dance-hall; between society united and resolved and the
individual reverted to worse than savagery.



Chapter VI. The Pathways Of The West

Since we have declared ourselves to be less interested in bald
chronology than in the naturally connected causes of events which
make chronology worth while, we may now, perhaps, double back
upon the path of chronology, and take up the great early highways
of the West--what we might call the points of attack against the
frontier.

The story of the Santa Fe Trail, now passing into oblivion, once
was on the tongue of every man. This old highroad in its heyday
presented the most romantic and appealing features of the earlier
frontier life. The Santa Fe Trail was the great path of commerce
between our frontier and the Spanish towns trading through Santa
Fe. This commerce began in 1822, when about threescore men
shipped certain goods across the lower Plains by pack-animals. By
1826 it was employing a hundred men and was using wagons and
mules. In 1830, when oxen first were used on the trail, the trade
amounted to $120,000 annually; and by 1843, when the Spanish
ports were closed, it had reached the value of $450,000,
involving the use of 230 wagons and 350 men. It was this great
wagon trail which first brought us into touch with the Spanish
civilization of the Southwest. Its commercial totals do not bulk
large today, but the old trail itself was a thing titanic in its
historic value.