Cover of Trip to the West and Texas comprising a journey of eight thousand miles, through New-York, Michigan, Illinois, Missouri, Louisiana and Texas, in the autumn and winter of — Inside the Classic

Trip to the West and Texas comprising a journey of eight thousand miles, through New-York, Michigan, Illinois, Missouri, Louisiana and Texas, in the autumn and winter of — Inside the Classic

(0 User reviews) 527

In Category - Geography

Authors: Parker, A. A. (Amos Andrew), 1791-1893 Digital Source: Project Gutenberg Gutenberg Release Year: 2016 First Publication Year: Not confirmed

Key Word: Texas -- History -- Revolution, 1835-1836; Frontier and pioneer life -- Mississippi River Valley; Texas -- Description and travel; Frontier and pioneer life -- Texas; Mississippi River Valley -- Description and travel Target Reader: Readers of public-domain and historical texts

Book Edition: Project Gutenberg digital edition Book Language: en

Edition facts

Words 96,775

Reading time 421 min

Text sections 9

Trip to the West and Texas comprising a journey of eight thousand miles, through New-York, Michigan, Illinois, Missouri, Louisiana and Texas, in the autumn and winter of — Inside the Classic can be approached with a clearer sense of reading commitment from its source measurements: 96,775 words, 7 hr 1 min estimated reading time, and 9 detected text sections.

The text analysis averages about 21.9 words per sentence, while the detected sections provide another way to judge how the source is divided.

Project Gutenberg metadata also associates the work with “Texas -- History -- Revolution, 1835-1836,” connecting these edition facts with the source record’s subject description.

Source: Project Gutenberg record #53648

A.A. Parker's 1834-35 travel narrative records observations on soil, climate, and frontier justice across the Mississippi Valley and Texas, with a plain-spoken style and attention to economic details like duty-free goods and blacksmith fees.

Editorial Edition Score 4.8/5

★★★★★ ★★★★★

Calculated from edition completeness, EPUB availability, text structure and catalogue metadata. Not a user rating.

How this score is calculated

Description quality20 pts
Title & short description10 pts
Source metadata20 pts
Text length15 pts
Chapters / structure15 pts
EPUB file integrity20 pts

Total of 100 points, scaled to a 2.5-5.0 range. Editions with an empty description or a missing EPUB file are not scored.

Edition quality

File: pg53648

Read the Text

Objects of the Trip--Albany, situation and appearance--Erie canal basin--western travellers--rail road--canal boats, packets, line boats and scows--accommodations--number of boats--mode of passing each other--tow-pathbridges--accident in crossing--Erie canal--Villages and grog-shops--Trenton falls--Ithaca falls--Taghcanic falls--Rochester--canal aqueduct--Genesee falls--Sam Patch's last leap--flouring mills--Lockport--double canal locks--deep cut--arrival at Buffalo. Page, 13

The city of Buffalo--steamboat on the Niagara river--Fort Erie--Black Rock--visit to Niagara falls--Canada shore--Manchester--State of New-York--emigration--return to Buffalo--different routes to the West--passage in steamboat--Cleaveland--Maumee--Monroe--number of emigrants--vessels on the lake--Detroit--the Canada shore--ferry boats. 25

Travelling by stage to the mouth of St. Joseph river--miry roads--Ann Arbor--Upsilanti--oak openings--prairies and woodland--Michigan, level, clear water, but not pure---Jackson--Marshall--Gull lake and prairie--Kalamazoo river--Bronson--Pawpaw river--St. Joseph village--lake Michigan--misfortune of an emigrant--crossing the lake--Michigan city--stage road on the beach. 35

Chicago, a general description thereof--Pottawattomie tribe of Indians, their appearance and actions--the land back of Chicago--the lakes and their original outlet through the Illinois river--character of the inhabitants of Chicago--house rent and provisions. 43

Trip to Fox river--fellow travellers--river Oplane--Du Page river and Naper's settlement--big and little woods--pleasant settlement of emigrants--Fox river--upper house--lost in a prairie at night--log house--travelling towards Rock river--gravel hills--Walker's grove. 51

General description of the north part of Illinois--various kinds of trees--prairies--excellent coal--government grant of land--unsurveyed land settled upon--pre-emption right--not subject to fever and ague--wild game--prairie wolves and mode of killing them--prairie rattle snakes, blackbirds and squirrels--manner of judging of a new country--anecdote of a Vermont emigrant--New-Hampshire emigrant--statements of settlers and landholders not always to be credited. 57

