Class 
 L 
 
 c 
 
 
 CopiglitH _ 
 
 COPHHGHT DEPOSIT. 
 
A BRIEF HISTORY OF 
 
 ROCKY MOUNTAIN 
 EXPLORATION 
 
 WITH ESPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE 
 
 EXPEDITION OF LEWIS AND CLARK 
 
 BY 
 
 REUBEN GOLD THWAITES 
 
 AUTHOR OF DANIEL BOONE, FATHER MARQUETTE, ON THE STORIED OHIO 
 
 THE COLONIES, ETC. ; EDITOR OF JESUIT RELATIONS, CHRONICLES 
 
 OF BORDER WARFARE, HENNEPIN' S NEW DISCOVERY, ETC. 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS AND MAPS 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
 
 1904 
 
T- 
 
 LIBRAE o* CONGRESS 
 Two Copies Received 
 
 JAN 27 1904 
 
 V" Copyright Entry . 
 
 •COPTBIGHT, 1904, BY 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
 
 Published February, 190% 
 
/ 
 
 Wqt expansion 
 
 of tl)e ftepubitc 
 
 Series 
 
 A BRIEF HISTORY OF ROCKY 
 MOUNTAIN EXPLORATION 
 
 3 to 
 
APPLE-TONS' 
 
 Expansion o! the Republic Series 
 
 Each volume nmo. Illustrated. $1.25 net 
 Postage, 12 cents additional 
 
 The History of the Louisiana Purchase 
 
 By James K. Hosmer, Ph.D., LL.D. 
 Ohio and Her Western Reserve 
 
 By Alfred Mathews. 
 
 The History of Puerto Rico 
 
 By R. A. Van Middeldyk. With an introduction, 
 etc., by Prof. Martin G. Brumbaugh. 
 
 Steps in the Expansion of Our Territory 
 
 By Oscar Phelps Austin, Chief of the Bureau of 
 Statistics, Treasury Department. 
 
 Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 By Reuben Gold Thwaites. 
 
 The Conquest of the Southwest 
 
 By Cyrus Townsend Brady, Author of " Paul Jones" 
 in the Great Commanders Series. In preparation. 
 
 The Purcha.se of Alaska. 
 
 By Oscar Phelps Austin, Chief of the Bureau of 
 Statistics, Treasury Department. In preparation. 
 
 Proposed Volumes 
 The Settlement of the Pacific Coast 
 The Founding of Chicago and the Development 
 
 of the Middle West 
 John Brown and the Troubles in Kansas 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK 
 
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Go 
 JOHN JOHNSTON, LL. D. 
 
 FOR TWELVE YEARS PRESIDENT OF THE WIS- 
 CONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY, AND SOMETIME 
 PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF REGENTS OF 
 THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN, THIS LIT- 
 TLE BOOK OF WESTERN ADVENTURE IS 
 RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED BY HIS FRIEND 
 
 THE AUTHOR 
 
PEEFACE 
 
 It is a long stretch of fruitful years, from 
 Balboa's crossing in Darien to the completion 
 of the transcontinental railways in the United 
 States. Adequately to treat of Rocky Moun- 
 tain Exploration as a whole would require 
 a series of bulky volumes. When, therefore, 
 one is asked to tell of the multitude of ad- 
 venturous expeditions incident to the scaling 
 of the continental divide, within the limits of 
 one small book, the task largely resolves itself 
 into the recitation of a bead-roll of principal 
 events. 
 
 And yet the story seems worth telling, 
 even with such restrictions. The records of 
 most, if not all, of the enterprises herein re- 
 lated are somewhere accessible in print, and 
 some of them have been given a popular dress. 
 But nowhere else, so far as I know, has the 
 entire range been treated in connected form 
 
 vii 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 within the covers of a single volume. It 
 is sincerely hoped that this catalogue of 
 events may prove sufficiently readable, to in- 
 spire youth with adequate appreciation of 
 what has been dared and done for them by 
 their predecessors upon the stage. The deeds 
 of Lewis and Clark, Pike, Long, Fremont, 
 and their compeers, will always stir the 
 blood of those who love to read of noble 
 adventure in the public cause. Hardly less 
 thrilling and inspiring are the daring ex- 
 ploits of those eminent Canadian explorers, 
 Verendrye, McKenzie, Thompson, and Fraser. 
 Far more space within this book is de- 
 voted to the experiences of Lewis and Clark 
 than to those of any others in the roll of 
 American explorers. There is appropriate- 
 ness in this. Their expedition was the first 
 to cross the continent under the auspices of 
 the United States Government; in many 
 ways it was, considering both the occasion 
 and the result, the most important of all — 
 other expeditions but continuing and broad- 
 ening the work of the men who broke the 
 path. It has seemed proper, upon the eve 
 of the centennial celebration of their crossing, 
 
 Vlll 
 
Preface 
 
 to dwell in as much detail as space would 
 allow, upon an event fraught with momen- 
 tous consequence in the Expansion of the 
 Republic. 
 
 R. Gr. T. 
 
 Madison, Wisconsin, 
 December, 1903. 
 
 IX 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 Preface vii 
 
 I. Exploration op the Northwest Coast . . 1 
 
 II. French Explorations from the East . . 22 
 
 III. English Explorations from the East . . 37 
 
 IV. The Missouri a Path to the Pacific . . 62 
 
 V. The Louisiana Purchase 81 
 
 VI. Organization of Lewis and Clark's Expedi- 
 tion 92 
 
 VII. From River Dubois to the Mandans . . 109 
 
 VIII. At Fort Mandan 127 
 
 IX. From the Mandans to the Sea . . . 137 
 
 X. At Fort Clatsop, and the Return . = . 162 
 
 XI. Thompson, Fraser, The Astorians, and Pike 188 
 
 XII. The South Pass 209 
 
 XIII. The Conquest of California .... 228 
 
 XIV. The Continent Spanned by Settlement . . 244 
 INDEX 253 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 FACINO 
 PAGE 
 
 Gates of the Rocky Mountains . . . Frontispiece 
 
 Map drawn by the Indian Ochagach 28 
 
 Portrait of Meriwether Lewis . . , . . 96 ' 
 
 Portrait of William Clark 96 
 
 Page of Clark's Journal ....... 110 
 
 Page of Lewis's Journal 130 
 
 Grant's Castle, on Columbia River 158 ' 
 
 Portrait of Zebulon M. Pike 196 
 
 Portrait of John C. Fremont 232 
 
 Portrait of Kit Carson 232 
 
A BRIEF HISTORY OF ROCKY 
 MOUNTAIN EXPLORATION 
 
 OHAPTEK I 
 
 EXPLORATION OF THE NORTHWEST COAST 
 
 Amid the prayers and the plaudits of 
 Spain, Columbus set sail from the little port 
 of Palos, seeking not a new world, but the 
 shores of old India. It was from the Indus 
 that Europe obtained her silks and gold, her 
 spices and her precious stones ; while of the 
 wealth of ancient China and Japan, the " Sun- 
 rise Land," travelers like Marco Polo had 
 brought glowing though vague accounts. 
 When the Spanish admiral furled his sails in 
 the palm-girt harbor of Cat Island, he was 
 convinced that he had reached but an out- 
 lying portion of those coveted lands ; to him, 
 this was indeed the West Indies. Columbus 
 went to his grave probably unconscious of the 
 fact that he had discovered a new continent ; 
 and the belief that America was merely a 
 
 1 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 projection of Asia was long after persisted in 
 by geographers. It was two and a half cen- 
 turies later (1741) before Vitus Bering, sailing 
 from the Pacific to the Arctic Ocean, proved 
 to the world that America was insulated. 
 
 Another time-worn geographical theory re- 
 garding North America — a theory the origin 
 of which is lost in obscurity — did not die until 
 a half century later : that a waterway some- 
 where extended through the heart of the 
 continent between the Atlantic Ocean and 
 the Pacific, or South Sea, as it was then 
 named. The Spanish conquerors of Mexi- 
 co, while vainly seeking for gold among the 
 pueblos of our Southwest and along the 
 gloomy shores of the Gulf of California, were 
 early searchers for that transcontinental 
 waterway which was to give them a short 
 route from Europe to India. So, too, the ad- 
 venturous French of Canada, while penetra- 
 ting the heart of the continent by means of 
 the Great Lakes and the Mississippi, were 
 seeking to pierce the elusive mystery of the 
 South Sea. John Smith, of Virginia, confi- 
 dently thought to find it by ascending the 
 James ; other Englishmen, little knowing the 
 
 2 
 
Montezuma's Strait 
 
 breadth of the continent, made similar trials 
 by way of the Potomac and the Roanoke. 
 Hendrik Hudson thought at first that the great 
 river of New York might lead him into a 
 passage to the Western Ocean, and still later 
 fancied he had found it in Hudson Strait and 
 Bay. Transcontinental exploration in North 
 America was for nearly three centuries largely 
 stimulated by this search for a mythic water- 
 way. It is therefore necessary that we famil- 
 iarize ourselves with the history of the long 
 and fruitless quest. 
 
 In 1513, a hundred and seven years before 
 the landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, Bal- 
 boa scaled the continental back-bone at Darien 
 and unfurled the flag of Spain by the waters 
 of the Pacific. With wondrous zeal did 
 Spanish explorers beat up and down the 
 western shore of the Gulf of Mexico, seek- 
 ing for an opening through. Cortez had 
 no sooner secured possession of Mexico, after 
 his frightful slaughter of the Aztecs, than 
 he began pushing out to the west and north- 
 west — along the " upper coasts of the South 
 Sea " — in search of the strait which Monte- 
 zuma told him existed. 
 2 3 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 It is unlikely that Montezuma's knowledge 
 of North American geography was much 
 greater than that of his conqueror. But in 
 every age and land aborigines have first as- 
 certained what visiting strangers most sought, 
 whether it be gold or waterways, and assured 
 them that somewhere beyond the neighbor- 
 ing horizon these objects were to be found 
 in plenty. Spanish, French, and English have 
 each in their turn chased American rainbows 
 that existed only in the brains of imagina- 
 tive tribesmen who had little other thought 
 than a childish desire to gratify their guests. 
 
 Cortez undertook, at his own charge, several 
 of these expensive exploring expeditions to 
 discover the strait of which Montezuma had 
 spoken, and one of them he conducted in per- 
 son. In 1528 — the year he visited Spain to 
 meet his accusers — we find him despatching 
 Maldonado northward along the Pacific coast 
 for three hundred miles ; and five years later 
 Grijalva and Jimenez were claiming for Spain 
 the southern portion of Lower California. 
 A full hundred years before Jean Nicolet 
 related to the French authorities at their 
 feeble outpost on the rock of Quebec the 
 
 4 
 
Seven Cities of Cibola 
 
 story of his daring progress into the wilds of 
 the upper Mississippi Valley, and the rumors 
 he had there heard of the great river which 
 flowed into the South Sea, Spanish officials 
 in the halls of Montezuma were receiving 
 the tales of their adventurers, who had pene- 
 trated to strange lands laved by the waters 
 of this selfsame ocean. 
 
 It was about the year 1530 when the Span- 
 iards in Mexico first received word, through 
 an itinerant monk, Marcos de Niza, of certain 
 powerful semi-civilized tribes dwelling some 
 six hundred miles north of the capital of the 
 Aztecs. These strange people were said to 
 possess in great store domestic utensils and 
 ornaments made of gold and silver; to be 
 massed in seven large cities composed of 
 houses built with stone ; and to be proficient 
 in many of the arts of the Europeans. The 
 search for "the seven cities of Cibola," as 
 these reputed communities came to be called 
 by the Spaniards, was at once begun. 
 
 Guzman, just then at the head of affairs in 
 New Spain, zealously set forth at the head of 
 four hundred Spanish soldiers and a large 
 following of Indians, to search for this mar- 
 
 5 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 velous country. But the farther north the 
 army marched the more distant became Ci- 
 bola in the report of the natives whom they 
 met on the way ; until at last the invaders be- 
 came involved in the pathless deserts of New 
 Mexico and the intricate ravines of the foot- 
 hills beyond. The soldiers grew mutinous, 
 and Guzman returned crestfallen to Mexico. 
 
 In April, 1528, three hundred enthusiastic 
 young nobles and gentlemen from Spain 
 landed at Tampa Bay, under the leadership 
 of Narvaez, whom Cortez had supplanted in 
 the conquest of Mexico. Narvaez had been 
 given a commission to hold Florida, with its 
 supposed wealth of mines and precious stones, 
 and to become its governor. Led by the cus- 
 tomary fables of the natives, who told only 
 such tales as they supposed their Spanish tor- 
 mentors wished most to hear, the brilliant 
 company wandered hither and thither through 
 the vast swamps and forests, wasted by 
 fatigue, famine, disease, and frequent assaults 
 of savages. At last, after many distressing 
 adventures, but four men were left — Cabeza 
 de Vaca, treasurer of the expedition, and 
 three others. For eight long years did these 
 
 6 
 
The Age of Romance 
 
 bruised and ragged Spaniards wearily roam 
 across the region now divided into Texas, 
 Indian Territory, Oklahoma, New Mexico, 
 and Arizona — through tangled forests, across 
 broad rivers, morasses, and desert stretches 
 beset by wild beasts and men ; but ever 
 spurred on by vague reports of a colony of 
 their countrymen to the southwest. At last 
 (May, 1536) the miserable wanderers, first to 
 make the transcontinental trip in northern 
 latitudes, reached the Gulf of California, 
 where they met some of their fellow country- 
 men, who bore them in triumph to the City 
 of Mexico as the guests of the province. 
 
 In that golden age of romance travelers 
 were expected to gild their tales, and in this 
 respect seldom failed to meet the popular de- 
 mand. The Spanish conquistadores, in par- 
 ticular, lived in an atmosphere of fancy. 
 They looked at American savages and their 
 ways through Spanish spectacles ; and know- 
 ing nothing of the modern science of ethnol- 
 ogy, quite misunderstood the import of what 
 they saw. Beset by the national vice of 
 flowery embellishment, they were also par- 
 donably ignorant of savage life and had an 
 
 7 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 indiscriminating thirst for the marvelous. 
 Thus we see plainly how the Cibola myth 
 arose and grew ; and why most official Span- 
 ish reports of the conquest of the Aztecs 
 were so distorted by false conceptions of the 
 conquered people as in some particulars to be 
 of slight value as material for history. It 
 was, then, small wonder that Cabeza de Vaca 
 and his fellow adventurers, in the midst of 
 the hero worship of which they were now re- 
 cipients, should claim themselves to have seen 
 the mysterious seven cities and to have en- 
 larged upon the previous stories. 
 
 Coronado, governor of the northern prov- 
 ince of New Galicia, was accordingly sent to 
 conquer this wonderful country, which the 
 adventurers had seen but Guzman had failed 
 to find. In 1540, the year when Cortez again 
 returned to meet ungrateful neglect at the 
 hands of the Spanish court, Coronado set out 
 with a well-equipped following of three hun- 
 dred whites and eight hundred Indians. The 
 Cibola cities were found to be but mud pueb- 
 los in Arizona and New Mexico, with the as- 
 pect of which we are to-day familiar ; while 
 the mild-tempered inhabitants, destitute of 
 
 8 
 
Coronado's Expedition 
 
 wealth, peacefully practising their crude in- 
 dustries and tilling their irrigated fields, were 
 foemen hardly worthy of Castilian steel. 
 
 Disappointed, but still hoping to find the 
 country of gold, Coronado's gallant little 
 army, frequently thinned by death and deser- 
 tion, for three years beat up and down the 
 southwestern wilderness : now thirsting in 
 the deserts, now penned up in gloomy canons, 
 now crawling over pathless mountains, suffer- 
 ing the horrors of starvation and of despair, 
 but following this will-o'-the-wisp with a mel- 
 ancholy perseverance seldom seen in man save 
 when searching for some mysterious treasure. 
 Coronado apparently twice crossed the State 
 of Kansas. "Through mighty plains and 
 sandy heaths," says the chronicler of the ex- 
 pedition, " smooth and wearisome and bare of 
 wood. . . . All that way the plains are 
 as full of crookback oxen [buffaloes] as the 
 mountain Serena in Spain is of sheep. . . . 
 They were a great succor for the hunger and 
 want of bread which our people stood in. One 
 day it rained in that plain a great shower of 
 hail as big as oranges, which caused many 
 tears, weaknesses, and vows." The wanderer 
 
 9 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 ventured as far as the Missouri, and would 
 have gone still farther eastward but for his 
 inability to cross the swollen river. Co-oper- 
 ating parties explored the upper valleys of 
 the Rio Grande and Gila, ascended the Colo- 
 rado for two hundred and forty miles above 
 its mouth, and visited the Grand Canon of 
 the same river. Coronado at last returned, 
 satisfied that he had been victimized by the 
 idle tales of travelers. He was rewarded 
 with contumely, and lost his place as govern- 
 or of New Galicia ; but his romantic march 
 stands in history as one of the most remark- 
 able exploring expeditions of modern times. 
 
 Meanwhile, explorers did not forget the sup- 
 posed transcontinental waterway — the " Strait 
 of Anian," as some European geographers 
 now called it; the "Northwest Passage," 
 as it was generally styled by the English. 
 The latter were not long in exploring the in- 
 lets of the Atlantic coast south of the St. 
 Lawrence, and in consequence relegating to 
 the extreme north the eastern end of the 
 mythic strait. The Spanish on their part 
 ascended but slowly along the Pacific coast, 
 their successive maps locating the strait 
 
 10 
 
Spanish Coast Voyages 
 
 at varying distances northward of the latest 
 exploration ; although there were not lacking 
 those who claimed actually to have sailed 
 upon it, their fabrications gaining wide popu- 
 lar acceptance. We have seen that in 1533 
 they claimed Lower California. Ten years 
 later, one of Cabrillo's ships reached Cape Men- 
 docino ; but it was long before this record was 
 broken — indeed, the well-equipped expedi- 
 tion of Vizcaino, which came to anchor in 
 Monterey Bay in 1602-03, was little more 
 than a repetition of Cabrillo's, and Oregon 
 was still practically an undiscovered country. 
 In fact, now that India was found to be so 
 far away, and large Spanish interests had be- 
 come established in the Philippines and else- 
 where in the South Seas, concern in the 
 American north quickly waned ; save that it 
 was deemed important to find a port of 
 refuge on the American coast, in the in- 
 terest of the Manila traders, which was in 
 part the occasion of Vizcaino's voyage. As 
 regarded the much-sought-for strait, it came 
 to be recognized that a short route from 
 Europe to India through the American con- 
 tinent might well prove a positive disad- 
 
 11 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 vantage to Spain, by making it more con- 
 venient for rivals to reach her markets and 
 prey upon her commerce ; although many 
 argued that in that event it would be well 
 for Spain herself to discover the strait in 
 order to close it to others. Now that Eng- 
 lish piratical cruisers, officered by Drake 
 (1579) and Cavendish (1587), had rounded 
 Cape Horn and enriched themselves with the 
 spoils of her galleons, Spain's plight might 
 have been serious indeed had the Pacific been 
 also accessible through Hudson Bay. As it 
 was, a hundred and seventy years elapsed 
 after Vizcaino's enterprise, with practically 
 nothing discovered by Spanish sailors north 
 of the Gulf of California. 
 
