The Oregon Trail

by Francis Parkman

Whisky by the way circulates more freely in Westport than is altogether safe in a place where every man carries a loaded pistol in his pocket.

Great changes are at hand in that region. With the stream of emigration to Oregon and California, the buffalo will dwindle away, and the large wandering communities who depend on them for support must be broken and scattered. The Indians will soon be corrupted by the example of the whites, abased by whisky and overawed by military posts; so that within a few years the traveller may pass in tolerable security through their country. Its danger and its charm will have disappeared together.

One other lesson our short prairie experience had taught us; that of profound contentment in the present, and utter contempt for what the future might bring forth.