"We succeeded in purchasing several mules which cost us between ten and twenty dollars worth of goods apiece. In Comanche trade the main trouble consists in fixing the price of the first animal. This being settled by the chiefs, it often happens that mule after mule is led up and the price received without further cavil. Each owner usually wants a general assortment; therefore the price must consist of several items, as a blanket, a looking-glass, an awl, a flint, a little tobacco, vermillion, beads, etc. ...The Santa Fe caravans have generally avoided every manner of trade with the wild Indians, for fear of being treacherously dealt with during the familiar intercourse which necessarily ensues. This I am convinced is an erroneous impression; for I have always found, that [natives] are much less hostile to those with whom they trade, than to any other people. They are emphatically fond of traffic, and, being anxious to encourage the whites to come among them, instead of committing depredations upon those with whom they trade, they are generally ready to defend them against every enemy."
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Commerce of the Prairies
1806 – 1850
Commerce of the Prairies: or, The journal of a Santa Fé trader, 1831–1839 was written by Josiah Gregg (1806–1850), a merchant, explorer, naturalist, and author who described his travels and adventures throughout the American Southwest and Northern Mexico. He is most famous for this book, a classic description of his early travels along the Santa Fe Trail to Santa Fe, then along El Camino Real to Chihuahua, Mexico and further south.
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