[Footnote: Turner, "Significance of the
Frontier," in Am. Hist. Assoc., Report 1893, pp. 200, 206, 208.]
Not only was the country vast in extent, it was rapidly growing. In
the decade the nation increased its population by over three million
and a quarter inhabitants, an addition which nearly equaled the
whole population of any one of the three great sections, the middle
states, the south, and the west. As traveler after traveler passed
over the routes of his predecessor in this period, reporting the
life by the wayside and in the towns, we can almost see American
society unfolding with startling rapidity under our gaze; farms
become hamlets, hamlets grow into prosperous cities; the Indian and
the forests recede; new stretches of wilderness come into view in
the farther west, and we see the irresistible tide of settlement
flowing towards the solitudes.
Nevertheless, at the opening of our survey the nation was in the
gloom of the panic of 1819. This was brought on by the speculative
reaction that immediately followed the war, when the long-pent-up
crops of cotton found a market at the extraordinary price of nearly
thirty cents a pound, and as high as seventy-eight dollars per acre
was bid for government land in the offices of the southwest.
Pages:
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208