Daily they had to pass through hostile
nations; but spite of many other difficulties, such as ignorance of the
passes and want of water, they arrived at Santa Fe.
The adventurers returned to Missouri during the fall; their profit had
been immense, although the capital they had employed had been very
small. Their favourable reports produced a deep sensation, and in the
spring of the next year, Colonel Cooper and some associates, to the
number of twenty-two, started with fourteen mules well loaded. This time
the trip was a prompt and a fortunate one; and the merchants of St.
Louis getting bolder and bolder, formed, in 1822, a caravan of seventy
men, who carried with them goods to the amount of forty
thousand dollars.
Thus began the Santa Fe trade, which assumed a more regular character.
Companies started in the spring to return in the fall, with incredible
benefits, and the trade increasing, the merchants reduced the number of
their guards, till, eventually, repeated attacks from the savages
obliged them to unite together, in order to travel with safety.
At first the Indians appeared disposed to let them pass without any kind
of interruption; but during the summer of 1826 they began to steal the
mules and the horses of the travellers; yet they killed nobody till
1828.
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