If now we consult a map of the United States it is seen that the thirty-fourth parallel crosses the Mississippi at the mouth of the Arkansas, cuts New Mexico in the middle, and reaches the Pacific near Los Angeles. It was long the belief of statesmen that the great tide of emigration must set along this line, because it had the most temperate climate, was shorter, and would be found freer from hardship than the route by way of the South Pass. This view had set on foot the exploration of the Arkansas and Red rivers. But if we except the little that Pike and Long had gathered, almost nothing was known about it. Yet the prevailing belief gave New Mexico, as related to California, an exceptional importance. These considerations weighed for more than acquisition of territory, though the notion that New Mexico contained very rich silver-mines undoubtedly had force in determining its conquest. Otherwise it was held to be a poor country, with little arable land, mostly mountainous, and scarcely fertile in the valleys, while in consequence of its great elevation the winters were severe. Thus New Mexico seemed placed by Nature as a half-way house may stand alone at the summit of a mountain pass with deserts upon either side. It offered a place for the refreshment of the nation's travellers. At best it was only a thin wedge of semi-civilization driven north into barbarism as far as Spanish power could send it, but this force had spent itself long ago, and New Mexico now lay a stumbling-block in the path of progress, in contented isolation. Our Government determined to remove the obstruction. With this object General Kearney marched from Fort Leavenworth in June, 1846, for Santa Fé, at the head of a force[1] of which a battalion of Mormons formed part. After subduing New Mexico, Kearney was to go on to California, and with the help of naval forces already sent there, for the purpose, conquer that country also. [Illustration: PUEBLO WOMAN GRINDING CORN.] It is worth while to dwell a moment upon one feature of this expedition, if only for its singularity. The Mormons were to be paid off in California, were to turn the sword into a ploughshare and settle in the country, and had therefore been allowed to take their families and property with them. They were seen when setting out on the march by Mr. Parkman, who thus describes them: "There was something very striking in the half-military, half-patriarchal appearance of these armed fanatics, thus on their way with their wives and children to found, it might be, a Mormon empire in California.