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Show 1836- 1837] Flagg's Far West 279 four professors [ 21] and about a hundred students. 17* Its principal building is a large and elegant structure of brick, and the seminary will doubtless, ere long, become an ornament to the place. At no distant day it may assume the character and standing of its elder brothers east of the Alleghanies; and the muse that ever delights to revel in college- hall may strike her lyre even upon the banks of the far- winding, wilderness Missouri. Among the heterogeneous population of St. Charles are still numbered a few of those wild, daring spirits, whose lives and exploits are so intimately identified with the early history of the country, and most of whose days are now passed beyond the bonier, upon the broad buffalo- plains at the base of the Rocky Mountains. Most of them are trappers, hunters, couriers du bois, traders to the distant post of Santa F6, or engagis of the American Fur Company. Into the company of one of these remarkable men it was my fortune to fall during my visit at St. Charles; and not a little to my interest and edification did he recount many of his " hairbreadth ' scapes," his " most disastrous chances,' 9 " His moving accidents by flood and field." All of this, not to mention sundry sage items on the most approved method of capturing deer, bar, buffalo, and painters, I must be permitted to waive. I am no tale- teller, " but your mere traveller, believe me," as Ben Jonson has it. The proper home of the buffalo seems now to be the vast [ 22] plains south and west of the Missouri border, called in St. Charles College, founded by Mrs. Catherine Collier and her son George, was opened in 1836 under the presidency of Reverend John H. Fielding. The Methodist Episcopal church has directed the institution. Madame Duchesne, a companion of Mother Madeline Barral, founder of the Society of the Sacred Heart, started a mission at St. Charles in 1810; but the colony was soon removed to St Louis. In 1828, however, she succeeded in establishing permanently at St. Charles the Academy of the Sacred Heart, with Madame Ludle as superior.- ED. |