 During this long period of inaction in 
 maritime discovery, New Spain exhibited a 
 certain degree of enterprise within the in- 
 terior. In 1582, some forty years after Coro- 
 nado's march, two Franciscan friars ascended 
 the valley of the Rio Grande, and went down 
 the valley of the Gila, making a transcon- 
 tinental tour, and securing a temporary re- 
 newal . of interest in the pueblos. Sixteen 
 years later, near the close of the sixteenth 
 
 12 
 
Spanish Missions 
 
 century, Juan de Onate invaded what is now 
 New Mexico, and Santa Fe was established 
 as the seat of Spanish power in the north. In 
 1604-05 Onate made extensive explorations 
 among the Zuni and Moqui towns, and de- 
 scended the Colorado to the sea ; while about 
 the same time several entradas were planted 
 among the Texan tribes far to the east. By 
 1630 the Roman Catholics had fifty missions 
 in New Mexico, Arizona, and Texas, admin- 
 istering religious instruction to ninety pueblos. 
 This was the high-water mark of Spanish 
 power in our Southwest. In 1680 the na- 
 tives, rendered desperate by the harsh rule of 
 their military taskmasters, drove them from 
 the land of Cibola ; but by the close of the 
 century the Spaniards were again in posses- 
 sion. 
 
 In 1697-1702 the Jesuits Kino and Sal- 
 vatierra, worthily imitating the deeds of their 
 French brethren in Canada, founded missions 
 along the Gila and Colorado Rivers — connect- 
 ing links between New Mexico and the 
 western coast. The Spaniards moved more 
 slowly than the French, and it was nearly a 
 century after Kino's notable expedition be- 
 
 13 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 fore an attempt was made to extend Indian 
 missions into Upper or Alta California. But 
 they were then pushed vigorously by the 
 Franciscans, headed by Father Junipero Serra, 
 at favorable points along the shore — San 
 Diego in 1769, Monterey the following year, 
 San Francisco in 1776, until by the end of 
 the century there were eighteen missions, 
 with forty priests, and 13,500 Indians living 
 at the convert villages. 
 
 It has been the fashion to charge the Span- 
 ish fathers with having practically enslaved 
 their dusky neophytes, in order to enrich 
 themselves from their labor. This conclu- 
 sion is not warranted by the facts. Like the 
 French Jesuits in Canada, the Spanish mis- 
 sionaries soon found it impracticable to suc- 
 ceed in the work of religious training and 
 oversight so long as their parishioners were 
 semi-nomads. Villages or compounds were 
 therefore formed in New Spain as in New 
 France, wherein it was thought the converts 
 might become accustomed to communal life, 
 and by continuous though moderate labor also 
 secure freedom from the taunts and tempta- 
 tions of the unconverted. While the Spanish 
 
 14 
 
Missionary Methods 
 
 army was undoubtedly cruel to the natives, 
 the laws of both Church and State were 
 models of benevolence toward these de- 
 pendent people. The sanitation in the con- 
 vert villages was inadequate, as it also was in 
 the towns of Spain, and the death-rate was 
 excessive ; the Indians chafed under sustained 
 labor in the communal fields ; they sometimes 
 rebelled against the modest tribute required 
 of them to meet the common expenses ; and 
 the minute rules and observances of the 
 Church, with corporal punishment meted out 
 at the sanctuary door to all offenders, were 
 not always to their liking. But these condi- 
 tions were such as Spaniards lived under at 
 home in that period when modern science 
 was unknown, when superstition prevailed, 
 and the Church ruled with the discipline of a 
 stern parent. The Indian, however, was less 
 prepared for this sort of thing than the Euro- 
 pean. We may now properly adjudge these 
 missionary methods as in some particulars 
 inapt, but they were born of the best Spanish 
 thought of their day, and were intended to 
 be philanthropic. That a mere handful of 
 priests could for so long a period firmly hold 
 
 15 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 in hand and to an appreciable degree soften 
 the fierce temper of so large a population of 
 sturdy savages, is an evidence that their rule 
 was not altogether that of the taskmaster. 
 
 In 1773, alarmed by the reports of Russian 
 coast explorations in the far north, Spain 
 sent out Juan Perez, who, doubtless first of 
 white men, examined the shore as far up as 
 latitude 55°. In 1774-75, Heceta, Perez, and 
 Cuadra explored the whole extent of the 
 Northwest Coast from 42° to about 58° — 
 the latter near the modern Sitka. On July 
 17th of the latter year Heceta's ship was 
 buffeted by the strong cross-currents of the 
 bay which forms the mouth of the Columbia ; 
 but no landing was made, and the existence 
 of the river was only surmised. Meanwhile, 
 exploration of the interior was not wholly 
 neglected by the Spaniards, for in 1776-77 
 Fathers Dominguez and Escalante journeyed 
 from New Mexico to Utah Lake, in the Great 
 Basin, which Father Font also visited in 1777. 
 
 Captain James Cook, the famous English 
 navigator, was, in 1778, on his third and 
 final voyage, searching the coast to the north 
 of Vizcaino's discoveries for the Northwest 
 
 16 
 
Perouse's Voyage 
 
 Passage, and in the course of his voyage ex- 
 plored between latitude 43° and 50°. The 
 following year, Cook's discoveries having be- 
 come widely known, Heceta and Cuadra con- 
 ducted extensive explorations as far up as 
 Alaska, and Spain now regarded the entire 
 Northwest Coast as her own ; indeed, further 
 voyages of discovery were the following year 
 forbidden by the king, although within a 
 few years the order was abrogated. 
 
 In 1786, a famous French navigator and 
 scientist, Count de la Perouse, visited these 
 shores and gave to the world its first defi- 
 nite knowledge of the California missions. 
 Within the next three years several English 
 fur-trading vessels were operating along the 
 coast, but added nothing to the record of 
 discoveries. Two and three vears later there 
 were new Spanish expeditions to watch the 
 Russians, who were contemplating establish- 
 ments in the north, also the adventurous 
 English, whose movements were alike sus- 
 picious; for while ostensibly only engaged 
 in carrying American furs to China, where 
 they were bartered for teas, silks, spices, and 
 other Oriental goods, the British captains 
 
 17 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 were suspected of entertaining designs of 
 permanent settlement on the American shore. 
 Irritation over the presence of small English 
 settlements at Nootka Sound occasioned a 
 diplomatic flurry between the two nations. 
 In 1789 Spanish naval officers seized at 
 Nootka two English trading vessels and 
 their crews, alleging trespass. After a long 
 and spirited controversy, which led almost 
 to war, Spain in 1795 agreed to abandon 
 Ebotka and substantially all of the shore 
 lying north of the Columbia ; thus enabling 
 English and American fur-traders to obtain a 
 firm hold upon the Northwest Coast. 1 
 
 1 Nootka Sound is on the west coast of Vancouver Island, 
 now Canadian territory. In August, 1903, upon the shore of 
 Friendly Cove, the Washington University State Historical So- 
 ciety erected " a fine monument of native granite " bearing this 
 inscription : " Vancouver and Quadra met here in August, 1792, 
 under the treaty between Spain and Great Britain of October, 
 1790. Erected by the Washington University State Historical 
 Society, August, 1903." The address of presentation was made 
 by Prof. Edmond S. Meany, of Washington University; that of 
 acceptance by Sir Henri Joly de Lotbiniere, Lieutenant-Governor 
 of British Columbia. A picture of the monument appears in the 
 Seattle Post-Intelligencer for August 30, 1903. During his visit 
 Professor Meany exhumed numerous " flat Spanish bricks " 
 used in the foundations of the old Spanish fort. For a half cen- 
 tury after the meeting the island bore the name, " Quadra and 
 Vancouver's Island." 
 
 18 
 
American Coast Traders 
 
 American fur- trading vessels, chiefly from 
 New England, appeared upon the scene within 
 the year following the treaty with England 
 under which the United States was recog- 
 nized as a nation. Like the English, they 
 sought to secure furs from the Pacific Coast 
 Indians and trade them in China and India 
 for goods salable in the Atlantic towns. The 
 leaders in this venture were a company of 
 Boston merchants who had read the reports 
 of Cook's voyages. In 1788 they sent out 
 the Columbia and Lady Washington, small 
 vessels with cargoes of blankets, gaily col. 
 ored cloths, beads, hatchets, and other ar- 
 ticles commonly used in traffic with the abo- 
 rigines ; and thereafter New England naviga- 
 tors were visitors frequently seen upon the 
 shores of what are now California, Oregon, 
 and Washington. 
 
 Upon the eleventh of May, 1792, Captain 
 Robert Gray, commanding the Columbia, 
 entered the mouth of the great river to which 
 he gave the name of his vessel, a stream des- 
 tined to play a conspicuous part in the roman- 
 tic story of Rocky Mountain exploration. In 
 this same year some thirty vessels visited the 
 3 19 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Northwest Coast — French, Portuguese, Eng- 
 lish, and American — most of them engaged in 
 trafficking for furs with the natives, others 
 upon errands either of diplomacy or explora- 
 tion. Most prominent of the English captains 
 was George Vancouver, probably the best 
 equipped navigator who had yet visited the 
 region. His surveys and reports did much to 
 open the way to subsequent English claims 
 in this quarter. 
 
 Owing to the fact that the East India Com- 
 pany enjoyed practically a monopoly of Eng- 
 lish trade upon the Pacific, especially that 
 with China and India, nearly all the vessels 
 of independent English traders had by the 
 close of the century abandoned the North- 
 west Coast. Thus the Americans were for 
 nearly twenty years left almost alone in this 
 important trade, an opportunity not neglected 
 by our adventurous marines. Leaving some 
 New England port with a diversified store of 
 "Yankee notions" for bartering with Poly- 
 nesians and Indians, a skipper would stop en 
 route at the West Indies and the South Sea 
 islands. There he would pick up molasses, 
 sugar, shells, cocoanuts, and other articles 
 
 20 
 
An Important Factor 
 
 suitable for traffic, with them proceeding to 
 the Northwest Coast, perhaps making Nootka 
 his chief port, where he quickly acquired a 
 stock of furs from the natives. Running 
 down with his peltries to the Sandwich Islands 
 at the close of the season, he would leave 
 them to be dressed on land by the greater 
 part of his ship's company, engage a fresh 
 crew of islanders, and return to Nootka for 
 another cargo of furs. Adding enough san- 
 dalwood at Hawaii to make a full cargo, he 
 would now sail for China, to exchange his 
 holdings for teas, silks, and Oriental cloths, 
 with which he would return to the Atlantic 
 coast after a profitable absence of three or 
 four years. 
 
 It will be seen in the course of this narra- 
 tive that the desire to cultivate the fur-trade 
 was, under the American regime, an important 
 factor in Rocky Mountain exploration. 
 
 21 
 
CHAPTEE II 
 
 FRENCH EXPLORATIONS FROM THE EAST 
 
 In common with the English colonists upon 
 the Atlantic slope, the men of New France 
 had no conception of the immense breadth of 
 the North American continent. When, prob- 
 ably in 1634, Champlain's agent, Jean Nicolet, 
 penetrated to the far-away wilds of Wiscon- 
 sin, he hoped to meet Chinamen upon the 
 shores of Green Bay. Before landing at the 
 principal Indian village there, he robed himself 
 in a gorgeous damask gown decorated with 
 gaily colored birds and flowers, a ceremonial 
 garment with which he had taken care to pro- 
 vide himself at Quebec, expecting to meet 
 mandarins similarly attired. In the name La 
 Chine, as applied to the settlement at the 
 great rapids of the St. Lawrence just above 
 Montreal, we have a memorial of the hope 
 entertained by La Salle that the road to 
 
 22 
 
Width of the Continent 
 
 China lay in this direction. These incidents 
 amuse us now. But we have seen that it was 
 somewhat over a century after Nicolet's visit 
 before Bering established the fact that Amer- 
 ica was insulated and not a part of Asia ; and 
 still another half century of spasmodic ex- 
 ploration was required before the facts rela- 
 tive to the width of the continent were at last 
 known. 
 
 Although the hope that Asiatics might be 
 found in the Mississippi Valley does not 
 appear to have been long entertained, the old 
 theory of a short-cut transcontinental water- 
 way was held by the French throughout their 
 occupancy of North America. Jolliet, Mar- 
 quette, and La Salle, as had many explorers 
 before them, thought at first that the Missis- 
 sippi itself might pour into the South Sea. 
 When they found this untrue, it was there- 
 after the dream of adventurers to discover 
 some stream flowing westerly to the Pacific, 
 which might prove a convenient waterway for 
 the portable craft then used by the explorers 
 of the interior. 
 
 For a long period the French were satisfied 
 not to penetrate far beyond Lakes Superior 
 
 23 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 and Nepigon, a region wherein Du Luth was 
 for many years the principal trader. The In- 
 dians were able to draw fairly correct maps 
 either on birch-bark or with a stick upon the 
 sand, and were fond of dilating upon the size 
 and length of the lakes and rivers by which 
 they had journeyed. Thus, from them, the 
 traders, settled in their little waterside forts 
 of logs, became in a general way well ac- 
 quainted with the interior ; but they did not 
 at first care to explore it to any great depth, 
 for the natives, eager for trade, brought in 
 furs from far-distant regions. 
 
 With the revival of European interest in 
 the Northwest Passage, some of the officials 
 of New France became imbued with an ambi- 
 tion to foster the search, and here and there 
 among the hardy Western forest traders were 
 men who expressed eagerness to undertake it. 
 The court at Paris, however, looked askance 
 at any scheme to divert public money to Can- 
 ada. If the colony across seas were not to 
 be a source of revenue, it at least must not, 
 if possible to prevent, prove a burden to 
 the motherland. When in 1719 Vaudreuil, 
 then Governor of New France, was authorized 
 
 24 
 
Fur-Trading Explorers 
 
 to establish a line of posts through the coun- 
 try to the west of Lake Superior, it was ex- 
 pressly stipulated by the court that they must 
 be planted " without any expense to the king 
 — as the person establishing them would be 
 remunerated by the trade." Thus Canadian 
 explorers under the French regime were, as a 
 rule, expected to turn fur-traders en route, 
 and support themselves from the country 
 through which they passed, being armed with 
 the often doubtful privilege of throttling the 
 trade of competitors in the field. Under such 
 conditions it is small wonder that some ex- 
 ploring parties soon developed into mere tyran- 
 nous trade monopolies, operating through wide 
 districts, and maintaining their grasp by cor- 
 rupt manipulation of court favorites; while 
 others, honestly bent on discovery, were in 
 the long absences of their leaders from home 
 ruined by enemies at court and in trade, and 
 came to sad ends. 
 
 In 1720 the Jesuit historian and traveler 
 Father Charlevoix was sent to New France 
 on a tour of observation, to inform the Coun- 
 cil of the Marine at Paris relative to a suit- 
 able route to the Pacific. He made two sug- 
 
 25 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 gestions : either to send an expedition up the 
 Missouri to its source, and then explore to the 
 westward, exactly what Jefferson planned in 
 the two closing decades of the century, or to 
 establish a line of fur-trade posts among the 
 Sioux, and thus gradually creep into and 
 across the interior. The second of these prop- 
 ositions, which he reported to be the less ex- 
 pensive and perhaps more certain, was chosen 
 by the French authorities. 
 
 It was, nevertheless, several years before 
 the resolution was carried into effect. Fort 
 Beauharnois, a stockaded trading station, 
 was built (1727) upon the Minnesota shore 
 of Lake Pepin, on the upper Mississippi, with 
 Bene Boucher de la Perriere in charge, and 
 the Jesuits Guignas and De Gonnor to look 
 after the missionary field ; for in New France 
 the service of the Church went hand in hand 
 with that of the king. A fresh uprising of 
 the Foxes in Wisconsin — they gave the 
 French no end of trouble in those days — 
 caused the abandonment of the post, where 
 little but discouragement had been heard con- 
 cerning the Western Sea. 
 
 Soon after De Gonnor's return to Quebec, 
 
 26 
 
Verendrye's Career 
 
 there arrived at the little capital of New 
 France one the remainder of whose life was 
 to be spent in searching for the Pacific Ocean 
 from the east — Pierre Gaultier de Varennes 
 de la Verendrye. Son of the governor of the 
 colony of Three Rivers, on the St. Lawrence, 
 Verendrye had had early experience as a fur- 
 trader. Upon the opening of the War of the 
 Spanish Succession (1702-13) he went to 
 France and obtained a lieutenant's commis- 
 sion in the royal army. Left for dead on 
 the bloody field of Malplaquet, where he was 
 wounded by both shots and saber cuts, he re- 
 covered, and returning to Canada re-entered 
 the woods as a trader, a pursuit then enlisting 
 the services of the most daring spirits in 
 New France. 
 
 Obtaining the command of the French out- 
 post on Lake Nepigon, and there also con- 
 ducting a fur-trade on his own behalf, Ve- 
 rendrye had opportunity for meeting Indians 
 representing many widely differing tribes, 
 scattered throughout a vast wilderness; for this 
 was the headquarters of the extensive trade 
 which was conducted in opposition to that of 
 the great English company on Hudson Bay. 
 
 27 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 From these Indians he heard many strange 
 tales of adventure and geography. One chief, 
 in particular, told him of a certain river flow- 
 ing westward out of a great lake which the 
 narrator had himself descended until he 
 came to a tide which so terrified him that he 
 turned back ; also of a salt lake with many 
 villages upon it. Warming with his story, 
 Ochagach drew on birch-bark a rude map of 
 the route to these regions, and set Veren- 
 drye's heart afire with a yearning to discover 
 the long-sought sea. 
 
 Acting upon the impulse of this desire, he 
 descended to Quebec in his birch canoe — a 
 long and dangerous journey, but one which 
 these Western traders undertook almost 
 yearly, in order to keep in touch with the 
 Government and the fur market. He there 
 laid before the governor, Beauharnois, this 
 Indian map and his scheme for reaching the 
 Pacific by way of the network of northern 
 lakes and rivers — chiefly Pigeon River, Lake 
 of the Woods, Rainy Lake and River, Lake 
 Winnipeg, and the Assiniboin. De Gonnor, 
 being convinced that the route thither was 
 not through the Sioux country, indorsed his 
 
 28 
 
JZorf- /daman 
 
 tstiecu/Q.* 
 
 <2/N/j€rtCN> 
 
 icr-tcw /u/fua ^cca*na.m> 
 
 '/& 
 
 niiCU.«tt 
 
 7e g. 
 
 deccuverfeJ 
 
Ccvytl. fracee. -par I- JauVafe OcAaja-cA, e£ aufoej, layiu/z. - J —<•' i*u awr dcccuyertr.i 
 
 «&* &//utirt ■Zfr'an 
 
 MAP DRAWN BY THE INDIAN OCHAGACH. 
 bcsimile of manuscript preserved in Dominion Parliamentary Library, Ottawa. 
 
 cent Zsyrrejenttcj c/ans faCark ou /y'yriJL' 
 
Ochagach's Waterway 
 
 friend's theory as at least probable. The 
 chief engineer of New France, Chaussegros 
 de Lery, an official of high repute, also 
 thought well of Verendrye's belief that by 
 this path he could find the ocean within five 
 hundred leagues from Lake Superior. 
 
 Having won the powerful backing of these 
 officers, the adventurous commandant asked 
 the king for a military force of a hundred 
 men, with canoes, arms, and provisions ; but, 
 as usual, the ministry would give nothing 
 further than a parchment with a great seal, 
 granting him a monopoly of the fur-trade 
 north and west of Lake Superior, upon the 
 supposed profits of which he was to reim- 
 burse himself. Possessing but small capital, 
 he was now chiefly dependent on what credit 
 he could obtain on the strength of his mo- 
 nopoly. Quebec merchants appear to have 
 had some doubts of the cash value of trade 
 privileges, and granted goods and equipment 
 to the expedition only on terms highly dis- 
 advantageous to Verendrye. With these, 
 however, he set forth upon his quest (June 
 8, 1731) in good heart, accompanied by his 
 three sons and his nephew La Jemeraye. At 
 
 29 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Mackinac the Jesuit Father Charles Michel 
 Mesaiger joined the expedition, and at the 
 close of the season Verendrye built his first 
 fort, St. Pierre, three miles above the falls 
 of Eainy River. The earthwork which sup- 
 ported the palisade of this establishment is 
 still to be seen. 
 
