The soil is extremely fer· tile, t~nd yields an ample production to the farmers. St. Charles' village stands upoR the left shore of the Missouri, twenty- follr miles above its mouth, and is remarkable as being the most western town yet built in that part of the United States. This town was tounded in 1780, and lies along the bank of the river about a mile in one continuous sheet, contain in~ at this time about tw() huP dred houses, and one thousand or twelve hundred people. Portage des Scioux is a village on the right bauk of the Missis~ippi, .six miles above the .Missouri. This village is small but increasing ; it c.ontain~ about fifty houses, and between one hundred and fifty to two hundred inhabitants. The timber and productions of St. Charles does not materially differ from those of St. Louis ; but the superficies of arable soil in the former is certainly greater, on an equal area, than in the latter. Like the adjacent districts, St. Charles produces lead and salt. Some of the richest mines of the latter, yet known in the country, is in this district. The salt springs are found principally upon the waters of the Missouri. The population of this· district was, in Jt)04, estimated at about one· thousand five hundred persons ; in 1810 they were found augmented to upwards of three thousand five hundred, aud are still rapidly in-creasing. ~rbe population of Missouri territory is recent. A few settlements existed upon the left 1hore of the Mississippi from the first discovery of the country by the French in 1683, but few or no establishments were made upon the right bank until the session of Canada to England, and Louisiana t(J Spain. In 1764 the first effective settlements in t~e now Missouri territory was formed at St. Louis. SiJ.Jce that ped nod the other posti wer<:! founded at different and di~tant times. The usual and ruinous policy of Spain was followed here as in all her other American dominions. The posts were separate~ frorri each other, and unable to yield mutual protection, and prevented from a reciprocity of commercial intercourse. Many causes have been adduced for the apparent ·decadence of Spain. Some of these ca.uses h.ave, and do exist, and have produced no doubt the effects ascnbeu to them ; but perhaps the cause that inflicted the deepest wound upon this great monarchy, was the dispersion of its phy~icaJ force over too wide a surface. Spa.in not only contributed little towards the peopling of Louisiana when m her ~and~, but she also, in abandoning the country, left impedi.. < ments to enngratwn, that has retarded the increase of its inhabitants t? this day. From the loose and careless manner of granting land ~Itles, practised by Spain, the officers of the United States have not, m twelve years, been able to develope their iutricacyo Though a g:eat number of claims have been acknowledged legal by our commisSIOners, an immense number still remains undetermin€d ; and until a final adjustment takes place upon the merits of the private claims, none of the public land in either tbe state of Loui~iana or the territ~ ry of Missouri can be ~old. ' 19 " |