304 The Winning of the West 



deeply stirred by quarrels over questions of church 

 discipline and doctrine. 6 Most of the books were 

 either text-books of the simpler kinds or else theo 

 logical. 



Except when there was an Indian campaign, pol 

 itics and the river commerce formed the two chief 

 interests for all Kentuckians, but especially for the 

 well-to-do. 



In spite of all the efforts of the Spanish officials 

 the volume of trade on the Mississippi grew stead 

 ily. Six or eight years after the close of the Rev 

 olution the vast stretches of brown water, swirling 

 ceaselessly between the melancholy forests, were 

 already furrowed everywhere by the keeled and 

 keelless craft. The hollowed log in which the In 

 dian paddled; the same craft, the pirogue, only a 

 little more carefully made, and on a little larger 

 model, in which the Creole trader carried his 

 load of paints and whiskey and beads and bright 

 cloths to trade for the peltries of the savage; 

 the rude little scow in which .some backwoods farm 

 er drifted down stream with his cargo, the prod 

 uce of his own toil; the keel boats which, with 

 square-sails and oars, plied up as well as down the 

 river; the flotilla of huge flat boats, the property 

 of some rich merchant, laden deep with tobacco 

 and flour, and manned by crews who were counted 

 rough and lawless even in the rough and lawless 



6 Durrett Collection; see various theological writings, 

 e.g., "A Progress," etc., by Adam Rankin, Pastor at Lex 

 ington. Printed "at the Sign of the Buffalo," Jan. i, 1793. 