 The following year the explorers built 
 their second fort, St. Charles, upon the south- 
 west shore of the Lake of the Woods, where 
 they hoped to reap profits from the trade of 
 the Sioux, who visited this region in consid- 
 erable numbers for fishing and intertribal 
 barter. A year later the expedition reached 
 Lake Winnipeg. By this time Verendrye's 
 finances were in sad condition. The ex- 
 penses of his enterprise, in which the cost of 
 maintaining the posts was a large item, had so 
 far outweighed the receipts of the uncertain 
 fur-trade that he had lost the then large sum 
 of 43,000 livres. La Jemeraye returned to 
 Quebec to report the situation to the govern- 
 or, who represented to the king that the ex- 
 pedition must stop if unaided. As usual, the 
 court gave an unfavorable reply, merely reiter- 
 ating its proffer of the fur-trade monopoly. 
 
 30 
 
A Wilderness Tragedy 
 
 V6rendrye rallied, notwithstanding, and in 
 1734 built a post at the mouth of Winnipeg 
 River, Fort Maurepas, named after the French 
 Prime Minister, whose favor he vainly courted. 
 The year following, while awaiting the result 
 of a second appeal for help, the time of the 
 explorers was spent in an extended traffic with 
 the savages between Lakes Superior and 
 Winnipeg, and in taking cargoes of furs to 
 Mackinac in exchange for goods in demand 
 among the Indians. 
 
 The year 1736 was marked by successive 
 disasters, culminating in a tragedy. Veren- 
 drye's eldest son, together with a Jesuit 
 missionary, Jean Pierre Aulneau, and twenty 
 others, were surprised and massacred by 
 Sioux upon an island in the Lake of the 
 Woods, five leagues from St. Charles. Ve- 
 rendrye was now beset by creditors, who 
 pestered him with lawsuits, and necessitated 
 his journeying several times to Montreal. 
 But during these years of adversity the pen- 
 niless though undaunted adventurer somehow 
 contrived to push his explorations. By 1738 
 he had a chain of six fortified posts reaching 
 westward from Lake Superior — St. Pierre on 
 
 31 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Rainy Lake, St. Charles on Lake of the Woods, 
 Maurepas at the mouth of the Winnipeg, Bour- 
 bon on the east shore of Lake Winnipeg, La 
 Reine at Portage la Prairie on the Assiniboin, 
 and Dauphin on Lake Manitoba. Fort Rouge, 
 on the site of the present city of Winnipeg, and 
 another post at the mouth of the Saskatche- 
 wan, were occupied for a short time. Most 
 of these were small stockades, flanked by log 
 blockhouses, and built and manned with 
 great difficulty ; while others were merely 
 winter stations, hastily erected. 
 
 In 1738 he determined to make his long- 
 projected journey in search of the Pacific. 
 Leaving Fort La Reine in October, with a 
 party of about fifty persons, French and In- 
 dians, he was lured on by the false tales of 
 the natives, who sent him thither and yon, 
 seeking some band which might conduct him 
 to the ocean. At last he determined to visit 
 the Mandans, on the upper Missouri, the 
 tribe among whom Lewis and Clark spent the 
 winter sixty-six years later. On December 
 3d the wanderers reached the central Man- 
 dan town, situated 250 miles from Portage la 
 Prairie. Verendrye was much impressed by 
 
 32 
 
Among the Mandans 
 
 the physiognomy of the Mandans, whom he 
 found to be quite different in appearance 
 from the Indians with whom he was familiar ; 
 among them he saw many with light com- 
 plexions, and some of the women had flaxen 
 hair. Their village fortifications were new to 
 him, and many of their customs were alike 
 strange. Explorers of a later date ascribed 
 these peculiarities to a supposed Welsh 
 origin, a theory now exploded. Verendrye 
 would have passed the winter among these 
 interesting people, but his Assiniboin guide 
 and interpreter would not stay, and a return 
 march was necessitated. Fort La Keine was 
 reached February 11th, after many hardships, 
 during which the leader became, he tells us in 
 his journal, " greatly fatigued and very ill." 
 
 After another year of lawsuits and jealous 
 opposition, Verendrye made (1741) an un- 
 successful journey towards the Mandans. The 
 next year, his eldest surviving son, Pierre, later 
 called the Chevalier de la Verendrye, set 
 out upon the same quest, in company with his 
 brother and two other men. Keaching the 
 Mandans in three weeks from La Eeine, the 
 adventurers pushed their way farther and f ar- 
 
 33 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 ther southwestward, enticed by the usual 
 fairy-tales of the tribesmen. All summer and 
 autumn and through the early winter they 
 wearily plodded on, now and then joining 
 native war-parties, occasionally taking wide 
 detours for hunting, but ever seeking news 
 of the Western Sea. 
 
 Upon New Year's day, 1743, they, doubt- 
 less first of all white men, saw the Rocky 
 Mountains from the east — probably the Big- 
 horn Range, a hundred and twenty miles 
 east of Yellowstone Park — and it is thought 
 that they pushed on until sighting the Wind 
 River Range. Finding their pathway to the 
 ocean thus blocked — although little suspect- 
 ing that nearly a thousand miles of these 
 dreary mountains lay between them and the 
 sea — they returned to La Prairie, which they 
 reached upon the second of July, to their 
 father's great joy, for he had almost given 
 them up for lost. 
 
 The elder Verendrye was now given a cap- 
 taincy in the colonial troops and decorated by 
 the Cross of the Order of St. Louis, but he 
 died at Montreal, December 6, 1745, when he 
 was again about to start for the West. His 
 
 34 
 
Post of the Western Sea 
 
 sons added to their record by ascending the 
 Saskatchewan River to its forks and making 
 known other wide tracts of country. Beau- 
 harnois and his successor, Galissoniere, who 
 were stanch friends of the family, had, how- 
 ever, been succeeded (1749) by the corrup- 
 tionist La Jonquiere, and the claims of the 
 Verendryes were not only ignored, but their 
 goods were seized, their posts and property 
 turned over to Legardeur St. Pierre, and they 
 reduced to poverty. The unscrupulous St. 
 Pierre, who was in collusion with the intend- 
 ant Bigot, built a small post, La Jonquiere, 
 near the mountains on the upper Saskatche- 
 wan, not far from the site of the modern 
 Calgary ; but after three years of hardship, 
 in which his little party sometimes lacked 
 sufficient food and were attacked by hostile 
 Indians, he was compelled to abandon the 
 enterprise. 
 
 Although St. Pierre had left the country, 
 others carried on the work, the chain of posts 
 from Lake Superior to La Jonquiere being 
 collectively styled in the official reports " Post 
 of the Western Sea," a name expressing the 
 dream of Verendrye, which Englishmen were 
 4 35 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 to realize a generation later. Two years be- 
 fore the downfall of New France a report 
 upon these posts describes them as "forts 
 built of stockades . . . that can give protec- 
 tion only against the Indians . . . and trusted 
 generally to the care of one or two officers, 
 seven or eight soldiers, and eighty engages. 
 From them the English movements can be 
 watched," and " the discovery of the Western 
 Sea may be accomplished ; but to make this 
 discovery it will be necessary that the travel- 
 ers give up all view of personal interest." 
 
 In the collapse of French dominion Rocky 
 Mountain exploration suffered a temporary 
 check, for the Western posts beyond Kami- 
 nistiquia, on Lake Superior, were at once aban- 
 doned. The methods of New France were not 
 rapid, but they achieved results more quickly 
 than those of the British, under which a gen- 
 eration passed before her fur-traders succeeded 
 in breaking a path to the Pacific. 
 
 36 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 ENGLISH EXPLOKATIONS FKOM THE EAST 
 
 As a result of explorations made by two 
 daring French adventurers — Pierre d'Esprit, 
 Sieur Radisson, and M6dard Chouart, Sieur 
 des Groseilliers, who probably were the first 
 white men to discover Lake Superior and 
 possibly Hudson Bay — there was organized 
 in London in 1667 one of the most powerful 
 trading corporations known to history, " The 
 Governor and Company of Adventurers of 
 England, trading into Hudson Bay." The 
 redoubtable Prince Rupert headed the list of 
 stockholders, prominent among whom were 
 the Duke of York and other members of the 
 court. It would have been impossible for a 
 king to have granted to any company a charter 
 more favorable than that with which Charles 
 II endowed this ambitious fur-trading cor- 
 poration. They were given outright the far- 
 
 37 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 stretching region drained by all waters either 
 directly or indirectly flowing into and from 
 Hudson Bay — to which they later added great 
 grants upon the Pacific and Arctic slopes. 
 Throughout this vast wilderness, called " Ku- 
 pert's Land," they were to enjoy the ' ' whole, 
 entire, and only liberty of Trade and Tramck," 
 and the right to seize upon the property and 
 persons of all competitors, whether British or 
 not ; they were to make and enforce laws for 
 their wide domain ; to administer justice ; to 
 build and garrison forts ; to maintain ships of 
 war, and to exercise all military as well as 
 civil powers, even to the making of war or 
 peace with other peoples. In short, theirs 
 was as absolute a sway as that of any Orien- 
 tal monarch. 
 
 During the entire term of their government 
 the Hudson's Bay Company sternly exercised 
 these great powers. Their dealings with the 
 Indians were just ; their commercial methods, 
 while stern, were honorable; their agents 
 were, as a rule, well selected and judicious ; 
 but they insisted upon absolute monopoly, 
 and brooked no violation of the rule, offend- 
 ers being as severely handled as though guilty 
 
 38 
 
Secrets of the Interior 
 
 of serious crime. With the advance of years, 
 however, and the general amelioration of gov- 
 ernmental methods in England, the company 
 gradually tempered their rule. Two centu- 
 ries after their organization they surrendered 
 to the public all powers save such as in our 
 time properly appertain to a commercial body. 
 Keen in trade, the company were long sin- 
 gularly inactive in the matter of interior ex- 
 ploration. The Indians and half-breeds came 
 long journeys to bring their pelts to the well- 
 fortified trading-posts upon the shores of the 
 bay, whence they were loaded directly into 
 ships and transported to England ; and with 
 this the merchant adventurers seemed content 
 for about eighty years. It is a question in 
 dispute as to what induced this early apathy 
 — whether hesitancy at spending money, the 
 natural sluggishness of a monopoly which 
 easily made large dividends despite heavy 
 losses from several French military expedi- 
 tions against the bay forts, timidity of the 
 company's agents, or a serious policy of keep- 
 ing from both competitors and possible set- 
 tlers the secrets of the great fur-bearing wil- 
 derness. Certain it is that the company's 
 
 39 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 inaction was in ill accord with the temper of 
 the British people, in whom the love of bold 
 adventure has ever been strong. 
 
 Of this indifference toward exploration 
 upon the part of "the old lady of Fen- 
 church Street " we have seen that the more 
 active French took advantage. The opera- 
 tions of Verendrye and St. Pierre, and their 
 successors in the long " Post of the Western 
 Sea" — stretching for over twelve hundred 
 miles from Lake Superior to the upper waters 
 of the Saskatchewan — were clearly within the 
 territory so lavishly bestowed upon the great 
 compauy by King Charles. But for the fall 
 of New France no doubt the Pacific would 
 within a few years have been reached by 
 French agents in the far West. Thus might 
 the British have for a time been checkmated 
 by a system of fortified stations connecting 
 the Western Sea with Lake Superior, and 
 serving as the left wing of that thin line of 
 occupation which already connected Canada 
 and Louisiana by way of the Great Lakes and 
 the Mississippi Valley — the whole an enor- 
 mous letter T, with its horizontal bar a trans 
 continental system stretching from the Gulf 
 
 40 
 
The Northwest Passage 
 
 of St. Lawrence to the Pacific, and its stem 
 commanding the entire length of the Missis- 
 sippi River and its approaches. It was an 
 ambitious project; although that the entire 
 cordon would eventually have been broken 
 at every point by the slower but steadier 
 British, there is no room to doubt. 
 
 The Atlantic coast had been explored in 
 detail at a much earlier date than the Pacific. 
 The early dreams that the mythical trans- 
 continental waterway might be found leading 
 through such rivers as the James, the Roan- 
 oke, and the Hudson had soon been shat- 
 tered. Every opening south of the Gulf of 
 St. Lawrence had been examined in vain ; 
 and now the only promise seemed to be that 
 Hudson Strait and Bay would prove to be 
 connected with the Northwest Passage. To 
 find this was for over two hundred years the 
 dream of navigators ; indeed, " the discovery 
 of a New Passage into the South Sea " was 
 one of the duties imposed upon the Hudson's 
 Bay Company by its charter. That it failed 
 to do anything for fifty years, awakened se- 
 vere criticism, which it was sought to mollify 
 in 1719 by a fruitless expedition with two 
 
 41 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 ships along the west coast of the bay, fol- 
 lowed two years later by another ; but these 
 enterprises were not regarded by enemies as 
 serious attempts to solve the problem. 
 
 About 1735, Arthur Dobbs, a talented and 
 pugnacious Irishman, commenced a vigorous 
 assault on the company, which lasted for some 
 fifteen years. Dobbs was an enthusiast on 
 the subject of the Northwest Passage, and 
 with rare gift of phrase and considerable 
 knowledge of North American conditions, 
 fired the British imagination by painting in 
 heightened colors the beauty and resources 
 of the interior and the great profits which 
 might ensue from this trade and that which 
 would also be developed by a short route to 
 the East Indies. Dobbs bitterly attacked 
 the company for neglecting the exploration 
 and settlement originally expected of it, for 
 abusing the Indians, neglecting their forts, 
 ill-treating their own servants, and encourag- 
 ing the French. Its replies were not of a 
 character such as wholly to convince the 
 people, whose sympathies were from the first 
 with Dobbs. 
 
 In 1736 the company sought to satisfy the 
 
 42 
 
Dobbs's Contention 
 
 public by despatching two sloops on a voy- 
 age to discover the passage, but of course 
 they were unsuccessful, as was also a like ex- 
 pedition tne^ following year. In N 1>£41-42 
 Captain Christopher Middleton took out two 
 small vessels directly under the supervision 
 of Dobbs, who now had the backing of the 
 lords of the admiralty. But when this search, 
 from which much had been expected, met 
 with equal discouragement, Dobbs accused the 
 navigator of playing into the hands of the 
 company. A bitter dispute ensued, during 
 which numerous and widely read books and 
 pamphlets were published on both sides. 
 Popular interest was so aroused by this agi- 
 tation that in 1745 Parliament voted a re- 
 ward of <£20,000 to the British navigator who 
 should discover a passage from Hudson Bay 
 to the Pacific Ocean — an offer renewed in 
 1776. In 1746-47 a committee of Dobbs's 
 friends sent out another expedition under his 
 special direction; but it was quite as unsuc- 
 cessful as Middleton's, whereupon Dobbs 
 dropped this phase of the discussion. 
 
 The opposition now centered upon a plea 
 of " non-user," under which the company's 
 
 43 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 charter was in 1749 attacked in Parliament. 
 It was shown that at that time it had only 
 four or five forts upon the coast, housing but 
 120 regular employees. The attempt, how- 
 ever, to secure a charter for a new com- 
 pany, whose promoters promised to explore 
 the interior, crowd out the French, and secure 
 the entire fur-trade for English merchants, 
 failed at this time, and the corporation es- 
 caped unscathed. Fortunately for the fur- 
 ther peace of the company, Dobbs was soon 
 thereafter (1750) sent out as governor of 
 North Carolina, where he exhibited much abil- 
 ity and broad, liberal views, although his con- 
 tentious disposition led him into frequent 
 quarrels with the legislature. His interest in 
 the Northwest Passage continued active until 
 death claimed him in 1765. 
 
 By the Treaty of Paris (1763), Great Brit- 
 ain obtained control, as against any other 
 European power, of the entire northeast of 
 North America, of the northwest to the Mis- 
 sissippi, and of the country north and west of 
 the sources of the Mississippi as far as the 
 Hudson's Bay Company cared to go. Que- 
 bec and Montreal, particularly the latter, soon 
 
 44 
 
The Henrys 
 
 began to attract adventurous Englishmen and 
 Scotchmen, many of whom entered the fur- 
 trade as independent operators, none of them 
 over particular as to whether or not they 
 poached on the preserve of the great com- 
 pany. In the employ of these traders were 
 many experienced French agents, while 
 French and half-breed voyageurs found under 
 their new employers quite as lucrative occu- 
 pation as in the days of the old regime. 
 
 One of these Scotchmen, Alexander Henry, 
 was at Mackinac and Sault Ste. Marie as 
 early as 1761, two years after the victory of 
 Wolfe and two before the definitive treaty of 
 peace. In 1765 he enjoyed a monopoly of 
 the Lake Superior trade, and three years later 
 we find him establishing a regular trade route 
 between Kaministiquia and Mackinac. At 
 the close of the century this sturdy pioneer's 
 nephew, also Alexander Henry — of whom we 
 shall hear later — was operating in the Mani- 
 toba region ; both traders have left us volu- 
 minous journals of their experiences, which 
 are interesting if only on the side of roman- 
 tic adventure. 
 
 Thomas Curry, another Scotch merchant, 
 
 45 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 penetrated in 1766 with his crew of voya- 
 geurs and interpreters to one of Verendrye's 
 old posts on the lower Saskatchewan, and 
 won such gains by his venture in peltries 
 that, says Mackenzie, " he was satisfied never 
 again to return to the Indian country." An- 
 other profitable fur-trading journey was made 
 two years later by James Finlay, who reached 
 as high a point on the Saskatchewan as that 
 attained by the Verendryes. 
 
 While unconnected with the search for a 
 transcontinental waterway, these expeditions 
 of the independent traders served to smooth 
 the path toward the Rocky Mountains, 
 and therefore have a place in our narrative. 
 Meanwhile, an enterprising Englishman was 
 directly seeking the waterway in a more 
 southern latitude- -through the country of 
 the Sioux, thus unconsciously attempting the 
 venture which Charlevoix had forty-five years 
 before (p. 25) suggested as an alternative to 
 the Missouri River route, and toward which 
 La Perriere had made a feeble start. 
 
 Jonathan Carver had served as a captain in 
 a Massachusetts militia regiment— with Wolfe 
 on the Plains of Abraham, and under Amherst 
 
 46 
 
Carver's Quest 
 
 at the capture of Montreal. With the advent 
 of peace, he became possessed of the patriotic 
 desire to " continue still serviceable, and con- 
 tribute, as much as lay in my power, to make 
 that vast acquisition of territory, gained by 
 Great Britain, in North America advanta- 
 geous to it." The exploration which he under- 
 took was ambitious in character : " What I 
 chiefly had in view, after gaining a knowl- 
 edge of the Manners, Customs, Languages, 
 Soil, and natural Productions of the different 
 nations that inhabit the back of the Missis- 
 sippi, was to ascertain the Breadth of that 
 vast continent ; " then to propose to the gov- 
 ernment the establishment of a post " in some 
 of those parts about the Straits of Annian, 
 which having been first discovered by Sir 
 Francis Drake, of course belong to the Eng- 
 lish," which "would greatly facilitate the 
 discovery of a North- West Passage, or a com- 
 munication between Hudson's Bay and the 
 Pacific Ocean." 
 
