At the period of its cession to us Arizona was practically unknown except to hunters and trappers or to the few who had read the accounts of the early Spanish explorers. Mr. Gadsden was ridiculed for making the purchase, and Congress censured for squandering the people's money upon an arid waste destitute of sufficient wood and water to sustain a population of civilized beings. The failure of the Spaniards to found any considerable settlements was dwelt upon. Stories of mines of fabulous wealth that Arizona held locked up in her mountains had indeed come down from a remote time, and were more or less current abroad, but few believed in them, or could see any compensating advantage to accrue to us for the millions Congress had spent. Government, however, caused the territory immediately to be surveyed with the view of settling the question whether we had or had not been cheated in making the purchase. [Illustration: MISSION SAN XAVIER DEL BAC, NEAR TUCSON.] II. THE CONTEST FOR FREE SOIL. THE KANSAS-NEBRASKA STRUGGLE. At the period now reached by our story the political sense of the people, in all things touching the national life, was represented by the Whig and Democratic parties. There was yet another body formed to prevent the coming in of any more slave States, and therefore called the Free-Soil party. This last party had only come into being since the war with Mexico, and was not yet strong enough to successfully cope with the older ones for control in national affairs; but it was growing stronger every day. Neither of the two great parties was divided by geographical lines. Both called themselves national parties, but since the extension of slavery was become the vital question of the hour, the Whig party was losing ground to the Free-Soil party, which indeed mostly grew up from the defection of those Whigs who determined henceforth to stand with the opponents of slavery until that question should be settled forever. So while the Whig party was strongest in the free States, it was beginning to go to pieces because it no longer represented the growing feeling against slavery in those States, though it was still led by able statesmen like Daniel Webster, whom the country had always looked to in the past for safe counsel and guidance through all the perils of party strife. The Democratic party, on the contrary, being most numerous in the slaveholding States, was more firmly united than ever by the agitation about slavery, which their great leader, Calhoun, had told them could only be maintained by being extended, and could only be extended by becoming aggressive. [Illustration: STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS.]