Holderman's Grove--Ottawa--junction of Fox and Illinois rivers--Hennipen--Princeton--present and past situation of an emigrant--massacre of Elijah Philips by the Indians, and the fortunate escape of his companions. 66

Peoria--beauty of the surrounding country--fever and ague--scholars studying aloud in school--stages from Peoria--anecdote of a tavern keeper--Illinois river--passage down it in a steamboat--narrow lakes--high bluffs--Pekin--Beardstown--Naples--arrival at upper Alton. 74

General description of the state of Illinois--streams skirted with timber--more than half prairie--a level State--generally rich soil--American bottom--military bounty lands--beautiful region of Sangamon river--the best tracts of land in the State--more good land than any other State--cause of the existence of prairies--country once inhabited by a civilized race anterior to the Indians--its rivers, Kankakee, Oplane, Du Page, Fox, Illinois, Rock, Spoon, Kaskaskia, Wabash, &c.--lead mines--productions--milk-sickness--chief towns--schools, &c. 79

Burning of the prairies--backwoodsmen--society--meeting-houses and school-houses--what kind of goods an emigrant ought to take with him--cheapness of provisions--manner of commencing a settlement--ploughing the prairies--guarding the improvements against the prairie fires--junction of the Missouri with the Mississippi--arrival at St. Louis--a description of the town--steam ferry boat. 92

General description of the state of Missouri--south part generally barren, or wet and unhealthy--soil not muddy--prairie on the Mississippi--banks of the Missouri--large prairies destitute of wood and water--productions--prairie blossoms--wild animals, snakes, &c.--dryness and purity of the atmosphere--diseases--mildness of the winter--lead mines and minerals--chief towns. 99

Voyage down the Mississippi in a steamboat--high bluffs--screw auger grist mills--shot towers--curiosities--dangers of the Mississippi navigation--narrow escape--run aground on a sand bar--mouth of the Ohio--cargo of the boat--amusements on board--history of one of the ladies--"Queen of the Nile"--description of the steamboat--price of passage--wooding the boat--ludicrous fracas on board--noise of the boats, &c.--peculiarities of expression of the western people--names of money. 107

Independent frankness of the western people--eastern people--towns on the river--great earthquake at New Madrid--bluffs on the river--woodcutters--serpentine course of the Mississippi--negro slaves on board--one died of the cholera--benefit of steamboat navigation--flat boats still in use. 119

Arrival at Natchez--description of the city--starts for Texas with another traveller--cotton plantations--description of the cotton plant--passage through the great Mississippi swamp--cypress knees, water and mud--Tensaw river--overtaken by night in the swamp--gloomy situation--lake Lovelace--planter's house on Indian mound--mildness of the weather--good accommodations--travelling in a right spirit--anecdote of a testy traveller. 125

Outlet of the lake--Washita river--Harrisonburg--pine woods--description of a planter--Red River rightly named--changes at its mouth--arrival at Alexandria and description of the place--race-course and horses--death of a gambler--fruit trees and vegetables--moschetoes. 134

Bayou Rapide--fine cotton plantations--stream running in opposite directions--accompanied by another traveller--pine woods--planter's house--price of meals, &c.--Spanish moss--bottom land covered with dense forest--pine woods--the widow's house--manner of lodging travellers--inquisitiveness of the people--emigrants to Texas--Sabine river. 139

Arrival in Texas--oak openings and prairies--plantations of corn and cotton--St. Augustine--arrival at Nacogdoches--its grotesque appearance--Indian trade in deer pelts--Galveston bay and Texas land company--four leagues of land for a dog--pine woods--Indian mounds--mounds in Ohio, Missouri and Illinois--Monastery near a mound--their origin and use--Neches river--new made bridge. 149

Leave the pine woods--wet prairie--Trinity river--planter's house--death of an emigrant's wife--perplexities of emigration--an emigrant lost his money--breach of trust in a hired man--beautiful prairies--muddy streams--red cedar--petrified wood--mode of grinding corn--living from hand to mouth--beautiful prospect--Indians on horseback--massacre of twenty Polanders--muddy swamp--Brazos river--Spanish trader--Indians more friendly to Americans than Spaniards--prairie country--Cole's settlement--live oak--Colorado river. 160

GENERAL VIEW OF TEXAS--herds of buffalo and wild horses--mustangs, manner of catching--seacoast flat--Galveston bay and Texas land company--burning of the prairies--fine grazing country--wildgame--deer-hunting--shooting deer in the night--productions of the soil--list of forest trees--Spanish moss--health of the country and climate. 169

Continue Reading →

A.A. Parker opens his 1834-35 travelogue by disavowing literary ambition: he is “unknown to fame” and offers “a plain unvarnished tale.” That promise of directness shapes every page. Parker moves through New York, Michigan, Illinois, Missouri, Louisiana, and Texas, measuring soil, noting the price of shoeing a horse (three to four dollars), and recording how settlers handled a thief with thirty-nine lashes. His voice is that of a practical observer, not a romantic explorer.