 Leaving Boston in June, 1766, Carver pro- 
 ceeded by way of Albany and Niagara to 
 Mackinac, then the farthest English outpost 
 in the Northwest. Ascending the Fox Kiver 
 
 47 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 of Green Bay, lie descended the Wisconsin 
 and ascended the Mississippi to the Falls of 
 St. Anthony (November 17th), the site of 
 the modern Minneapolis. Here he had ex- 
 pected supplies for which he contracted at 
 Mackinac, intending to push through to the 
 old fur-trade route west of Lake Superior, 
 and eventually reach " the Heads of the river 
 of the West " — by which he meant that he 
 would seek the sources of the Columbia, 
 which elsewhere he calls " the River Oregon, 
 or the River of the West, that falls into the 
 Pacific Ocean at the straits of Annian." 
 
 But through somebody's carelessness these 
 supplies never reached him. While waiting 
 for them he explored Elk and Minnesota 
 Rivers — the latter for a distance of two hun- 
 dred miles, to the Sioux of the plains. Later, 
 in the spring of 1767, he descended to Prairie 
 du Chien, at the junction of the Wisconsin 
 and Mississippi Rivers, and obtained a few 
 supplies from some traders who centered 
 there. Ascending the Chippewa, and later 
 the St. Croix, he portaged over to a stream 
 flowing into Lake Superior, and coasted 
 around the western end of the lake to Grand 
 
 48 
 
A Notable Volume 
 
 Portage, near the mouth of Pigeon River, 
 where he obtained from Indians much valu- 
 able information regarding the Winnipeg 
 region. Still unable to procure the goods 
 needed for an extensive journey into the in- 
 terior, Carver reluctantly returned to Mack- 
 inac by the southern shore of the lake, and 
 reached Boston in October, 1768, having been 
 absent about two and a half years and trav- 
 eled nearly seven thousand miles, much of it 
 through an almost unknown wilderness. The 
 bulky volume of his travels, published in Lon- 
 don in 1778, attracted wide attention, being 
 an important contribution to American geog- 
 raphy, and it is still held in high regard as a 
 treatise upon the manners and customs of the 
 Indians ; for his report is that of an intelligent 
 and discriminating eye-witness. 
 
 Carver had brought back most remarkable 
 stories told him by the Indians concerning 
 great beds of gold in the " Shining Moun- 
 tains," probably those now known as the 
 Black Hills. His hopeful reports concern- 
 ing the " Straits of Annian " and the " River 
 of the West" were also well calculated to 
 quicken popular interest among Englishmen 
 
 49 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 who had not yet forgotten the fervid descrip- 
 tions by Arthur Dobbs. This awakened the 
 Hudson's Bay Company to fresh endeavors. 
 
 Samuel Hearne, a trusted servant of the 
 corporation, was sent out in November, 1769, 
 " to clear up the point, if possible . . . 
 respecting a passage out of Hudson Bay into 
 the Western Ocean, as hath lately been repre- 
 sented by l the American traveler ' " — mean- 
 ing Carver. Abandoned by his native guides, 
 and himself as yet unused to the ways of the 
 wilderness, Hearne was soon obliged to re- 
 turn discomfited to his base, the Prince of 
 Wales Fort, at the mouth of Churchill River. 
 He started afresh the following February, 
 only to be plundered by the Indians, and again 
 returned to the fort, this time after a weary 
 absence of nearly nine months. A third time 
 did the persevering Hearne make the attempt, 
 starting in December, 1770. Joining a great 
 war-party of various bands, whose members 
 had not before seen a white man, the expedi- 
 tion reached Coppermine River the following 
 July, and descended it to the Arctic Ocean. 
 
 After witnessing the horrible spectacle of 
 a massacre of Eskimos on the part of his na- 
 
 50 
 
Hearne's Crossing 
 
 tive companions, Hearne set up a stake and, 
 in the presence of a wondering audience of 
 skin-clad savages, went through the empty 
 ceremony of taking possession of the country 
 for the Hudson's Bay Company. Upon the 
 return he went with the Indians to the north 
 shore of Lake Athabasca, and after sore pri- 
 vations reached his fort upon the last day of 
 June, 1772, having been absent upon this jour- 
 ney nearly nineteen months, and traveled on 
 foot over immense stretches of arctic and sub- 
 arctic wilderness. The company thanked 
 their courageous servant, and three years later 
 rewarded him with the governorship of 
 Prince of Wales Fort, in which capacity he 
 waged bitter war upon his employers' fur- 
 trade rivals. Hearne deserves a high place 
 in the records of North American explora- 
 tion ; the published account of his remarkable 
 travels shows him to have been a close and 
 enlightened observer, as well as possessed of 
 a remarkable capacity for dealing with savage 
 minds. 
 
 The fur-trade of the Northwest suffered 
 a severe blow from the fierce competition 
 which arose among the independent specu- 
 5 51 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 lators who swarmed the country soon after 
 the cession to Great Britain. The distance 
 from legal restraint led the rivals to exercise 
 a free hand in using every possible means 
 for taking advantage of each other. By pres- 
 ents and misrepresentations, they sought to 
 injure their competitors in the eyes of the 
 Indians ; by drinking and carousing with 
 their dusky customers they thought them- 
 selves to win favor. Property and credit 
 were wasted with the natives, who soon 
 gained a contempt for the warring whites, 
 and held their own pledges in small regard. 
 This kindling of the worst passions of both 
 races not seldom led to pitiful broils and 
 sometimes murders, while meanwhile the prof- 
 its of the trade were scattered to the winds. 
 In the winter of 1783-84 a combination of 
 the majority of the Canadian traders was 
 formed under the name of the North- West 
 Company, a stock corporation which entrusted 
 the management of its business to the two 
 largest houses — Benjamin and Joseph Frob- 
 isher and Simon McTavish. A rival establish- 
 ment, however, was founded by several op- 
 erators who had been slighted in the alliance. 
 
 52 
 
The North-West Company 
 
 After a fierce contest, ending in a fight in the 
 Athabasca country, in which one of the inde- 
 pendents was killed and some others wounded, 
 the malcontents were at last admitted to the 
 union (1787). Thereafter the Canadian fur- 
 trade was controlled by two organizations 
 only, the Hudson's Bay and the North- West 
 Companies, the former having its chief head- 
 quarters at Prince of Wales Fort, and the latter 
 on the island of Mackinac and at Grand Portage 
 near where Pigeon River empties into Lake 
 Superior. Of the life led by the North- West 
 trading chiefs at Grand Portage — the gate- 
 way to the far-stretching Winnipeg, Saskatch- 
 ewan, and Assiniboin water systems — during 
 these palmy days of the fur traffic, Wash- 
 ington Irving has given us a vivid descrip- 
 tion in his charming Astoria. 
 
 A large share of their peltries were shipped 
 to China upon United States vessels, for the 
 reason that, owing to the East India Com- 
 pany's maritime monopoly in the Orient, 
 American captains could traffic in Chinese 
 ports to better advantage than British sub- 
 jects. 1 
 
 1 See ante, p. 20. 
 
 53 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Reducing competition to the two great 
 companies did much to dignify the trade, and 
 profits were greater than under the irrespon- 
 sible strife of former days. But all along the 
 undefined border-line between the two, each 
 rival freely distributed liquor among the sav- 
 ages, embittered them against the opposition, 
 and indulged in a fierce contention for su- 
 premacy which sometimes induced predatory 
 expeditions and not infrequent shedding of 
 blood. This condition of affairs lasted for 
 many years. In 1795 a secession from the 
 North- West Company — long brewing, and ap- 
 parently fomented by Alexander Mackenzie, of 
 whom we shall presently hear — was brought 
 to a head by the organization of the X Y 
 Company. Rivalry between these two Mon- 
 treal concerns at once attained a warmth here- 
 tofore unknown, which lasted until the death 
 of McTavish in 1804, the year of Lewis and 
 Clark's expedition, when they united. 
 
 Mackenzie, a hardy and restless young 
 Highlander, had been a prominent agent of 
 the Montreal Company, which had opposed 
 Frobisher and McTavish. When the union 
 of 1787 was consummated he was given 
 
 54 
 
Mackenzie's Adventures 
 
 charge of the Athabasca department. Here 
 he was thrown into communication with In- 
 dians who remembered the exploits of Hearne, 
 the Hudson's Bay Company's explorer, and 
 soon Mackenzie was eager to undertake ex- 
 plorations even more extended. 
 
 Upon the third of June, 1789, the adven- 
 turous agent set out from Fort Chepewyan, 
 on the south shore of Lake Athabasca. His 
 little fleet consisted of four birch-bark canoes 
 — his own, manned by a crew of four Cana- 
 dians and one German, two of the former be- 
 ing accompanied by their squaws ; the second, 
 occupied by the guide and interpreter, Eng- 
 lish Chief, an Indian who had accompanied 
 Hearne upon the Coppermine Eiver, the 
 chief's two wives, and two young Indians ; 
 the third, by the chief's followers ; and the 
 fourth, a trading boat, which also contained 
 ammunition, supplies, and presents for the In- 
 dians — this craft being in charge of Le Koux, 
 a company clerk, who proceeded as far as 
 Great Slave Lake, where he was ordered to 
 build a fort. 
 
 Mackenzie was an experienced woodsman, 
 and well understood the Indian character, so 
 
 55 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 that his trials were more easily borne than 
 those which befall men less expert in the ways 
 of the forest. Nevertheless, upon the placid 
 pages of the unpretentious journal which he 
 eventually published (1801) it is plainly to 
 be seen that the party experienced much suf- 
 fering and were subjected to not a few 
 dangers. Mosquitoes, the greatest pest of 
 the northern wilderness, tormented them un- 
 ceasingly ; the portages were numerous, often 
 difficult, and always fatiguing ; the savages 
 were fickle, and sought to plunder and desert 
 them at critical stages ; and cold and rain, 
 and sometimes shifting ice, added to their 
 miseries. 
 
 Skirting Lake Athabasca, they entered 
 Snake River, which was known to them, and 
 on the ninth reached Great Slave Lake. 
 Leaving Le Roux on the twenty-fifth to trade 
 with the natives on this dismal inland sea, 
 the explorer pushed on along the shore to the 
 southwest, and four days later entered a here- 
 tofore unknown river, which was henceforth 
 to bear his name. This he descended with 
 his little fleet, until on Sunday, July 12th, he 
 sighted the Arctic Ocean, which was filled 
 
 56 
 
On Arctic Shores 
 
 with ice-floes, between which were spouting 
 whales. Two days later, after many annoy- 
 ances from thievish Eskimos, "I ordered a post 
 to be erected close to our tents, on which I en- 
 graved the latitude of the place [69° 14' IN.], 
 my own name, the number of persons which 
 I had with me, and the time we remained 
 there." Four weeks later (September 12th) 
 he was back again at Fort Chepewyan, having 
 " concluded this voyage, which had occupied 
 the considerable space of one hundred and 
 two days." 
 
 Mackenzie was quick to put to commercial 
 use his knowledge of the country north and 
 west of Lake Athabasca, and during the next 
 two years extended thither the trade of the 
 North- West Company, which thus flanked its 
 Hudson's Bay rival. His heart was, however, 
 in exploration. Realizing that his knowledge 
 of mathematical and astronomical instruments 
 was too meager for success in this work, he 
 went to London in 1791 — a journey of great 
 difficulty from the far northwest — and 
 passed the winter there in the study of these 
 necessary tools of the explorer. 
 
 The following autumn (October 10, 1792) 
 
 57 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 he left Fort Chepewyan with two canoes, 
 again skirted the great lake to Slave River, 
 and then ascended its southwest tributary, 
 Peace River, determined this time to reach 
 the Pacific Ocean. At the falls, whither he 
 had despatched an advance party to erect a 
 palisaded trading house, the party wintered, 
 hunting and trading with the Indians. On 
 the eighth of May six canoes were sent back 
 with furs to Fort Chepewyan, and the follow- 
 ing day Mackenzie started up the river with 
 his friend and colleague, Alexander Mackay, 
 six Frenchmen, and two Indian hunters and 
 interpreters. Their conveyance was a birch 
 canoe twenty-five feet long, but " so light, that 
 two men could carry her on a good road three 
 or four miles without resting. In this slender 
 vessel, we shipped provisions, goods for pres- 
 ents, arms, ammunition, and baggage, to the 
 weight of three thousand pounds, and an 
 equipage of ten people." 
 
 Thenceforth the expedition met with innu- 
 merable "discouragements, difficulties, and 
 dangers." The rapids were numerous, involv- 
 ing toilsome use of setting-poles and towing- 
 lines ; the canoe was not infrequently broken ; 
 
 58 
 
On Pacific Tidewater 
 
 the frequent portages often involved almost 
 insuperable difficulties; and more than once 
 the voyageurs and Indians of the party, their 
 clothing in shreds, footsore, and fatigued, 
 were in sullen discontent, believing "that 
 there was no alternative but to return." But 
 Mackenzie, with Scotch persistence, would 
 not hear of turning back, and adroitly checked 
 the incipient mutiny. 
 
 After laboriously climbing over the moun- 
 tainous divide and trying several west-flow- 
 ing waters, the party decided on the turbu- 
 lent Tacouche Tesse (subsequently called Fra- 
 ser Eiver), which they descended for many 
 days. Finding, however, that this would be 
 a long and hazardous road, and that the na- 
 tives reached the sea by an overland trail, 
 Mackenzie left the river on the fourth of 
 July. For fourteen days the little company 
 plodded through the dense forest, some- 
 times on dizzy trails over snow-clad moun- 
 tains, until they reached a rapid river, upon 
 which "we embarked, with our small bag- 
 gage, in two canoes, accompanied by seven of 
 the natives." After portaging around falls 
 and visiting several bands of Indians who had 
 
 59 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 had dealings with American coast traders, in 
 two days they reached an arm of the sea. 
 " The tide was out, and had left a large space 
 covered with sea- weed. The surrounding hills 
 were involved in fog." The dream of Y6- 
 rendrye had at last been realized — the conti- 
 nent had been spanned from east to west by 
 the northern route. 
 
 Proceeding to the main coast, the explorer 
 was visited by several canoe-loads of the na- 
 tives, who expressed great astonishment at 
 his astronomical instruments, at the same time 
 freely pilfering from his stores and by their 
 insolence testing his unfailing tact and cour- 
 age. He makes this triumphant entry in his 
 record : " I now mixed up some vermilion in 
 melted grease, and inscribed, in large charac- 
 ters, on the South-East face of the rock on 
 which we had slept last night, this brief me- 
 morial — ' Alexander Mackenzie, from Canada 
 by land, the twenty-second of July, one thou- 
 sand seven hundred and ninety-three.' " 
 
 The following day they set forth upon the 
 hazardous return, and on the twenty-fourth 
 of August reached Fort McLeod, their win- 
 tering place on Peace River. "Here," says 
 
 60 
 
Crowned with Success 
 
 the modest Mackenzie in his journal, which 
 is as thrilling as well as informing a tale of 
 adventure as has come down to us from those 
 heroic days of Rocky Mountain exploration, 
 "here my voyages of discovery terminate. 
 Their toils and their dangers, their solicitudes 
 and sufferings, have not been exaggerated in 
 my description. On the contrary, in many 
 instances, language has failed me in the at- 
 tempt to describe them. I received, however, 
 the reward of my labours, for they were 
 crowned with success." 
 
 61 
 
CHAPTEK IV 
 
 THE MISSOURI A PATH TO THE PACIFIC 
 
 From the time of the earliest explorations 
 by white men in the Mississippi Valley there 
 was current a strong belief in the existence of 
 a west-flowing river, lying somewhere beyond 
 a gentle divide, which would, when discov- 
 ered, afford the canoeist easy access to the 
 Pacific Ocean — provided it were established 
 that the Mississippi itself did not pour its 
 flood into that great sea. Jolliet and Mar- 
 quette (1673) satisfied themselves that the 
 Mississippi flowed into the Gulf of Mexico 
 (p. 23), but they looked upon the Missouri 
 as the undoubted road to the westering water- 
 way ; and the missionary tells us in his jour- 
 nal that he became imbued with a strong de- 
 sire to carry the gospel to the tribes along its 
 banks. 1 
 
 1 Marquette's journals and map are in Jesuit Relations 
 (Thwaites's ed Cleveland, 1896-1902), lix. 
 
 62 
 
Straits of Anian 
 
 The Indians, not themselves given to ex- 
 ploration, despite their periodical wanderings 
 upon the hunt and the war-trail, and with 
 geographical knowledge often confined to a 
 comparatively narrow belt of forage, soon dis- 
 covered that a water-passage to the Pacific 
 was eagerly sought by the whites ; and forth- 
 with amused the latter by inventing tales of 
 such streams, myths which found their way 
 into the numerous maps of North America 
 drawn by cartographers at the European capi- 
 tals. Some of these stories had a long life 
 and led to many curious theories and futile 
 explorations. One chart of 1700 (Lugten- 
 berg's), which antedated Verendrye's Indian 
 map by some thirty years, showed a waterway 
 from Lake Superior to the western " Straits of 
 Anian." The Baron Lahontan, an imagina- 
 tive French traveler who in 1703 published a 
 nowfamousbookupon North America, claimed 
 to have himself been upon the sources of the 
 west-flowing stream. 
 
 The belief that the Missouri had a branch 
 leading to the Pacific, thus affording a trade 
 route to Japan and China, figures prominently 
 in French despatches in 1717-18. In 1719 
 
 63 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 two adventurers, La Harpe and Du Tisne, 
 conducted independent explorations of the 
 Missouri, searching for this mythical water- 
 way, but after some two or three hundred 
 miles of futile journeying abandoned their 
 undertakings. Three years later De Bourg- 
 mont, acting for the Company of the Indies, 
 established Fort Orleans on the north bank 
 of the Missouri, near the entrance of Grand 
 River, the design being to hold the Missouri 
 Valley against the Spanish traders who were 
 operating from the northwest, and to protect 
 settlers — particularly Germans — who were 
 now coming into the country. In 1739 we 
 read of an expedition led by two Frenchmen 
 named Mallet, who reached the plains of Col- 
 orado by way of the southern fork * of the 
 Platte; thence traveling overland to the 
 south, they spent the winter at Santa Fe. 
 Half of the party crossed the plains to the 
 Pawnee Indians, while the others descended 
 the Arkansas to the Mississippi. Bienville, 
 then Governor of Louisiana, judged from the 
 reports of this enterprise that the country 
 visited was a part of China — showing how 
 long-lived was the old theory that North 
 
 64 
 
An Aboriginal Geneologist 
 
 America was an outlying portion of Asia. 
 He accordingly sent a second expedition up 
 the Arkansas, but its members returned with- 
 out reaching the Orient. 
 
 In 1753, at a time when the French still 
 entertained a hope of finding the river flow- 
 ing westward from the neighborhood of the 
 Missouri, there was published, in Paris, Du- 
 mont's Memoires de la Louisiane, containing 
 a remarkable detailed narrative of explora- 
 tion, obtained from Le Page du Pratz, sub- 
 sequently author of a Histoire de la Louisi- 
 ane, which gave a modified version of the 
 tale. Du Pratz claimed that about 1725 he ob- 
 tained the relation from an old and garrulous 
 Yazoo Indian named Moncacht-Ape\ The 
 story goes, that about the year 1700 this inter- 
 esting aborigine, bent on gathering knowledge 
 regarding the history of his people, traveled 
 toward the sunrise through the country of 
 the Chickasaws until he reached the Atlan- 
 tic Ocean, incidentally gaining knowledge of 
 Niagara and the great tides of the Bay of 
 Fundy. Disappointed at not finding the 
 genealogical information desired, he at first 
 returned home and then sought the land of 
 
 65 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 the setting sun. At first traveling north- 
 ward, he went to the Ohio River, crossed the 
 Mississippi near the mouth of the Missouri, 
 ascended the latter, wintered among the 
 Missouri Indians, reached the sources of the 
 river, crossed the mountainous divide, and, 
 like Lewis and Clark, descended the Colum- 
 bia to the sea. Here the natives induced him 
 to join in a deadly attack on a party of 
 bearded white men who came to the coast to 
 trade. The inquisitive savage now journeyed 
 to the north until the days grew longer, and 
 there learning that the land beyond was " cut 
 through from north to south " — wherein we 
 recognize Bering's Strait — he returned to his 
 home on the Mississippi, his thirst for genea- 
 logical knowledge still unsatisfied. He was 
 absent upon this fruitless quest, eastward 
 and westward, about five years, but thought 
 he could repeat his travels in thirty-two 
 moons. While it is possible that a journey 
 bearing some distant resemblance to this was 
 once undertaken, no doubt the tale grew 
 largely in the telling, and some of the most 
 important details are now regarded as apoc- 
 ryphal. Nevertheless, it long won wide cre- 
 
 66 
 
Jefferson's Early Interest 
 
 dence, 1 and affected the maps of both French 
 and English cartographers until near the close 
 of the eighteenth century. 
 
