80 Trans. Acad. Sci. of St. Louts. 
and one of the most interesting and picturesque figures 
in the annals of botanical discovery in America, may be 
said to have been the first scientist to visit the vicinity 
of St. Louis. Before coming to America, Michaux had, 
in the interests of science, traveled in France, England 
and the Orient. He came to the United States in 1785 at 
the request of the French government to study the forest 
trees and experiment with regard to their transplanta- 
tion to France. In the course of his travels in North 
America Michaux explored the mountains of the Caro- 
linas, journeyed through the hazardous swamps and 
marshes of Florida, visited the Bahamas, crossed the 
Alleghanies in his search for new plants, and in 1795-96 
made a journey from Charleston, S. C., through Tennes- 
see, Kentucky and Indiana, to Kaskaskia, Cahokia and 
vicinity. Most probably he visited the western shore of 
the Mississippi. In his ‘‘Flora Boreali Americana’’ 
he records several species of plants as coming from the 
Missouri river. This is no positive proof, however, of 
his having collected west of the Mississippi, as the plants 
might have been given to him while he was at Cahokia. 
He mentions St. Lonis as a prosperous settlement, but 
makes no further allusion to it. 
Looking back through the vista of years, we find pic- 
turesque and interesting incidents shaping the early his- 
tory of St. Louis, when around it and far to the west 
stretched an unbroken wilderness into which the white 
man had scarcely penetrated. One of the central figures 
in the little French village in the year 1800 was Dr. 
Antoine Francois Saugrain—scientist, physician and 
chemist. Although he was not the first to practice medi- 
cine here, he was the most notable of the early represen- 
tatives of the profession because of his broad learning 
and scholarly attainments. 
Dr. Saugrain* was educated as a physician and chem- 
2 Bliss, E. F. Dr. Saugrain’s relation of his voyage down the Ohio 
river from Pittsburgh to the Falls in 1788. Proc. Amer, Ant. Soc. 11: 
369-380. 1897. 