Parker’s diction is concrete and economical. He describes the Erie Canal basin, packet boats, and “scows” without flourish. When he reaches Texas, he notes that coffee is drunk in large quantities but tea is nearly absent. Such small details accumulate into a portrait of a region in transition, seen through the eyes of a man who values information over ornament.

A Plain Unvarnished Tale: Parker’s Stated Method

In his preface, Parker explicitly rejects “the regions of fancy and fiction.” He calls his work a “plain unvarnished tale” and says he has “told his own story … in his own way.” This is not false modesty; it is a deliberate authorial stance. He contrasts his concise approach with “some of the journalists of the day” who would have made a larger book. Parker’s goal is to give “such descriptions, incidents and anecdotes only, as he believes may instruct and amuse.” The word “amuse” here is modest—he means to hold the reader’s attention with useful facts, not entertainment. His tone is consistently matter-of-fact, even when describing a vigilante whipping. He reports the event without moralizing, simply noting that “substantial justice” was done. This restraint is a key feature of his narrative voice.

Economic Observations: Goods, Duties, and Prices

Parker’s eye for economic detail is sharp. In Texas, he notes that “almost all kinds of goods afford a good profit and a ready sale,” especially “domestic cottons, boots, shoes, hats and ready made clothing.” He observes that when he left the Brazos River, “there was no custom house officer upon it,” so vessel loads of goods landed duty-free. Such specifics ground his account in the realities of frontier commerce. He also records that blacksmiths are indispensable but scarce, charging three to four dollars to shoe a horse. Mechanics, he warns, will find little custom work because manufactured articles are imported cheaply from the North. These observations are not mere lists; they reflect Parker’s assessment of economic opportunity and risk for potential settlers.

Legal and Social Conditions: Courts, Elections, and Vigilantism

Parker describes Texas’s legal system as “liberal,” with freedom of religion, trial by jury, and elective government. He attended an election where voting was viva voce, as in southern states, and notes that mere inhabitancy qualified a voter. Yet he also acknowledges that in a thinly settled country, “laws, however wise and good, cannot always be enforced.” He illustrates this with a specific anecdote: a notorious thief was given thirty-nine lashes by neighbors and told the punishment would be repeated weekly; he left before the week was up. Parker presents this as an instance of “substantial justice” rather than lawlessness. His tone is neutral, reporting the event without endorsing or condemning it. This balance between describing official institutions and extralegal practices is a recurring tension in his narrative.

Diction and Descriptive Texture: Soil, Salt, and Slavery

Parker’s descriptive vocabulary is plain but precise. He mentions a salt lake in the interior that appears “inexhaustible,” and a stream that sometimes makes the Brazos waters “too brackish for use.” Such details are typical: he notes what is useful or problematic for settlers. On slavery, he reports that while the law forbids it, the prohibition is evaded by “binding the negroes by indenture for a term of years.” He states this as a fact, without commentary. His word choice throughout is concrete: “soil, climate and productions,” “manners, customs and health,” “animals, reptiles and insects.” He does not generalize about “the West” but itemizes what he sees. This granularity gives his account a documentary quality, even when the observations are brief.

Parker’s narrative rewards readers who attend to small details: the price of a shod horse, the absence of tea, the method of voting. His plain style is not artless but purposeful, designed to convey information without embellishment. The book is best approached as a primary document of frontier perception—one man’s record of what he deemed worth noting in 1834-35, offered without apology or literary pretension.

Sometimes a traveler’s plain notes, like Parker’s ledger of soil and blacksmith fees, stay with me longer than any grand saga. There’s a lonely honesty in such records. I felt that again, oddly, in Constantinople, v. 2 (of 2) — Context and Discussion. Its quiet attention to daily life, the textures of a place far away, left me the same gentle ache—one I’ve been turning over since.