 It will be remembered that the North- 
 West Company was organized at Montreal in 
 1783. In the same year John Ledyard pub- 
 lished an account of Captain Cook's third 
 and last voyage (1778). These two events 
 caused a marked revival of interest in Lon- 
 don in the Northwest Passage, or in any 
 transcontinental route which promised an 
 easy path to the Pacific, and thus to China 
 and Japan. Thomas Jefferson was then liv 
 ing in retirement in Virginia, but keenly re 
 ceptive to all suggestions which aimed at ex 
 tending the bounds of human knowledge 
 The fact that the country beyond the Mis 
 sissippi was practically an unknown land, 
 awakened his curiosity to know more of it. 
 Twenty years before he finally despatched 
 Meriwether Lewis and William Clark upon 
 the errand of breaking a path across the con- 
 
 1 In the Revue d' Anthropologic, in 1881, Quatrefages gives it 
 full credence, on ethnological grounds; but Andrew McFar- 
 land Davis's critique on Quatrefages's conclusions (in Proc. 
 American Antiquarian Soc, April, 1883, pp. 321-348) gives us 
 a saner view. 
 
 6 67 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 tinent, we find him desirous, although Spain 
 still possessed the trans-Mississippi, of foster- 
 ing a similar enterprise of exploration. Wri- 
 ting from Annapolis on the 4th of December, 
 1783, to General George Rogers Clark, the 
 hero of Kaskaskia and Vincennes, and elder 
 brother of the explorer, he says : 
 
 " I find they have subscribed a very large 
 sum of money in England for exploring the 
 country from the Missisipi to California. 
 . . . they pretend it is only to promote 
 knoledge. I am afraid they have thoughts 
 of colonising into that quarter. . . some 
 of us have been talking here in a feeble way 
 of making the attempt to search that country, 
 but I doubt whether we have enough of that 
 kind of spirit to raise the money, how 
 would you like to lead such a party ? . . . 
 tho I am afraid our prospect is not worth 
 asking the question." 1 
 
 Nothing came of this proposal. It is not 
 known whether Clark even replied to it. Ten 
 years later, that popular idol of the border 
 fell into disgrace through his miserable in- 
 
 1 The original MS. is in the Draper Collection, library of the 
 Wisconsin Historical Society, its press-mark being " 52 J 93." 
 
 68 
 
John Ledyard 
 
 trigue with Genet, of whom we shall presently 
 hear more; twenty years later, his young 
 brother won imperishable renown in doing 
 the very thing which Jefferson had proposed 
 to him. 
 
 Jefferson was a persistent man. Three 
 years after his letter to Clark, and while 
 minister to the French court, he made more 
 serious overtures to another adventurer — 
 John Ledyard, a picturesque character, then 
 perhaps the best known of American travel- 
 ers. Born in the Connecticut town of Gro- 
 ton in 1751, he early developed a fondness 
 for roving. While an undergraduate at 
 Dartmouth he absented himself from col- 
 lege to visit the tribesmen of the Six Na- 
 tions in New York. Afterward a theolog- 
 ical student, he left school before taking or- 
 ders, to enter as a common sailor on a ship 
 bound for the Mediterranean. At Gibraltar 
 Ledyard enlisted in a British regiment, with 
 which he soon went to the West Indies. In 
 1778 we find him a corporal of marines under 
 Captain Cook, on that famous mariner's third 
 voyage around the world; and it was his 
 journal of that tour (published in 1783) 
 
 69 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 which stirred Christendom with news of 
 Cook's great discoveries. 
 
 Finally deserting the British naval service, 
 Ledyard, now among his Connecticut friends 
 after eight years' absence, conceived the plan 
 of fitting out a fur-trading expedition to ex- 
 plore the Northwest Coast. Going to Europe 
 in 1784, he found it difficult to raise means 
 for his ambitious project, and when he finally 
 reached Paris was disheartened. The Ameri- 
 can minister made his acquaintance (1786), 
 and tells us in his autobiography : * 
 
 "He ... being out of business, and 
 of a roaming, restless character, I suggested to 
 him the enterprise of exploring the Western 
 part of our continent, by passing thro St. 
 Petersburg to Kamschatka, and procuring a 
 passage thence in some of the Russian vessels 
 to Nootka Sound, whence he might make his 
 way across the continent to America ; and I 
 undertook to have the permission of the Em- 
 press of Russia [Catherine II] solicited. He 
 eagerly embraced the proposition, and M. 
 de Semoulin, the Russian Ambassador, and 
 
 1 Ford's Writings of Thomas Jefferson, i, pp. 94-96. 
 
 70 
 
Stopped by Russia 
 
 more particularly Baron Grimm, the special 
 correspondent of the Empress, solicited her 
 permission for him to pass thro' her domin- 
 ions to the Western coast of America . . . 
 the Empress refused permission at once, con- 
 sidering the enterprise as entirely chimerical. 
 But Ledyard would not relinquish it, per- 
 suading himself that by proceeding to St. 
 Petersburg he could satisfy the Empress of 
 its practicability and obtain her permission. 
 He went accordingly, but she was absent on 
 a visit to some distant part of her dominions, 
 and he pursued his course to within 200 miles 
 of Kamschatka, where he was overtaken 
 [February, 1788] by an arrest from the Em- 
 press, brought back to Poland, and there 
 dismissed." 1 
 
 "Disappointed, ragged, and penniless, but 
 with a whole heart," the unfortunate Ledyard 
 
 1 In a letter by Jefferson to an American correspondent, writ- 
 ten at Paris, September 1, 1786 (Ford, iv, pp. 298, 299), he gives 
 this somewhat more detailed account of the project : u A coun- 
 tryman of yours, a Mr. Lediard, who was with Capt. Cook on 
 his last voyage, proposes either to go to Kamschatka, cross 
 from thence to the Western side of America, and penetrate 
 through the Continent to our side of it, or to go to Kentucke, 
 & thence penetrate Westwardly to the South sea, the vent [he 
 went] from hence lately to London, where if he finds a passage 
 
 71 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 arrived in London, where lie was at once be- 
 friended by sympathizers in his project, who 
 secured him employment to lead an expedi- 
 tion to the center of Africa, whither he at 
 once set out. He reached Cairo, but died 
 there in January, 1789. 1 
 
 In December, 1789, General Henry Knox, 
 Washington's Secretary of War, secretly 
 wrote to General Josiah Harmar, then com- 
 manding the Western frontier at Cincinnati, 
 calling his attention to the desirability of ob- 
 taining " official information of all the West- 
 ern regions," and asking him to "devise some 
 practicable plan for exploring that branch of 
 the Mississippi called the Messouri, up to its 
 
 to Kamschatka or the Western coast of America he would avail 
 himself of it : otherwise he proposes to return to our side of 
 America to attempt that route. I think him well calculated for 
 such an enterprise, & wish he may undertake it." 
 
 In another letter, written September 20, 1787 (Ford, v, p. 448), 
 Jefferson adds, relative to Ledyard : "He is a person of in- 
 genuity & information. Unfortunately he has too much im- 
 agination. However, if he escapes safely, he will give us new, 
 curious, & useful information." 
 
 1 See his life, in Sparks's American Biography— a thrilling 
 story of adventure, of which we have given but the barest out- 
 line. Jefferson's brief account of Ledyard's Russian experi- 
 ences omits the numerous romantic details of this audacious 
 enterprise. 
 
 72 
 
Armstrong's Expedition 
 
 source," and possibly beyond to the Pacific. 
 After conferring with General Arthur St. 
 Clair, Governor of the Northwest Territory, 
 General Harmar selected for this purpose 
 Captain John Armstrong, then in command 
 at Louisville, and widely known as an ex- 
 plorer and woodsman. The following spring 
 Armstrong, entirely alone, " proceeded up the 
 Missouri some distance above St. Louis," with 
 the intention of eventually crossing the moun- 
 tains to the Pacific ; " but, meeting with some 
 French traders, was persuaded to return in 
 consequence of the hostility of the Missouri 
 bands to each other, as they were then at 
 war, and he could not safely pass from one 
 nation to the other." Knox's proposed expe- 
 dition, therefore, came to naught. 
 
 Jefferson was the next to make a venture 
 in transcontinental exploration. His third 
 trial resulted in an even more dramatic fail- 
 ure than the Ledyard affair. The central 
 figure was Andre Michaux, a French bota- 
 nist, born in Versailles in 1 746. Michaux had, 
 in the interests of science, visited various 
 countries in Europe and Asia. Returning 
 from Asia in 1785, he was sent by his Govern- 
 
 73 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 ment to New York, to conduct a botanical 
 nursery from which American trees and 
 shrubs were to be removed to and natural- 
 ized in France. After extensive journeys 
 through the new States on the Atlantic slope, 
 Michaux started a nursery near Charles- 
 ton, S. C, and ascending the Savannah 
 River spent some time among the Southern 
 Indians, among whom he exercised much in- 
 fluence. In the course of his wide range of 
 travel he visited the Bahamas and Florida, 
 and in the summer of 1788 crossed the Alle- 
 ghanies. 
 
 Upon the outbreak of the French Revolu- 
 tion Michaux's official stipend ceased, and his 
 private funds were thenceforth used in con- 
 tinuing the investigation of American flora. 
 In April, 1792, he started upon a long jour- 
 ney into the subarctic region around Hud- 
 son Bay, but beyond the Saguenay was de- 
 serted by his guides and obliged to retrace 
 his steps, arriving in Philadelphia the follow- 
 ing December. 
 
 Laying before the American Philosophical 
 Society — then almost the only organization 
 for the encouragement of scientific studies in 
 
 74 
 
Instructions to Michaux 
 
 America — a plan for conducting an explora- 
 tion to the Northwest Coast, his project was 
 at once indorsed. 1 Jefferson, now Secretary 
 of State in Washington's Cabinet, and prom- 
 inent in the councils of the society, was par- 
 ticularly pleased with the thought of having 
 so eminent a scientist enter upon an under- 
 taking which had for a decade been close to 
 his heart. His official co-operation was at 
 once tendered, and preparations were soon 
 under way. The society appears to have be- 
 come responsible for the funds, but Jefferson 
 assumed some part in the direction of the 
 enterprise. 
 
 In the instructions which Jefferson issued 
 to Michaux in January, 2 this versatile states- 
 man gave evidence of a careful study of the 
 conditions which would be met in the course 
 of the exploration. He tells the botanist 
 that the society would procure for him a con- 
 veyance to Kaskaskia " in company with the 
 Indians of that town now in Philadelphia." 
 
 1 The society opened a subscription for this purpose, the sum 
 thus raised being $128.25. Of this Washington subscribed 
 $25, and Jefferson and Hamilton $12.50 each. 
 
 2 Full text in Ford, vi, pp. 158-161. 
 
 75 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Michaux is ordered to " cross the Mississippi 
 and pass by land to the nearest part of the 
 Missouri above the Spanish settlements, that 
 you may avoid the risk of being stopped." 
 He is then to " pursue such of the largest 
 streams of that river as shall lead by the 
 shortest way and the lowest latitudes to the 
 Pacific ocean ... It would seem by the 
 latest maps as if a river called Oregon, inter- 
 locked with the Missouri for a considerable 
 distance, and entered the Pacific ocean not 
 far southward of Nootka Sound." But as 
 these maps are " not to be trusted," the ex- 
 plorer is in this respect left to his own de- 
 vices. 
 
 He is enjoined to "take notice of the 
 country you pass through, its general face, 
 soil, rivers, mountains, its productions — ani- 
 mal, vegetable, and mineral " ; astronomical 
 observations are to be taken ; the aborigines 
 are to be studied in detail ; and, " under the 
 head of animal history, that of the mammoth is 
 particularly recommended to your inquiries." 
 Like Washington, in instructing his Ohio 
 Biver surveyors, the versatile Jefferson de- 
 scends to such details as telling Michaux how 
 
 76 
 
Genet's Conspiracy 
 
 to write his notes— on skins, and " the bark 
 of the paper-birch, a substance which may 
 not excite suspicions among the Indians, and 
 little liable to injury from wet or other com- 
 mon accidents." He is to return to Phila- 
 delphia and report in detail to the society, 
 although privileged himself to publish cer- 
 tain portions of his journal that may be 
 agreed upon between them. 
 
 Jefferson furnished the explorer with a 
 letter of introduction to Governor Shelby, of 
 Kentucky, and upon the fifteenth of July Mi- 
 chaux left Philadelphia on his way westward. 
 No doubt the latter had been quite sincere 
 in his proposition to explore the trans-Missis- 
 sippi country. But Genet had arrived at 
 Charleston in April as the minister of France, 
 charged with the secret mission of forming a 
 filibustering army of American frontiersmen 
 in the Carolinas, Georgia, and Kentucky to 
 attack the Spanish possessions on the Gulf of 
 Mexico and beyond the Mississippi. Michaux 
 was selected as Genet's agent to deal with 
 the Kentuckians, led by George Kogers Clark, 
 who had proposed, under the banner of 
 France, to descend the Mississippi with fifteen 
 
 77 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 hundred frontiersmen and attack New Or- 
 leans. This use of the intending explorer 
 was unofficially confessed to Jefferson by- 
 Genet ten days before the former's de- 
 parture. 1 
 
 Michaux proceeded no farther west than 
 Kentucky, and spent the rest of the year act- 
 ing as go-between for Clark and Genet. In 
 December we find him in Philadelphia, be- 
 cause Genet had postponed operations until 
 spring, and early in 1794 he was back in 
 Charleston looking after his nursery. Clark 
 is assured in March that Michaux will return 
 to Kentucky by the middle of April. But 
 Washington had by this time taken a firm 
 stand in opposition, troops were sent to the 
 border to prevent the expedition, the now 
 discredited Genet was recalled by his Gov- 
 ernment, and Michaux's diplomatic services 
 were no longer required. 2 
 
 *See Turner's Correspondence of Clark and Genet, in Re- 
 port of Historical Manuscripts Commission of American His- 
 torical Association for 1896, p. 933; also Turner's The Sig- 
 nificance of the Louisiana Purchase, in Review of Reviews for 
 May, 1903. 
 
 2 In his Introduction to Biddle's version of Lewis and Clark's 
 Travels (Philadelphia, 1814), Jefferson would have it appear 
 
 78 
 
Michaux's Later Life 
 
 After further botanical explorations among 
 the Kentucky hills, this scientific adventurer 
 sailed for France in August, 1796. The ves- 
 sel in which he embarked being wrecked off 
 the Holland coast, he lost all save his collec- 
 tions, with which he finally reached France, 
 where the Government and the savants re- 
 ceived him with unusual honors. In his long 
 absence, however, the nurseries which he had 
 privately established at Rambouillet, chiefly 
 for the acclimatization of foreign plants, had 
 been ruined by neglect ; of the sixty thou- 
 sand American specimens which he had sent 
 thither few remained. But far from being 
 discouraged, Michaux set himself bravely to 
 the task of repairing his losses, and to the 
 publication of several important works. 
 In 1800 he accompanied an official expe- 
 dition to Madagascar, and two years later 
 lost his life from fever contracted while 
 breaking ground for a new botanical garden. 
 
 that Michaux had no sooner reached Kentucky than he was re. 
 called and bade "to pursue elsewhere the botanical inquiries 
 on which he was employed." This is not borne out by the 
 documents in the case. Michaux was in active correspondence 
 with the Kentucky conspirators for fully eight months after his 
 arrival among them. 
 
 79 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Thus his plans for returning to America for 
 the completion of the botanical discoveries, 
 which had greatly interested him, came to 
 naught. It is fair to presume that had this 
 energetic traveler and scientist not fallen un- 
 der the malign influence of the Clark-Genet 
 intrigue, and thus wandered from the line 
 of professional duty, he would have suc- 
 ceeded in the great task of transcontinental 
 exploration for which Jefferson had selected 
 him. 
 
 80 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE 
 
 Upon the eve of the downfall of New 
 France, when the inevitable was plainly fore- 
 seen, Louis XV, in order to prevent England 
 from obtaining them, ceded to Spain (No- 
 vember, 1762) the town and neighborhood 
 of New Orleans and the broad possessions of 
 France west of the Mississippi. The follow- 
 ing year, by the Treaty of Paris, she lost to 
 England all of her holdings east of the great 
 river. Spain remained in possession of the 
 trans- Mississippi country until 1800. Napo- 
 leon, just then dreaming of another New 
 France in the western half of North Amer- 
 ica, as well as desiring to check the United 
 States in its development westward, in that 
 year (October 1st) coerced the court of Ma- 
 drid into a treaty of retrocession. Under this 
 agreement Spain was to receive as recom- 
 
 81 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 pense the improvised " Kingdom of Etruria," 
 in northern Italy, to be governed by the 
 Duke of Parma, son-in-law of the Spanish 
 king ; she was also to retain East and West 
 Florida, which Napoleon had sought, but de- 
 spite Spanish subserviency could not obtain. 1 
 
 That the great. Corsican desired to establish 
 a strong colonial empire to the west of the 
 United States, controlling the Gulf of Mexico 
 and the entire Mississippi Valley, there is now 
 no doubt. Immediately after the retroces- 
 sion of Louisiana, a large French expedition 
 occupied the island of Santo Domingo, and an- 
 other corps was destined for New Orleans ; 
 but the army in Santo Domingo was at once 
 confronted by a native negro revolution, and 
 the occupation of New Orleans, timed for 
 October, 1802, was accordingly deferred. 
 
 These movements naturally alarmed Presi- 
 dent Jefferson, for New Orleans was the key 
 to the continental interior. James Monroe 
 
 1 See Senor Jeronimo Becker's article in La Espana Moderna 
 for May, 1903, wherein the Spanish side of the story is given. 
 He says that the tricky Talleyrand promised Spain that the ces- 
 sion was but nominal, and that the latter might still retain pos- 
 session of Louisiana. As late as 1815 Spain still entertained 
 hopes of regaining the province through English diplomacy. 
 
 82 
 
The West Dissatisfied 
 
 was sent as a special envoy to Paris (March, 
 1803) to seek the purchase of New Orleans 
 and the Floridas, with a view of securing to 
 our Western settlers the free navigation of 
 the Mississippi. The denial of this privilege 
 by Spain, and the threatened denial by 
 France, had been the cause of long-continued 
 dissatisfaction among the trans-Alleghany 
 borderers, who at that time cared more for 
 an opening for their surplus products than 
 they did for the Federal union — to them as 
 yet a shadowy thing, controlled by men 
 of the Atlantic slope, unknowing and in- 
 different, they thought, to the needs of the 
 West. 
 
