It is said that Cabet developed a dictatorial spirit in Nauvoo. This may be doubted. It is possible he only attempted to enforce measures without which he believed the commune must prove a failure. At any rate, a division took place among the Icarians. The colony at Nauvoo was broken up, and the members scattered, save fifty or sixty, who emigrated to Iowa. Cabet and his followers went to St. Louis, where he died in 1856. The emigrants to Iowa founded a settlement near Corning, on the Burlington and Missouri Railroad, which they called Icaria. They began with four thousand acres of land and a debt of $20,000. At first they had a hard struggle, being obliged to content themselves even with log-houses. When Mr. Nordhoff wrote his book, in 1874, the debt was paid, they lived in frame houses, and enjoyed a considerable degree of comfort. The community consisted of eleven families and sixty-five members, comprising twenty children and twenty-three voters. They had a good saw-mill and a grist-mill, and owned one thousand nine hundred and thirty-six acres of land, of which three hundred and fifty were under cultivation. They had one hundred and twenty cattle and five hundred sheep. A friend[29] has lately spent a week in Icaria, and has kindly written me the following account of the present condition of the community, which has experienced noteworthy changes since Mr. Nordhoff paid it a brief visit a few years ago: “GRINELL, IA., _May 7, 1883_. “——. First, let me say that I think no one has yet done adequate justice to Icarian history.... I was fortunate in being received into the community in the most friendly manner, and spent many hours in talking with the members. Especially, I was fortunate in making the acquaintance of two old men—original members—one of them the leader in the quarrel with Cabet at Nauvoo, and the successor of Cabet as president.... I have never enjoyed a visit more than this, for the Icarians, though poor and necessarily very hampered, are highly courteous and intelligent. To begin with their dissensions.” [For the present purpose it is sufficient to state that the members of the community, not being able to live together peaceably, agreed to separate; the “Young Party” retained the old village, and is now officially known as the “Icarian Community,” and the “Old Party” established a new commune in the vicinity.]