I believe it still to be the spirit of a triumphant democracy, knowing its own, taking its own, holding its own.

They travel yet, the dauntless figures of that earlier day.

Let them not despair.

No imaginary line will ever hold them back, no mandate of any monarch ever can restrain them.
In our own caravans, now pressing on for the general movement west of the Missouri, there was material for a hundred canvases like yonder one, and yet more vast.

The world of our great western country was then still before us.