The immense American forests, the free land waiting to be claimed, the mighty rivers and wild romantic scenery; the rattlesnakes, the hummingbirds, the unpredictable climate – in the accounts of European visitors, all this took second place to the Americans themselves, to the men, women, and children who inhabited this wild new world, and who themselves seemed a species of New People, particularly those who seemed possessed by the pioneering spirit.  The Chevalier de Castellux, a French officer who had arrived in America with Rochambeau’s forces during the Revolutionary War, spent many years subsequently in traveling the newly independent United States.  In Virginia he met with his first pioneer, a young man who had come from Philadelphia with his pretty wife and infant, and was now on his way to “Kentucket.”  The Frenchman was amazed at the easy manner in which this family proceeded on their expedition, with only a horse, no cattle, no tools.  “I have money in my pocket,” the young man said, “and I shall want for nothing.”  This nonchalance at moving about seemed one of the most striking traits of Americans.  “Four times running they will break land for a new home, abandoning without a thought the house in which they were born, the church where they learned about God, the tombs of their fathers, the friends of their childhood, the companions of their youth, and all the pleasures of their first society.”  The American apparently clung to nothing – except perhaps money.  At a price he would part with “his house, his carriage, his horse, his dog.”

It was the very antithesis of Europe, this repudiation of the past, and for foreigners it repelled or inspired according to personal philosophy.  But always it intrigued, fascinated and continued to attract the millions.