 Jefferson was strongly impressed by the 
 demands of the frontiersmen ; but as a man 
 of peace apparently would have been willing, 
 if unable to secure any French territory at the 
 mouth of the river, to accept a free naviga- 
 tion agreement from France, rather than have 
 an armed contest with that power. He ap- 
 pears to have thought that eventually an al- 
 liance with England might win still further 
 concessions from Paris. It is not evident that 
 at this time his interest in the country west 
 7 83 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 of the river went further than a desire to dis- 
 cover within it a path to the Pacific. 
 
 Affairs were in this unsatisfactory condi- 
 tion, promising ill for the future of the young 
 nation, when the French minister, Talleyrand, 
 greatly surprised the American minister at 
 Paris, Robert R Livingston, by proposing 
 (April 11th) that the United States buy all 
 of Louisiana. The reason for this sudden 
 change of heart was, that Napoleon had de- 
 termined on a new war with England. This 
 ambitious military enterprise required more 
 money than he then possessed ; he feared that 
 England's navy might, during the struggle, 
 capture the approaches to Louisiana ; by pre- 
 viously disposing of the territory to the 
 United States he would not only obtain 
 funds, but would thwart his enemy, and 
 assist in rearing a formidable rival to her in 
 North America. 
 
 Monroe had just arrived at Paris, bearing 
 instructions authorizing Livingston and him- 
 self to pay $2,000,000 for New Orleans and 
 the Floridas. This new proposition came to 
 them as unexpectedly as " a bolt from the 
 blue." The only method of communicating 
 
 84 
 
Our Territory Doubled 
 
 with Washington was by the ocean mails, 
 which were then very slow. The First Con- 
 sul insisted on haste, for he needed the money 
 at once ; war was soon to be declared between 
 France and England, and in brief time the 
 latter might seize the Gulf of Mexico, and thus 
 win Louisiana for herself. 
 
 Our envoys were equal to the emergency. 
 Lacking opportunity to consult with the Presi- 
 dent, they realized that delay might mean de- 
 feat, and promptly entered upon negotiations. 
 At the end of a week's discussion, during 
 which his brothers Lucien and Joseph bitterly 
 opposed the sequestration of this vast colonial 
 possession, Napoleon arbitrarily directed his 
 finance minister, Marbois, to sign a treaty 
 (April 30th) 1 with the American repre- 
 sentatives, by which Louisiana, with its ill- 
 defined boundaries, was sold to the United 
 States for $15,000,000. 2 Thus was our ter- 
 ritory doubled at a few strokes of the pen. 
 When Livingston, the principal American ne- 
 
 1 Such is the date of the document ; but the actual signing 
 was on May 2d. 
 
 2 The actual price was $11,250,000, in addition to which the 
 United States agreed to pay certain debts owing our citizens by 
 France, amounting to $3,750,000. 
 
 85 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 gotiator, rose after signing, he shook hands 
 with his colleague and Marbois, saying : ft We 
 have lived long, but this is the noblest work 
 of our lives ! " 
 
 It was the early days of July before the 
 news of this remarkable diplomatic negotia- 
 tion reached Washington. Needless to say, 
 it awakened uncommon excitement at the na- 
 tional capital. Captain Meriwether Lewis was 
 in town, obtaining from the President final 
 instructions before starting upon his great 
 exploring expedition to the Pacific, an enter- 
 prise which was now placed upon a far dif- 
 ferent footing from the original intention. 
 When, upon the fifth of the month, he bade 
 farewell to his friends at the White House, 
 and left for the West, he left behind him a 
 partizan squabble upon the issue of which 
 hung the future of the United States as a 
 world power. 
 
 In this dispute the Federalists bitterly op- 
 posed, while the Republicans favored, the 
 proposed purchase of foreign territory. Jef- 
 ferson himself, on constitutional grounds, en- 
 tertained strong scruples against the transac- 
 tion. He was but slowly won to the theory 
 
 86 ' 
 
A Continental Nation 
 
 that the treaty-making power was sufficient 
 to warrant the purchase, without an amend- 
 ment to the Constitution. 
 
 The treaty itself arrived in Washington the 
 fourteenth of July, and was ratified by Con- 
 gress on the nineteenth of October following ; 
 but it was some time before New England be- 
 came reconciled, prophetically fearing that the 
 acquisition of so much new territory, which 
 was eventually to be formed into voting States, 
 would result in throwing the balance of po- 
 litical power into the West. There was even 
 some talk in that section of secession, because 
 of this threatened loss of prestige. In the 
 end, however, all concerned became reconciled 
 to the contemplation of a United States ex- 
 tending across the continent. Florida, Texas, 
 and California later followed in natural se- 
 quence — not without qualms upon the part 
 of many ; but the great struggle had been 
 fought out over the Louisiana Purchase, and 
 the power of territorial expansion accepted 
 as a constitutional doctrine. 1 
 
 1 "Perhaps most fundamental of all in its effects is the em- 
 phasis which the Louisiana Purchase gave to the conception of 
 space in American ideals. The immensity of the area thus 
 
 87 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Although Spain ceded Louisiana to France 
 in October, 1800, and the latter had now sold 
 the territory to the United States, the French 
 Government had not in the meanwhile found 
 it convenient to take formal possession of the 
 region. Spanish officials at New Orleans and 
 St. Louis were still governing the sparse 
 population, 1 consisting chiefly of easy-going 
 French Creoles, with several small groups of 
 American bordermen who had been induced 
 to become Spanish subjects by liberal offers 
 of rich land along the west bank of the Mis- 
 sissippi and the lower reaches of the Missouri. 
 Among these were Daniel Boone and several 
 of his sons and old neighbors in Kentucky 
 and West Virginia. Sighing for elbow-room 
 and broader hunting-grounds, and not a little 
 disgruntled over the restrictions to liberty and 
 the legal technicalities which confronted men 
 in the older settlements, they had established 
 
 opened to exploitation has continually stirred the Americans' 
 imagination, fired their energy and determination, strengthened 
 their ability to handle vast designs, and made them measure 
 their achievements by the scale of the prairies and the Rocky 
 Mountains." — Dr. Frederick J. Turner's The Significance of 
 the Louisiana Purchase, in Review of Reviews for May, 
 1903. 
 1 Estimated at 50,000 whites. 
 
 88 
 
Spain Disturbed 
 
 themselves not far from the French village of 
 St. Charles. 
 
 The fact that Spain had never formally 
 surrendered to France possession of Louisi- 
 ana, although three years had elapsed since 
 the Treaty of St. Ildefonso, did not disturb 
 the mind of Napoleon. But the court of 
 Spain was of the opinion that that treaty had 
 not been properly observed and that the 
 cession was void, particularly as France had 
 engaged " not to retrocede Louisiana to any 
 other power." The Spanish minister served 
 notice to this effect on the American Govern- 
 ment. This merely served to hasten the 
 preparations of the French charge d'affaires 
 at Washington, who at once forwarded in- 
 structions to his colleague in New Orleans, 
 where the message arrived on November 23d. 
 Both French and Spanish commissioners 
 agreed promptly to carry out the programme 
 of cession. 
 
 A proper regard for legal forms rendered 
 essential two ceremonies of transfer — of Spain 
 to France, and of France to the United States. 
 At New Orleans, on the thirtieth of Novem- 
 ber, the Spanish commissioners, with much 
 
 89 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 formality, surrendered Louisiana to the repre- 
 sentative of France, Pierre Clement Laussat. 
 Seventeen days later, the American commis- 
 sioners, William C. C. Claiborne (appointed 
 to be governor of the new territory) and Gen- 
 eral James Wilkinson, arrived by ship with 
 a small escort of troops, and camped near the 
 town. Upon the twentieth of December the 
 French representative delivered to the Ameri- 
 cans the keys of the capital, and absolved all 
 French residents from their oath of allegiance 
 to France ; the tricolor of France was hauled 
 down, after its brief service of twenty days, 
 and the Stars and Stripes replaced it amid 
 salvos of artillery and the playing of a regi- 
 mental band. 
 
 Early in January, Laussat served upon 
 Charles Dehault de Lassus, the lieutenant- 
 governor of Upper Louisiana, at St. Louis, an 
 order from the Spanish commissioners to sur- 
 render that region to such person as Laussat 
 might name : that person being Captain Amos 
 Stoddard, of the United States army, detailed 
 to serve as American transfer commissioner, 
 and now stationed at the military post of Kas- 
 kaskia, on the east side of the Mississippi. 
 
 90 
 
The Transfer 
 
 Stoddard appears to have spent much of 
 the winter in St. Louis, the gay little capital 
 of the region, where he, no doubt, almost 
 daily met Captain Meriwether Lewis, of the 
 Lewis and Clark exploring expedition, then 
 passing the winter at Eiver Dubois, also on 
 the east side opposite the mouth of the 
 Missouri. On the ninth of March the Ameri- 
 can troops were brought in boats across the 
 river, under the command of Stoddard's ad- 
 jutant, Lieutenant Stephen Worrell, and es- 
 corted Stoddard, Lewis, and other Americans 
 to the government house. Here De Lassus 
 read a proclamation ; addressed the villagers 
 as they congregated in the square fronting his 
 residence, releasing them from their oath of 
 fidelity to France ; and with Stoddard signed 
 a formal document of transfer, to which 
 Lewis among others placed his signature as 
 witness. Artillery salutes greeted the Ameri- 
 can flag as it was hoisted on the official staff, 
 and the day closed with expressions of mutual 
 good-will. At last the great purchase had 
 been consummated at all points, and the en- 
 tire breadth of the continent was now open 
 to American exploitation. 
 
 91 
 
CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 ORGANIZATION OF LEWIS AND CLARETS 
 EXPEDITION 
 
 We have seen that as early as 1783 Jef- 
 ferson, then in private life, entertained a hope 
 that he might be able to set on foot an expe- 
 dition, to be led by George Eogers Clark, for 
 the discovery of a path across the Rocky 
 Mountains, connecting the Missouri River 
 with Pacific tide- water. Nothing coming of 
 this, three years later, while minister to France, 
 he induced the adventurous John Ledyard to 
 attempt to cross from Kamchatka and trav- 
 erse the North American continent from the 
 west. Because of the jealousy of Russia, 
 this project also failed. Intertribal wars 
 upon the Missouri caused the abandonment 
 of an expedition undertaken in 1790 by di- 
 rection of General Henry Knox, Washington's 
 secretary of war. As secretary of state, Jef- 
 ferson returned to the charge, and in 1793 — 
 the year of Mackenzie's brilliant exploit — 
 
 92 
 
Jeffer 
 
 son's Zeal 
 
 through the agency of the American Philo- 
 sophical Society, despatched Michaux, the 
 French botanist, upon a mission similar to 
 the one tentatively proposed to Clark ten 
 years before. But with the miserable snding 
 of the Michaux affair we are familiar. 
 
 Ten years now elapsed, with no develop- 
 ments in Rocky Mountain exploration upon 
 the part of Americans. Jefferson had be- 
 come President in 1800, and was deeply im- 
 mersed in the multifarious incidents of office. 
 Yet his early yearning for the discovery of 
 an overmountain path to the Pacific had not 
 lessened. 
 
 The lapse in the winter of 1802-03 of an 
 " act for establishing trading houses with the 
 Indian tribes," gave him the opportunity 
 sought. In a secret message to Congress 
 (January 18th) the President urges that trade 
 with the Western aborigines be more assidu- 
 ously cultivated than hitherto, and that they 
 be encouraged to abandon the hunting life in 
 favor of agriculture and the domestic arts. 
 Adroitly he leads up to the desirability of 
 reaching out for the trade of the Indians on 
 the Missouri River, which now is absorbed 
 
 93 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 by English companies ; and then suggests 
 that the friendship of these savages may best 
 be secured through the visit of an exploring 
 party. 
 
 " An intelligent officer," he writes, " with 
 ten or twelve chosen men fit for the enter- 
 prise and willing to undertake it, taken from 
 posts where they may be spared without in- 
 convenience, might explore the whole line, 
 even to the Western Ocean, have conferences 
 with the natives on the subject of commercial 
 intercourse, get admission among them for 
 our traders as others are admitted, agree on 
 convenient deposits for an interchange of 
 articles, and return with the information ac- 
 quired in the course of two summers. Their 
 arms and accouterments, some instruments of 
 observation, and light and cheap presents for 
 the Indians would be all the apparatus they 
 could carry, and with an expectation of a sol- 
 dier's portion of land on their return would 
 constitute the whole expense." The country 
 which he thus proposed to explore was the 
 property of France, although still governed 
 by Spain ; but Jefferson thinks that the latter 
 nation would regard the enterprise merely 
 
 94 
 
A Modest Appropriation 
 
 " as a literary pursuit," and " not be disposed 
 to view it with jealousy, even if the expiring 
 state of its interests there did not render it a 
 matter of indifference." 
 
 An estimate of the necessary expenses, 
 drawn by the President's private secretary, 
 Captain Meriwether Lewis, accompanied the 
 message, showing that $2,500 was thought to 
 be sufficient for the purpose. The entire pay 
 of the party being chargeable to the War 
 Department, also their rations previous to 
 leaving United States soil, of course these 
 important items did not enter into the calcu- 
 lation. Jefferson, a born diplomat, proposes 
 that this modest sum be appropriated "for 
 the purpose of extending the external com- 
 merce of the United States," it being under- 
 stood by the Executive that this would 
 signify legislative sanction of his projected 
 exploration. An appropriation so phrased 
 "would cover the undertaking from notice 
 and prevent the obstructions which inter- 
 ested individuals might otherwise previous- 
 ly prepare in its way." Congress acceded to 
 the President's request. 
 
 Meriwether Lewis, who now enters upon 
 
 95 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 the stage of history, was born of good family 
 near Charlottesville, Va., in 1774. From 
 childhood he had been in local repnte as a 
 hunter and amateur botanist, and his cele- 
 brated neighbor, Thomas Jefferson, evinced 
 great fondness for him. At the age of twenty 
 he served as a private in the Virginia militia, 
 during the Whisky Rebellion in western 
 Pennsylvania, and at the close of the dis- 
 turbance was employed in the regular army — 
 originally as ensign in the First Infantry, but 
 in two years rising (1797) to a captaincy in 
 the same regiment. While in this last ca- 
 pacity he was regimental paymaster, and as 
 such traveled extensively among the frontier 
 posts in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Kentucky, 
 In 1792, when Jefferson was negotiating with 
 Michaux, Lewis applied for the post of ex- 
 plorer ; but his old neighbor evidently 
 thought that a youth of eighteen years, even 
 with such training as his bright young friend 
 possessed, was as yet unfitted for a mission of 
 this magnitude. In 1801 he appointed Cap- 
 tain Lewis as his private secretary, and no 
 doubt from this time forward there were 
 frequent animated conversations at the White 
 
 96 
 
w 
 
 W 
 
 M 
 
 W 
 H 
 
 p£3 
 ft 
 
 c3 
 
 w 
 
 a 
 ft 
 
 
 
 c3 
 
 
Jefferson and Lewis 
 
 House table over the exploration of the Mis- 
 souri route to the Pacific. As early as July, 
 1802, the prospect of carrying their plans 
 into effect was deemed favorable by the 
 President and his secretary. Lewis again ap- 
 plied for the leadership of the expedition, 
 and this time his ambition was promptly 
 gratified. Thereafter the two friends — Jef- 
 ferson in his sixtieth year, and Lewis in his 
 twenty-eighth — were the leading spirits in 
 this daring enterprise. 
 
 Jefferson has placed on record 1 this gener- 
 ous tribute to Lewis : " I had now had oppor- 
 tunities of knowing him intimately. Of cour- 
 age undaunted; possessing a firmness and 
 perseverance of purpose which nothing but 
 impossibilities could divert from its direction ; 
 careful as a father of those committed to his 
 charge, yet steady in the maintenance of order 
 and discipline ; intimate with the Indian char- 
 acter, customs, and principles ; habituated to 
 the hunting life ; guarded, by exact observa- 
 tion of the vegetables and animals of his own 
 country, against losing time in the description 
 of objects already possessed ; honest, disinter- 
 
 1 Introduction to Biddle's edition of the Travels, i, pp. xi, xii. 
 
 97 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 ested, liberal, of sound understanding, and a 
 fidelity to truth so scrupulous that whatever 
 he should report would be as certain as if 
 seen by ourselves — with all these qualifica- 
 tions, as if selected and implanted by nature in 
 one body for this express purpose, I could 
 have no hesitation in confiding the enterprise 
 to him." 
 
 Jefferson fully realized that, connected with 
 a model exploring expedition, there should be 
 trained scientists, to make calculations as to 
 latitude and longitude, to report upon the 
 fauna, flora, and mineralogy of the country, 
 and to make ethnological and philological 
 notes upon the aborigines whom they should 
 meet. But, as he told a correspondent: 1 
 " We can not in the U. S. find a person who 
 to courage, prudence, habits & health adapted 
 to the woods, & spme familiarity with the 
 Indian character, joins a perfect knowledge 
 of botany, natural history, mineralogy & as- 
 tronomy, all of which would be desirable. 
 To the first qualifications Captain Lewis my 
 secretary adds a great mass of accurate obser- 
 
 1 Dr. Caspar Wistar, of Philadelphia ; letter in Ford, viii, p. 
 192. 
 
 98 
 
Preparations Under Way 
 
 vation made on the different subjects of the 
 three kingdoms as existing in these states, not 
 under their scientific forms, but so as that he 
 will readily seize whatever is new in the 
 country he passes thro', and give us accounts 
 of new things only ; and he has qualified him- 
 self for fixing the longitude &> latitude of the 
 different points in the line he will go over." 
 
 Congress having proved complaisant, prep- 
 arations were hurried forward. During April 
 Lewis was engaged at Lancaster, Harper's 
 Ferry, and elsewhere, conferring with military 
 and other authorities upon the West, build- 
 ing boats, and superintending the manufac- 
 ture and collection of weapons, scientific in- 
 struments, and miscellaneous supplies. Some 
 weeks were then spent in Philadelphia, in 
 company with several scientific men whose 
 good offices had been sought by Jefferson ; 
 from them Lewis learned the rudimentary 
 methods of taking astronomical observations, 
 and obtained much detailed advice upon the 
 scientific side of the expedition. 
 
 Early in May the President submitted to 
 his friend a l c rough draft " of detailed in- 
 structions, which were afterwards finished 
 
 . Lot C. 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 and signed on the twentieth of June. In 
 this important document Jefferson enters 
 with his love of detail into the methods to 
 be adopted by the expedition after leaving 
 United States territory. He sends to Lewis 
 passports from both the Spanish and French 
 ministers, permitting this " literary " party to 
 pass through their territory ; and one from the 
 British minister, to insure respect from Cana- 
 dian traders. Beginning at the mouth of the 
 Missouri, the explorers are to take frequent 
 astronomical observations; note the courses 
 and distances of the rivers traveled upon; 
 seek the fullest possible data of every sort re- 
 garding Indians along the path ; make record 
 of the soils, minerals, vegetable productions, 
 animal life, and climate; and to ascertain 
 facts relative to the sources of the Missis- 
 sippi, the position of the Lake of the Woods, 
 and the paths followed by Canadian traders in 
 their intercourse with the Western Indians. 
 Lewis is to cultivate among the savages a de- 
 sire to trade with Americans, and in every way 
 to conciliate them ; if possible, a party should 
 be brought back on a friendly visit to Wash- 
 ington. In order to obtain all the informa- 
 
 100 
 
Jefferson's Instructions 
 
 tion possible, and to guard against the loss 
 of it, the leader is required not only himself to 
 keep detailed journals, but- to encourage 
 others of his party to do so ; to " put into cy- 
 pher whatever might do injury if betrayed " ; 
 to use, if practicable, " the paper of the birch, 
 as less liable to injury from damp than com- 
 mon paper." If they meet with a superior 
 force representing another nation, they are to 
 return, for " in the loss of yourselves, we 
 should lose also the information you will have 
 acquired ... by returning safely with 
 that, you may enable us to renew the essay with 
 better calculated means ... we wish you 
 to err on the side of your safety, & bring back 
 your party safe, even if it be with less infor- 
 mation." Upon reaching the Pacific coast, he 
 is to " learn if there be any port within your 
 reach frequented by the sea-vessels of any 
 nation, and to send two of your trusty people 
 back by sea, in such way as shall appear 
 practicable, with a copy of your notes " — or 
 he may, in his judgment, have the entire party 
 " return by sea by way of Cape Horn or the 
 Cape of Good Hope, as you shall be able." 
 In order that this plan might be carried out, 
 
 101 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 a "letter of general credit," signed by the 
 President, was forwarded to Lewis, asking 
 " of the Consuls, agents, merchants & citizens 
 of any nation with which we have inter- 
 course or amity to furnish you with those 
 supplies which your necessities may call for, 
 assuring them of honorable and prompt retri- 
 bution." 
 
