216 STAY AT INDEPENDENCE. Book II. 
CHAPTER II. 
Stay at Independence — Frontier Places of Missouri — Caravans of Traders 
and Emigrants — Means of Conveyance — Northern and Southern Metho- 
dists — Negro Belief — Censorship and Indulgence — A Religious Curiosity 
— Historical and Political Views — A Political Murder — Preparations for 
Departure — Beyond the Limits of Civilization. 
Independence is a small town, with the character of a 
frontier place engaged in an extensive carrying trade. At a 
distance of ten to twelve miles from it, on the road to Santa 
Fe, were the last farms, on the edge of the great Prairie, and 
at a few days' journey further the road to Qregon sepa- 
rates from that to New Mexico and Chihuahua. The town 
is surrounded by wheelwrights' shops, large premises filled 
with new waggons, painted red, green, or blue, and the whole 
trade of the place consists in supplying the wants of trading 
and emigrant caravans, which start from this and from a 
few other stations on the Missouri for New Mexico, Utah, 
California, and Oregon. At certain times of the year the 
intercourse with these distant countries imparts great ani- 
mation to this small town. During the last spring the 
number of emigrants to California collected here had been 
very large, and the place is said to have resembled a fair, 
although those people generally live encamped outside the 
town. The season for these trains was now too far advanced, 
it being no longer possible to pass the Salt Lake before the 
winter. Some emigrants, however, who intended to winter 
among the Mormons, had still time for their journey, and 
the communication with Santa Fe and Mexico is not 
entirely stopped even in winter, although a journey across 
