Kirtland was but a temporary abode for the new sect. Revelations came in upon the prophet rapidly, pointing out the details of organization and administration, the duty of missionary activity among the Indians and gentiles, and the future home further to the west. Scouts were sent to the Indian Country at an early date, leaving behind at Kirtland the leaders to build their temple and gather in the converts who, by 1833 and 1834, had begun to appear in hopeful numbers. The frontier of this decade was equally willing to speculate in religion, agriculture, banking, or railways, while Smith and his intimates possessed the germ of leadership to take advantage of every chance. Until the panic of 1837 they flourished, apparently not always beyond reproach in financial affairs, but with few neighbors who had the right to throw the stone. Antagonism, already appearing against the church, was due partly to an essential intolerance among their frontier neighbors and partly to the whole-souled union between church and life which distinguished the Mormons from the other sects. Their political complexion was identical with their religion,--a combination which always has aroused resentment in America. For a western home, the leaders fell upon a tract in Missouri, not far from Independence, close to the Indians whose conversion was a part of the Mormon duty. In the years when Oregon and Santa Fé were by-words along the Missouri, the Mormons were getting a precarious foothold near the commencement of the trails. The population around Independence was distinctly inhospitable, with the result that petty violence appeared, in which it is hard to place the blame. There was a calm assurance among the Saints that they and they alone were to inherit the earth. Their neighbors maintained that poultry and stock were unsafe in their vicinity because of this belief. The Mormons retaliated with charges of well-spoiling, incendiarism, and violence. In all the bickerings the sources of information are partisan and cloudy with prejudice, so that it is easier to see the disgraceful scuffle than to find the culprit. From the south side of the Missouri around Independence the Saints were finally driven across the river by armed mobs; a transaction in which the Missourians spoke of a sheriff's posse and maintaining the peace. North of the river the unsettled frontier was reached in a few miles, and there at Far West, in Caldwell County, they settled down at last, to build their tabernacle and found their Zion. In the summer of 1838 their corner-stone was laid.