 Lewis deeming it advisable to have a com- 
 panion upon the expedition who, while sec- 
 ond in command, should be of equal military 
 rank with himself, Jefferson acceded. There- 
 upon Lewis sent a cordial note of invitation 
 to his boyhood friend William Clark, of Ken- 
 tucky; but pending a reply, by the Presi- 
 dent's consent he made an arrangement with 
 another friend, Lieutenant Moses Hooke, of 
 his old regiment, now military agent at Pitts- 
 burg, by which he was to go in case Clark 
 declined. The latter, however, agreed to the 
 proposition, and joined the expedition upon 
 its way down the Ohio River. 
 
 Like Lewis, William Clark was by birth a 
 Virginian. The Clark and Lewis families 
 were firm friends and neighbors in Caroline 
 County, William having been born on the 
 
 102 
 
William Clark 
 
 old Clark estate in 1770, four years previous 
 to the man with whose name his memory will 
 forever be linked. He was yet a small boy 
 when his older brother, George Eogers, began 
 his brilliant career upon the Western borders. 
 When fourteen years of age, his father, John 
 Clark, moved to Mulberry Hill, on Bear- 
 grass Creek, near Louisville, Ky. This new 
 home soon became a center of hospitality for 
 a wide district, and William grew up in close 
 friendship with the most distinguished Ken- 
 tuckians of his day, who were frequently 
 guests of the family. 
 
 Young Clark was a general favorite. In 
 March, 1791, when in his twenty-first year, 
 he was appointed a lieutenant with General 
 Scott upon special service. A friend convey- 
 ing this information to one of his elder broth- 
 ers, wrote concerning him : " William . . . 
 is a youth of solid and promising parts, and 
 as brave as Caesar." A year later he was 
 a lieutenant of infantry in regular service in 
 Wayne's Western army, and concluded his 
 four years' experience in fighting Indians by 
 participating in the battle of Fallen Timbers 
 (1796), at the head of his company. On two 
 
 103 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 occasions General Wayne sent Captain Clark 
 upon missions to the Spaniards west of the 
 Mississippi, and he appears to have impressed 
 these gentlemen as an officer deserving of 
 much respect. 
 
 Upon the conclusion of the treaty of Green- 
 ville, being in ill-health, the young captain 
 resigned from the army and retired to a Ken- 
 tucky farm, on which he was dwelling when 
 the letter arrived from Lewis, inviting him to 
 join the Western exploring expedition. This 
 letter "offered by the apprb n of the Presi- 
 dent," afterward wrote Clark, 1 "to place me 
 in a situation in every respect equal to himself, 
 in rank pretentions &c &c." Clark had ex- 
 pected appointment as captain of engineers ; 
 but just before starting up the Missouri the 
 following spring, was disappointed by receiv- 
 ing only the commission of a second lieutenant 
 of artillery. However, Lewis assured him 
 that a commission was needed only as an au- 
 thority to punish the soldiers in the party if 
 necessary, and that Clark's "command &c, 
 &c, should be equal to his." With this assur- 
 
 1 Letter in Coues's Lewis and Clark, New York (1891), pp. 
 lxxi, lxxii. 
 
 104 
 
Colleagues and Friends 
 
 ance, lie sensibly smothered his pride and 
 said nothing further about the affair. As a 
 matter of fact, the journals of the expedition 
 reveal that Lewis, while nominally in com- 
 mand, consistently regarded Clark as his offi- 
 cial equal, both being styled by all connected 
 with the party as "Captain." Throughout 
 all the trying experiences of the three years 
 during which they were united, their respect 
 and friendship for each other but deepened 
 and strengthened — a record far from com- 
 mon among exploring parties. 
 
 Parting from Jefferson, at Washington, on 
 the fifth of July — a few days after receipt 
 of the news from Paris announcing the Louisi- 
 ana Purchase — Lewis had expected to leave 
 Pittsburg for the descent of the Ohio by the 
 last week of that month. But the man who 
 was building his boat " shamefully detained " 
 him, through periodical drunkenness, for a 
 full month after this. The stage of water in 
 the Ohio was the lowest up to that time 
 recorded, and the young explorer was freely 
 advised not to attempt the voyage that sea- 
 son. But, as he wrote the President, he was 
 " determined to get forward though I should 
 
 105 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 not be able to make a greater distance than a 
 mile p r day." At seven in the morning of the 
 thirty-first of August the boat was ready for 
 the water, and by ten the expedition was under 
 way. He had often, with his small crew, 
 to cut his way through sand-bars and riffles, 
 and in a few cases was obliged to use horses 
 and oxen. "I find them," he writes, "the 
 most efficient sailors in the present state of 
 the navigation of this river." 
 
 Word had been sent in advance to the com- 
 manders of the military posts on the Ohio 
 and Mississippi — chiefly Southwest Point, 
 Massac, and Kaskaskia — to call for volunteers 
 for the expedition. There was no lack of 
 these, but the qualifications named by Lewis 
 were so exacting that upon his arrival at each 
 station some difficulty was experienced in 
 making suitable selections ; so that the busi- 
 ness of recruiting added materially to the 
 delay. Finally, he found fourteen soldiers 
 who pleased him ; to these he added nine Ken- 
 tucky frontiersmen of special merit, who were 
 sworn in as privates, for the expedition was 
 organized throughout on a military basis. Of 
 the party, also, was Clark's negro servant, 
 
 106 
 
In Winter Camp 
 
 York, a man of uncommon size and strength, 
 destined to figure prominently in the annals 
 of the exploration. All were young, unmar- 
 ried, and in robust health. 
 
 It had been the original intention of Lewis 
 to go into winter quarters at La Charette, a 
 small French village, the highest settlement 
 on the Missouri — a point which the expedi- 
 tion, the following spring, spent seven days 
 in reaching. But for several reasons this 
 plan was not carried out. The delays on the 
 Ohio had been so numerous that December 
 was a third past before the explorers arrived 
 at River Dubois, a small stream emptying 
 into the Mississippi nearly opposite the 
 mouth of the Missouri. Although the news 
 of the sale of Louisiana to the United States 
 had reached Washington early in July, the 
 Spanish commandant at St. Louis had had 
 no official notification of this event, and the 
 policy of his Government was such that he 
 did not feel authorized to grant permission to 
 the expedition to enter territory still under 
 his charge ; moreover, a letter from President 
 Jefferson, dated November 16 th, had suggested 
 that the season was now too far advanced to 
 
 107 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 make much progress up the Missouri, while 
 by encamping on the American side the men 
 could draw their winter rations from the 
 War Department, without entrenching on 
 the special appropriation. 
 
 The expedition constructed a winter camp 
 on River Dubois, and spent the succeeding 
 five months in careful preparation for the ar- 
 duous task which confronted it to the west- 
 ward. 
 
 108 
 
CHAPTEK VII 
 
 FEOM EIVEE DUBOIS TO THE MANDANS 
 
 Although as a body the expedition was 
 restricted to its winter's camp on the east 
 side of the Mississippi, the leaders not infre- 
 quently visited their military friends at the 
 neighboring American posts of Cahokia 
 and Kaskaskia, and — especially Lewis — were 
 often guests at the houses of leading citizens 
 in the village of St. Louis, on the west side. 
 To Clark, for the most part, appears to have 
 fallen the task of building boats and drilling 
 the men for the forthcoming task; while 
 Lewis purchased supplies and made extend- 
 ed inquiries regarding the Missouri River 
 country, which had been explored as far up 
 as the Mandan villages by many of the 
 French fur-traders and voyageurs who cen- 
 tered at St. Louis. We have already seen 
 that Lewis was one of the official witnesses of 
 
 109 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 the transfer of Upper Louisiana, upon the 
 ninth of March. During the winter, also, the 
 party received several accessions, chiefly of 
 French Canadians more or less familiar with 
 the Missouri country. 
 
 At four in the afternoon of the fourteenth 
 of May, 1804, " all in health and readiness 
 to set out," the expedition left camp at 
 River Dubois, " in the presence of many of 
 the neighboring inhabitants, and proceeded 
 on under a jentle brease up the Missourie." * 
 Clark was in charge of the embarkation, for 
 Lewis was attending to the last business de- 
 tails in St. Louis. The flotilla consisted of 
 three craft — a keel boat fifty-five feet long, 
 drawing three feet of water, carrying a sail, 
 propelled by twenty-two oars, with both fore- 
 castle and cabin, and the center guarded by a 
 breastwork, for attacks from Indians were 
 feared, especially on the lower reaches of the 
 Missouri ; a pirogue or open boat with seven 
 oars, and another with six, both of them car- 
 
 1 In all citations from the official journals kept by the leaders, 
 we follow the original manuscripts, now in the possession of the 
 American Philosophical Society at Philadelphia, and soon to be 
 published verbatim under the editorship of the present writer. 
 
 110 
 
/*t-*r^*«-« <*»y sCoc4.&-<r*^ (?L*L~ t^- c-i,^, S~<~y7 
 
 
 P 
 
 — =3 / 
 
 ^^^ ^C^-*-> o^L^s^ *^ g^^^^'- ^^ 
 
 ^ 2^? <~*~^ ^*-^, ^*— 
 
 
 A PAGE OF CLARK'S JOURNAL. 
 
 Original now in possession of the American Philosophical Society at 
 
 Philadelphia. 
 
Personnel of the Expedition 
 
 rying sails. The party comprised, in addition 
 to Clark, three sergeants (Ordway, Pryor, 
 and Floyd), twenty- three privates, two inter- 
 preters (Dronillard and Charbonneau), Char- 
 bonneau's Indian squaw Sacajawea, and the 
 negro York. 1 
 
 Lewis had not expected Clark to leave 
 until the fifteenth, but the latter's plans were 
 
 1 The personnel of the expedition was : 
 
 Meriwether Lewis, captain in First United States Infantry, 
 commanding. 
 
 William Clark, second lieutenant in United States Artillery. 
 
 Sergeants — John t Ordway, Nathaniel Pryor, Charles Floyd — 
 and Patrick Gass, succeeding Floyd on the latter's death (Au- 
 gust 20, 1804). 
 
 Privates — William Bratton, John Colter, John Collins, 
 Peter Cruzatte, Reuben Fields, Joseph Fields, Robert Frazier, 
 George Gibson, Silas Goodrich, Hugh Hall, Thomas P. Howard, 
 
 Francis Labiche, La Liberte, Hugh McNeal, John Potts, 
 
 George Shannon, John Shields, John B. Thompson, William 
 Werner, Joseph Whitehouse, Alexander Willard, Richard 
 Windsor, Peter Wiser. 
 
 Interpreters — George Drouillard and Toussaint Charbonneau. 
 
 Indian woman — Sacajawea ( u bird woman "), Charbonneau's 
 wife. 
 
 Clark's negro slave, York. 
 
 Two soldiers, John Newman and M. B. Reed, set out with 
 the expedition, but were punished for misconduct, and in April, 
 1805, sent back to St. Louis. In Newman's place, Baptist Le- 
 page enlisted at Fort Mandan, November 2, 1804, and remained 
 with the party until the discharge of all the men at St. Louis, 
 November 10, 1806. 
 
 Ill 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 perfected a day ahead of time, and he was anx- 
 ious to be off. Arriving the following noon 
 at St. Charles, then a French hamlet of some 
 four hundred and fifty inhabitants — "pore, 
 polite & harmonious," his journal aptly de- 
 scribes them — he lay there until the twentieth 
 when his friend joined him, the latter having 
 been accompanied twenty-four miles overland 
 from St. Louis by several citizens of that place 
 and a small knot of United States military offi- 
 cers, who had but recently taken part in the 
 territorial transfer from France. At their 
 head was Captain Stoddard, serving as mili- 
 tary governor of Upper Louisiana pending 
 its reorganization by Congress. 
 
 The people of St. Charles hospitably enter- 
 tained the visitors, and on the following day 
 the expedition set out u under three Cheers 
 from the gentlemen on the bank." During 
 the succeeding two or three days many set- 
 tlers flocked to the shores to watch the little 
 fleet toiling up the great muddy stream, and 
 good-naturedly to wish the company joy in 
 their great undertaking. 
 
 Difficulties commenced immediately. Vio- 
 lent currents swept around the great sand- 
 
 112 
 
Difficult Navigation 
 
 bars, in which the boats were often danger- 
 ously near swamping. Snags were numerous, 
 and against these sprawling obstructions they 
 were frequently hurled violently by the swirl- 
 ing waters ; several times masts were broken 
 by being caught in the branches. Now and 
 then war-trails were seen, and a close watch 
 was deemed essential to avoid possible surprise 
 by bands of prowling savages, jealous of this 
 formidable invasion of their hunting-grounds. 
 Farther up the river — by the third week of 
 September — high shelving banks, now and 
 then undermined by the current and falling 
 into the river in masses often many acres in 
 extent, gave them great alarm ; and not infre- 
 quently their craft, swept by the current to 
 the foot of such an overhanging bluff of sand 
 and clay, were in serious danger. 1 
 
 1 In a letter to his mother, dated Fort Mandan, March 31, 
 1805, Lewis states : " So far we have experienced more diffi- 
 culties from the navigation of the Missouri than danger from the 
 savages. The difficulties which oppose themselves to the navi- 
 gation of this immense river arise from the rapidity of its cur- 
 rent, its falling banks, sand-bars and timber which remains 
 wholly or partially concealed in its bed, usually called by the 
 navigators of the Missouri and the Mississippi ; sawyer ' or 
 ' planter ' 
 
 " one of these difficulties the navigator never ceases to 
 
 113 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 The expedition was obliged, as it pro- 
 gressed, to live upon the country. While the 
 majority of the company were employed in 
 the arduous duty of navigating the craft which 
 conveyed the arms, ammunition, instruments, 
 articles for traffic with the Indians, and general 
 stores, hunting was a task of the first impor- 
 tance. At least two hunters were out almost 
 constantly, and these led two horses along 
 the bank, to bring the abundant meat to the 
 camping places. Frequently they were 
 joined by others of the party, detailed for 
 shore duty; and almost always one of the 
 captains, generally Lewis, joined the pedes- 
 trians, himself engaged in collecting botanical 
 
 contend with from the Entrance of the Missouri to this place ; 
 and in innumerable instances most of these obstructions are at 
 the same instant combined to oppose his progress or threaten 
 his destruction. To these we may also add a fifth, and not much 
 less considerable difficulty — the turbed quality of the water — 
 which renders it impracticable to discover any obstruction, even 
 to the depth of a single inch. Such is the velocity of the current 
 at all seasons of the year, from the entrance of the Missouri to 
 the mouth of the great river Platte, that it is impossible to re- 
 sist its force by means of oars or poles in the main channel of 
 the river; the eddies which therefore generally exist on one 
 side or the other of the river, are sought by the navigators, but 
 these are almost universally encumbered with concealed timber, 
 or within reach of the falling banks." 
 
 114 
 
Entering the Wilderness 
 
 and other scientific specimens and making 
 notes npon the country. 
 
 On the twenty-fifth of May the explorers 
 passed La Charette, the last white settlement 
 on the river — the home of Daniel Boone, still 
 a vigorous hunter at a ripe old age. Upon the 
 sixth of June buffalo signs were seen ; on the 
 eleventh they first shot bears. Five days later 
 two small rafts were met, manned by French 
 and half-breed traders from the Mandan coun- 
 try, and bearing buffalo tallow and furs to 
 St. Louis. One of these men, named Dourion, 
 who had lived with the Sioux for twenty 
 years and gained their confidence, was per- 
 suaded to turn back with the expedition in 
 order to induce that tribe to send a friendly 
 delegation to visit the new Great Father at 
 Washington. 
 
 Rapids were now frequently met with, 
 necessitating the use in the swift water of 
 towing-lines and kedge-anchors, a work much 
 impeded by heavy growths, along the banks, 
 of bushes and gigantic weeds. " Ticks and 
 musquiters," and great swarms of "knats," 
 begin to be "verry troublesome," necessita- 
 ting smudge fires and mosquito-bars. The 
 9 115 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 men frequently suffer from snake-bites, sun- 
 stroke, and stomach complaints. Both Lewis 
 and Clark now play the part of physicians, and 
 administer simple though sometimes drastic 
 remedies for these disorders; the journals 
 make frequent mention of strange doses and 
 vigorous bleeding. Sometimes storms drench 
 them in their rude camp ; or, suddenly burst- 
 ing upon their craft in open river, necessitate 
 great ado with anchors and cables until the 
 flurry is over — as once, "when the Storm 
 Sudenly Seased and the river became In- 
 stancetainously as Smoth as Glass." 
 
 Reaching Platte River on the twenty-second 
 of July, they lay by for several days and sent 
 for some Oto and Missouri chiefs, who were 
 informed of the change of government and 
 made happy with presents of flags, medals, 
 and trinkets, and promises of future trade ; 
 the proceeding being graced with an Indian 
 feast and much savage ceremony. 
 
 On the eighteenth of August, as they ap- 
 proached the Omaha Indians, a disagreeable 
 event occurred. Two of the men, M. B. Reed 
 and La Liberte, sent upon errands into the 
 country, deserted. The captains were not dis- 
 
 116 
 
Death of Floyd 
 
 posed to countenance such conduct, for desert- 
 ers could work great injury by making false 
 representations about them and the motives 
 of the expedition. Search parties were there- 
 fore sent out. Both were caught, but La 
 Liberte contrived again to escape. Reed, 
 confessing his fault, was not condemned to 
 death, but obliged to "run the gauntlet" 
 four times, each of his former comrades be- 
 ing armed with nine switches, and then was 
 ignominiously dismissed the service, although 
 held until the following spring. 
 
 Two days later occurred the first and only 
 death. Sergeant Charles Floyd, a man of 
 firmness and resolution, being " taken verry 
 bad all at once with a Biliouse Chorlick . . . 
 Died with a great deal of composure." This 
 event took place a short distance below the 
 present Sioux City, about eight hundred and 
 fifty miles above the mouth of the Missouri. 
 Patrick Gass was elected his successor. 
 
 Upon the thirtieth and thirty-first of the 
 month, at a point within Knox County, Ne- 
 braska, a somewhat elaborate camp was estab- 
 lished, at which a large party of Sioux chiefs 
 and their followers, brought in by Dourion, 
 
 117 ' 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 were entertained with the customary cere- 
 monials of speaking, dancing, and feasting. 
 Clark's record of the affair gives much de- 
 tailed information about the dress, customs, 
 numbers, and trade of these people. He 
 quaintly relates that their savage visitors were 
 "much deckerated with Paint Porcupine quils 
 feathers, large leagins and mockersons, all with 
 buffalow roabs of Different Colours." 
 
