CHAPTER XXX.

THE FIRST MISSOURIANS.

Early Blending of the Population-The Bearnese-Virile Home Owners-The Scotch-Irish Strain-Cavaliers Well Represented-Jefferson Builded More Wisely Than He KnewMissourians as Travelers Found Them-Treasurer Didier's Integrity-The Coming of Daniel Boone-The Salt Industry of Boone's Lick-Kentucky's Tardy Recognition of the Pioneer-Don Luis Lorimier's Public Services-Duden and Muench, Pioneers of the German Immigration-The Latin Settlement-Polish Exiles-The Missourian Politically and Physically-Best of the State Soldiers at Chicago in 1892—John N. Edwards on Missouri Courage-Court Days in Saline-How Thomas Jefferson's Grandson Heard the Declaration of Independence-The Jefferson Descendants in Missouri-Pioneer Womanhood-The Mother and Wife of Benton-Three United States Senators in One Family -The First Charitable Society-Shackelford on the Early Preachers-Trial of Rev. A. P. Williams-The First Baptists-Pioneer Methodism-Early Law Givers-The Solomon of St. Charles-John Smith T.—Aaron Burr's Expedition-How John Dodge Quashed an Indictment.

Religion and morality and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall be encouraged and provided from the public lands of the United States in the said territory in such manner as Congress may deem expedient.-Declaration of the First Legislature of Missouri Territory.

Blending of the population of Missouri began early. Creation of the typical American has been progressive through every generation since "the first thirty" landed at St. Louis in February, 1764. In the first thirty were those who had come from New Orleans with the expedition, a few from Ste. Genevieve, more from Fort Charles and vicinity. As he passed through Cahokia on his way by the wagon road to join Auguste Chouteau on the site, Laclede was joined by several families.

Gallic strains most virile entered into the earliest blending to populate Missouri. Laclede was of noble family, but of hardy, vigorous stock, developed in the valleys of the Pyrenees. The first thirty were "mechanics of all trades." They dragged their boat up the Mississippi and began the building of St. Louis in the middle of February. What better proof of their physical qualities could be given?

St. Louis was a converging point of migration seeking permanent homes. Generations of these pioneer people in America had softened the speech, had added to the vocabulary, had supplemented the customs. While branches of these families, at home in France, were thinking the way to republican theories, the American offshoots were breathing free air and practicing liberty by instinct. There was nothing of degeneracy, physical or mental, in the first families that settled Missouri.

French fur traders came up the Mississippi in their bateaux; they made homes for themselves; their descendants settled all of the way from Ste. Genevieve to Femme Osage. Tennesseeans crossed over from the Seesaw State. There is not a well-known family of early days in Virginia or Kentucky that has not its flourishing Missouri branch. Every other southern State sent its full quota. A current of Pennsylvania's blood has been circulating in Missouri's population ever since the State was admitted. New Englanders and New Yorkers early saw the coming commercial advantages on the west bank of the Mississippi. They came to court them in numbers and were called "The Bostons."

If the typical American is to be a composite, Missouri should furnish his earliest evolution. All sections of the country have contributed to the settlement of the State. Main traveled roads from other countries have led this way for a century.

The Bearnese.

Pierre Laclede, the founder of St. Louis, was of the Bearnese people. Bearn was a small principality not much larger than the city and county of St. Louis combined. Occupying the extreme southwest corner of France, it embraced some fertile valleys and enough of the foothills and steeps of the Pyrenees to give grazing for the flocks of sheep. Here the Bearnese nation lived long a law unto itself. The Bearnese had their own kings before Bearn became a province of France. The Bearnese spoke and still speak a language of their own, more like the Spanish than the French. But in the speech are found elements of the Greek, so pronounced that the historians have given credence to the tradition that the original Bearnese came westward through the Mediterranean from the land of Jason and colonized this out-of-the-way corner. There is a history of Bearn, Taine says, composed by a Bearnais, who was counselor to the king in 1640. This "fine red folio" is ornamented with "a magnificent engraving representing the conquest of the Golden Fleece."

Pau is the chief city of the Bearnese. Oloron is the place of departure from the railway. Bedous is the village of the Valley of the Aspe shut in by lofty mountains. In Bedous the founder of St. Louis was born, a younger brother in the ruling family. Bedous was the home of Pierre Laclede until he was 31. Taine, the author of "A History of English Literature," traveled in the Pyrenees and studied the Bearnese at close range. He wrote of them:

"Liberty has thriven here from the earliest times, crabbed and savage, homeborn and tough like a stem of their own boxwood."

Taine told how Count Gaston, a Bearnais, was one of the leaders of the first crusade:

"He was, like all of the great men of this country, an enterprising and a ready-minded man, a man of experience and one of the vanguard. At Jerusalem he went ahead to reconnoiter, and constructed the machines for the siege. He was held to be the wisest in counsel, and was first to plant upon the walls the cows of Bearn."

A long record of courage the Bearnese made in the Middle Ages. Taine said: