Page:History of Southeast Missouri 1912 Volume 1.djvu/190

 130 HISTORY OF SOUTHEAST MISSOURI that Spain neglected to colonize the teri-itory. Of course there were other causes which joined with this to produce the same result. One of these was the greater interest which the southern part of the United States and even South America, had for the Spanish. They came from a diiferent climate, and they found the warmer parts of the country more congenial to them. The merchants who traded in these set- tlements were very different from the mer- chants of to-day. Some of them had very small warehouses, but most frequently, the goods of every kind were placed in a large box. They were brought out for inspection only on the demand of the customer. Within this box all kinds of things were kept — sugar, salt, dry goods, paints, tobacco, gunpowder, guns, hatchets ; in fact, the whole store of the merchant was usually contained within a single receptacle. The merchant was usually not very enterprising, and was content to wait for the coming of customers and made no great effort to extend his trade. One re- sult of this system of trading was the pre- vailing high prices of everything that was bought and sold. This was especially true of groceries which were imported from New Or- leans, Canada, or the eastern part of the United States. Sugar sold at two dollars a pound, and tea at the same price ; coffee was equally as dear. These high prices extended even to the products of the country : butter sold for from thirty to fifty cents a pound ; eggs, twenty-five cents a dozen : chickens, forty to fifty cents a piece. All of the trav- elers of the time speak of these high prices. Cumings, who visited New Madrid in 1809, says that milk, butter, eggs and chickens were outrageously high and Bradbury, who a few years later made a voyage from St. Louis to New Orleans, found similar prices prevail- ing. It is probably true that these high prices were in part the result of the system of bar- ter that prevailed in most parts of the coun- try. During the Spanish regime the Spanish officials were accustomed to pay for goods, which they bought, in currency ; and this at- tracted to the west side of the river a con- siderable amount of the produce from Illinois. These circumstances all combined to render the price of articles higher than would other- wise have been maintained. Nearly all the settlers- of the country were engaged in farming, as we have seen, and their principal products were cattle, wheat, corn, and horses. Other things were grown to a limited extent, but these were the staple products. "We may well suppose that agricul- ture was in the primitive state. It is said that in 1804 the entire crop of corn grown by the settlers of New Madrid amounted to only 6,000 bushels. Crops in other settlements were proportionately small. The amount pro- duced barely provided for the necessities of the settlers themselves and left only a small amount for export. Whatever surplus there was was sent east to New Orleans or to Can- ada. Cattle, of course, could be grown with little expense, owing to the vast range where they lived practically without being fed. This was true to some degree of horses also. It was noted, however, that both cattle and horses deteriorated in Louisiana. No atten- tion was given to the breeding of stock and they decreased in size and quality. Horses were especially valuable on account of the fact that almost all travel on land was done either on foot or on horseback. One of the great hardships endured by set- tlers in the new country is the isolation which