 The explorers were now in a paradise of 
 game. Great herds of buffaloes, sometimes 
 five thousand strong, were grazing in the 
 plains, the fattest of them falling easy victims 
 to the excellent aim of the hunters. Elk, 
 deer, antelopes, turkeys, and squirrels were 
 abundant, and gave variety to their meals, for 
 which the navigators generally tied up at the 
 bank and joined the land party around huge 
 camp-fires. Prairie-dogs, whose little bur- 
 rows punctured the plains in every direction, 
 interested the explorers. One day there was 
 a general attempt to drown out one of these 
 nimble miners ; but although all joined for 
 some time in freely pouring water down the 
 hole, the task was finally abandoned as im- 
 practicable. Prairie-wolves nightly howled 
 
 118 
 
Abundant Game 
 
 about their camps in surprising numbers and 
 in several varieties. 1 
 
 "Worn by the fatigue of a day's hard work 
 at the oars or the towing-line or pushing- 
 pole, or perhaps by long hours of tramping 
 or hunting upon the rolling plains, which 
 were frequently furrowed by deep ravines, 
 each member of the party earned his night's 
 rest. But as they lay under the stars, around 
 the generous fires of driftwood, great clouds 
 of mosquitoes not infrequently robbed them 
 
 i From Lewis's letter to his mother, previously cited : u Game 
 is very abundant, and seems to increase as we progress — our 
 prospect of starving is therefore consequently small. On the 
 lower portion of the Missouri, from its junction with the Mis- 
 sissippi to the entrance of the Osage river we met with some 
 deer, bear and turkeys. From thence to the Kancez river the 
 deer were more abundant. A great number of black bear, 
 some turkeys, geese, swan and ducks. From thence to the 
 mouth of the great river Platte an immense quantity of deer, 
 some bear, elk, turkeys, geese, swan and ducks. From thence 
 to the river S [ioux] some bear, a great number of elks, 
 the bear disappeared almost entirely, some turkeys, geese, swan 
 and ducks. From thence to the mouth of the White river vast 
 herds of buffalo, elk and some deer, and a greater quantity of 
 turkeys than we had before seen, a circumstance which I did 
 not much expect in a country so destitute of timber. Hence 
 to Fort Mandan the buffalo, elk and deer increase in quantity, 
 with the addition of the Cabie [cabra], as they are generally 
 called by the French engages, which is a creature about the 
 size of a small deer. Its flesh is deliciously flavored." 
 
 119 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 of sleep. The two leaders were possessed of 
 mosquito-bars, which generally enabled them 
 to rest with comparative comfort, although 
 sometimes even these were ineffectual; but 
 apparently none of the others enjoyed these 
 luxuries, and buried their heads within their 
 blankets, almost to the point of suffocation. 
 Once they had camped upon a sand-bar, in mid- 
 river. By the light of the moon the guard saw 
 the banks caving in above and below. Alarm- 
 ing the sleepers, they had barely time to launch 
 and board their boats before the very spot 
 where they had lain slipped into the turbid 
 current. In the upper reaches of the river, the 
 following year, grizzly bears and stampeded 
 buffalo herds were added to the list of night 
 terrors. 
 
 It was not always possible for the land and 
 water parties to make connections for the 
 night camps. The hunters and walkers were 
 often obliged to take long detours into the 
 interior, either in search of game or because 
 of deep ravines or of steep bluffs bordering 
 upon the river ; and sometimes a cat-short 
 was taken, to avoid the frequent bends of 
 the winding stream. The heavy growth of 
 
 120 
 
Perils Ashore 
 
 timber and bushes along the banks often 
 rendered it impossible for the land party to 
 trace or even to see the water. The result 
 was, that not infrequently the pedestrians 
 and horsemen would lose sight of the boats- 
 men, and then it was impossible to say 
 whether the former were above or below the 
 latter. In the last week of August, one of 
 the men, George Shannon, having the horses 
 in charge — there were now several of them in 
 the little herd — lost touch with his fellows 
 and thought them ahead of him. For six- 
 teen days he hurried on, without bullets to 
 shoot game, and not only lost all his horses 
 but one, but when finally caught up with by 
 his comrades was in a starving condition. 
 We shall, in future chapters, see that even 
 the leaders were sometimes lost in this man- 
 ner and obliged to camp out alone in the 
 wilderness, uncertain whether to hurry or to 
 tarry. 
 
 Lewis and Clark owed much of their suc- 
 cess to tactfulness in treating with the Indi- 
 ans whom they met in their long journey. 
 During the first season out they had but one 
 disagreeable incident on this account. At 
 
 121 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 the mouth of Teton River (September 25th) 
 was an encampment of Sioux, who stole the 
 horse of a hunter. The two captains sent 
 word to the village chiefs that they would 
 not speak to the tribesmen until the horse 
 had been returned. 
 
 The ceremonious red men thereupon ar- 
 ranged with the strangers for a council, which 
 took place under an awning reared upon a 
 sand-bar at the mouth of the Teton. The 
 animal was restored, and the head men were 
 shown the boats, each being given a drink of 
 whisky, "which they appeared to be verry fond 
 of." When the whites expressed a wish to 
 leave, some of the young bucks seized the 
 painter of a pirogue and wished forcibly to 
 detain their visitors, from whom they sought 
 more presents. Growing insolent, one or two 
 of them even drew their bows and arrows ; 
 whereupon, writes Clark, "I felt My Self 
 warm & spoke in verry possitive terms." The 
 men were ordered under arms, and thrusting 
 the Indians aside, the expedition pushed on 
 for a mile up-stream. Here the boats were 
 anchored off an island and heavily guarded 
 for the night. " I call this Island," records 
 
 122 
 
The Teton Sioux 
 
 Clark, " bad humered Island as we were in a 
 bad humer." 
 
 The tribesmen, recognizing that the explor- 
 ers were not to be cowed, became friendly, 
 and Lewis and Clark deemed it prudent to 
 accept the proffered friendship of this pow- 
 erful band, through whose country they must 
 pass upon the return. During the two fol- 
 lowing days councils were held in the village 
 council-house, with feasting, dancing, and 
 much smoking and oratory. There was still, 
 however, a disposition among some of the 
 pugnacious young warriors to stop the expe- 
 dition ; and when leave was taken on the 
 third day, the white captains informed them 
 that if the Sioux wanted war with the new 
 Great Father they could have it, but if peace, 
 then they were to keep their young bucks at 
 home and do as they were told. One of the 
 friendly chiefs concluded to travel for a way 
 upon one of the large boats, which had awa- 
 kened his admiration ; but after two days of 
 navigation the motion of the craft in high 
 waves caused him to beg to be put ashore, and 
 he was sent off with presents and good advice. 
 
 On the eighth of October they reached the 
 
 123 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Arikara country and went into camp near 
 their chief village — "a pleasent evening — 
 all things arranged both for Peace or War." 
 Two French traders and several of their men 
 were found here, and from them they ob- 
 tained much information about the country 
 and its savage inhabitants. These soon came 
 crowding about the camp, filled with wonder 
 at the newcomers and their outfit. The ex- 
 plorers strove hard to amuse the visitors. 
 Lewis's air-gun was a source of great aston- 
 ishment. But the dusky audience were par- 
 ticularly surprised at York, who did not lose 
 this opportunity to display his phenomenal 
 strength. The bulky negro told the Indians 
 that he had once been a wild animal, but had 
 been caught and tamed by his master. His 
 acrobatic performances and facial contortions, 
 combined with his feats of strength, succeeded 
 in frightening the simple audience ; indeed, 
 Clark tells us he " made himself more turri- 
 bal than we wished him to doe." The result 
 was, however, that at the several villages 
 which the expedition, amid much ceremonial, 
 visited during the next few days, it was 
 treated with marked civility. 
 
 124 
 
Savage Teetotalers 
 
 An unpleasant event occurred on the thir- 
 teenth, when one of the men, J. Newman, was 
 "confined for mutinous expression." That 
 night they tried him "by 9 of his Peers — 
 they did Centence him 75 Lashes & Dis- 
 banded [from] the party." He was, how- 
 ever, retained in custody until the arrival of 
 spring. 
 
 Almost daily, now, they met hunting bands 
 of Arikaras, by whom they were pleasantly 
 entertained in exchange for the trinkets which 
 were bestowed upon the delighted savages. 
 One of the chiefs volunteered to accompany 
 the explorers as far as their friends the Man- 
 dans, among whom Lewis and Clark desired 
 to winter. The Sioux had expressed fondness 
 for spirituous liquors ; but the Arikaras were 
 otherwise inclined, and when the white stran- 
 gers offered it to them, as a makeweight for 
 friendship, grew indignant. Clark writes 
 that they " say we are no friends or we would 
 not give them what makes them fools." 
 
 In the closing week of the month the Man- 
 dans were at last found in several riverside 
 villages, and the Arikara chief, after hobnob- 
 bing with his friends, warmly bade farewell 
 
 125 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 to the agents of the Great Father, and pad- 
 dled back to his own people. The principal 
 Mandan village was on a bluff overlooking 
 the Missouri, above the present Bismarck, 
 N. Dak. Three miles below, "on the north 
 side of the river in an extensive and well 
 timbered bottom," the expedition settled itself 
 for the winter within huts of cotton-wood 
 logs surrounded by a stout palisade of the 
 same timber, the establishment being named, 
 "in honor of our friendly neighbors," Fort 
 Mandan. 1 
 
 In reaching this point, 1,600 miles above 
 the mouth of the Missouri, they had occupied, 
 including delays of every sort, one hundred 
 and seventy-three days, thus making an aver- 
 age progress of a trifle over nine miles a day. 
 
 1 On the north bank of the Missouri, probably seven or eight 
 miles below Knife River, in what is now McLean County. 
 
 126 
 
CHAPTEE VIII 
 
 AT FORT MANDAN 
 
 During the five months spent at Fort 
 Mandan the leaders were never free from 
 care, for their position was one involving 
 danger and the necessity for exercising both 
 tact and firmness. At first the Mandans, 
 while nominally friendly, quite naturally sus- 
 pected the motives of these newcomers. 
 With the French trappers and traders who 
 either dwelt or frequently sojourned among 
 them in behalf of the British fur companies, 
 they were on intimate terms ; and the Scotch, 
 Irish, and English agents of these organiza- 
 tions were received upon their periodical 
 visits with much consideration. The aims of 
 these white men from the north were similar 
 to their own — the preservation of the wilder- 
 ness as a great hunting-ground, the only ex- 
 ploitation permissible being that which con- 
 tributed to the market for pelts. 
 
 127 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 There were found among the Mandans 
 several French and British representatives of 
 the North West Company, just then in bitter 
 rivalry with the Hudson's Bay Company, as 
 well as some independent traders. Some of 
 the Frenchmen had lived for years among 
 these people, with native wives and half-breed 
 children. During the winter numerous agents 
 of the North West Company came on horse- 
 back overland from their log forts in the As- 
 siniboin country to obtain news concerning 
 the transfer of Louisiana, and to satisfy their 
 curiosity concerning the expedition ; if possi- 
 ble, to thwart it, for the American invasion 
 was looked upon with aversion. During 
 their long stay, in the course of which they 
 frequently enjoyed the hospitality of the fort, 
 these emissaries sought, while pretending 
 friendship, to poison the minds of the Indians 
 by spreading their own ill opinions of Lewis 
 and Clark. 1 They circulated rumors that the 
 
 1 In the journal of Charles MacKenzie, one of these traders, it 
 is stated that Lewis and Clark always seemed glad to see their 
 visitors from Canada, and treated them with kindly civility. 
 But Lewis, though he " could speak fluently and learnedly on 
 all subjects," had an "inveterate disposition against the Brit- 
 ish"; while Clark, "equally well informed," conversed pleas- 
 antly and " seemed to dislike giving offence unnecessarily." 
 
 128 
 
British Intrigue 
 
 coming of the American explorers was soon 
 to be followed by an army of settlement and 
 the consequent death of the fur trade — a 
 prophecy more expeditiously realized than 
 they themselves could possibly have foreseen. 
 
 It required the utmost exertions of the 
 leaders of the expedition to overcome this 
 subtle opposition. In the end, however, they 
 succeeded. The chiefs were plainly told that 
 the United States now owned the country, 
 that loyalty to the Great Father at Washing- 
 ton was henceforth obligatory, and that they 
 must no longer receive medals and flags from 
 the British. At the same time, they were in- 
 formed that the exploration had no other 
 object than to acquaint the Great Father with 
 his new children, and that upon its return 
 arrangements would be made for sending 
 traders into the country, with better goods 
 and fairer treatment than had hitherto been 
 obtained from the Canadian companies. Long 
 before the close of the winter Lewis and 
 Clark had gained a fair degree of popularity 
 among these simple people, and the British 
 agents were correspondingly discomfited. 
 
 The daily duties of the fortified camp were 
 
 129 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 largely under the conduct of Clark, who was 
 the more practical woodsman of the two. 
 Lewis took upon himself, chiefly, the diplo- 
 matic task of visiting and ceremoniously 
 smoking pipes with the Indians in their sev- 
 eral villages, in which journeys he was 
 accompanied by one or two French inter- 
 preters and a body-guard of half a dozen of 
 his own men — the latter, a precaution some- 
 times quite necessary to personal safety. In 
 the neighborhood were several winter camps 
 of Grosventres and other tribes, on friendly 
 terms with the Mandans. Sometimes native 
 bands were met, for whom no direct inter- 
 preters could be obtained. On such occasions 
 the method of communication was round- 
 about : the Indians would address Sacajawea, 
 the wife of Charbonneau ; speaking no Euro- 
 pean tongue, she passed on the remark to her 
 husband, a Frenchman ; he in turn told the 
 story to a mulatto, " who spoke bad French 
 and worse English " ; and the mulatto finally 
 told the captains. 
 
 Such linguistic difficulties would have ap- 
 palled most men; but in the course of the 
 winter Lewis and Clark obtained in this man- 
 
 130 
 

 »• / . //jr. " • AT- /4- 
 
 / f 
 
 / a / " 
 
 A PAGE OF LEWIS'S JOURNAL. 
 
 Original now in possession of the American Philosophical Society at 
 
 Philadelphia. 
 
Folk- Lore Neglected 
 
 ner a mass of information concerning the 
 characteristics, life, manners, and languages 
 of the Indians which was quite remarkable. 1 
 The explorers have, however, left us in their 
 daily records but little in the way of folk- 
 lore. Clark's journal frequently contains such 
 entries as : " Several little Indian aneckd tB told 
 me to day ; " but he does not appear to have 
 written them out — a neglect greatly to be 
 deplored. 
 
 At one time there was an alarm that some 
 prowling Sioux were about to attack the 
 great Mandan village. Appealed to for aid, 
 Clark at once crossed the river with twenty- 
 three men, including interpreters, and skil- 
 fully and quickly flanked the town. No 
 Sioux appeared, but the villagers were much 
 impressed by this active military display, and 
 henceforth more generally respected the 
 Americans. At other times the natives were 
 effectually aided in their buffalo-hunts, which 
 
 1 President Jefferson had provided the explorers with printed 
 vocabulary blanks, which they were to fill out. The recording 
 of their words, a practise which they could not understand, 
 greatly alarmed the natives, who feared that this meant some 
 wicked design upon their country. Unfortunately, these vocab- 
 ularies, although reaching Jefferson safely, were eventually lost. 
 
 10 131 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 were conducted either on horseback across 
 the frozen plains or upon great ice-floes in 
 the river — the latter an exceptionally dan- 
 gerous proceeding. 
 
 The hospitality of the white men was some- 
 times severely taxed by the Indian visitors 
 who thronged the neighborhood of the fort. 
 The unsophisticated savages never tired of 
 watching the white men at their daily tasks 
 of wood-chopping, cooking, washing, repair- 
 ing, and military drill. At the blacksmith 
 shop, the bellows and the working of malle- 
 able iron were sources of much wonder. 
 Lewis's air-gun, which could discharge forty 
 shots from one load, awoke the chief est aston- 
 ishment, the bewildered spectators much 
 dreading the magician who could bring such 
 things to pass. A Grosventre chief told one 
 of the North West agents, however, that his 
 warriors could soon do for these palefaces, 
 out on the upper plains — for " there are only 
 two sensible men among them, the worker of 
 iron and the mender of guns." 
 
 The strictest discipline was maintained 
 at Fort Mandan. The natives frequently 
 sought to test these regulations. Sometimes 
 
 132 
 
Pestered by Indians 
 
 Indian women who were in the fort over- 
 night would unbar the gates to admit their 
 friends, and twice some of the bucks scaled 
 the palisade ; but such practises were sternly 
 prohibited and eventually stopped. The per- 
 tinacity of the natives was sometimes irksome 
 to the last degree. "They usually," wrote 
 Lewis in his journal, " pester us with their 
 good company the ballance of the day after 
 once being introduced to our apartment." 
 
 Having necessarily provided themselves 
 with a large store of homely remedies and 
 surgical appliances, and acquired the rudi- 
 ments of medical and surgical practise, the 
 two captains were called upon not only to 
 treat their own people but to play the part 
 of healers to the Indians, who, beset by va- 
 rious hurts and ailments, swarmed upon them 
 not only at Fort Mandan, but throughout 
 their entire route. The practise of this art 
 proved to be of the utmost importance in the 
 work of ingratiating themselves with the men 
 of the wilderness. 
 
 Amid their constant labors and watchful- 
 ness, holidays were carefully observed by the 
 often homesick explorers. Upon Christmas, 
 
 133 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Clark records, they were " awakened before 
 Day by a discharge of 3 platoons from the 
 Party and the French, the men merrily Dis- 
 posed, I give them all a little Taffia [brandy] 
 and permitted 3 Cannon fired, at raising Our 
 Flag, Some Men Went out to hunt & the 
 others to Danceing and Continued untill 9 
 oClock P.M. when the frolick ended <fcc." 
 For the time, they were free from their savage 
 guests, who had been told that this being a 
 " great medicine day " with the whites, their 
 company was not wanted. New Year's was 
 another gala-day. Two cannons were dis- 
 charged, and some of the men went with the 
 versatile York to the chief village and danced 
 and otherwise performed, greatly to the de- 
 light of their brown neighbors. 
 
 The last six weeks of their stay were 
 crowded with details. Towards the end of 
 February, with the thermometer still in the 
 neighborhood of 20° below zero, timber was 
 cut for the making of pirogues, and prep- 
 arations were commenced for the resump- 
 tion of the long journey. The approach of 
 spring brought the usual news of intertribal 
 jealousies and consequent raids, especially on 
 
 134 
 
Despatches and Specimens 
 
 the part of the restless Grosventres. A band 
 of Sioux waylaid the hunters for the expedi- 
 tion and carried off two of their horses and 
 considerable meat. Clark went upon a hunt- 
 ing trip as far as the Cannon Ball River. 
 Sacajawea was delivered of a son (Febru- 
 ary 11th). 
 
 A few days after arriving at Fort Mandan, 
 early in November, several of the French en- 
 gages, hired only for the trip thither, had re- 
 turned down the river. Upon the seventh of 
 April the barge and a canoe were despatched 
 to St. Louis, with several soldiers (accompany- 
 ing whom were the disgraced Reed and New- 
 man), and Frenchmen charged with despatches 
 and specimens to the President, as well as 
 private letters. Among the articles thus for- 
 warded were nine cages of living animals and 
 birds, and several boxes containing rocks, soils, 
 dried plants, stuffed zoological specimens, and 
 articles of Indian dress, utensils, weapons, and 
 ornaments. Many of these were long exhib- 
 ited by Jefferson at his Monticello home, and 
 others went to Peale's Museum in Philadel- 
 phia ; some are still in existence. 
 
 At the same moment (four in the after- 
 
 135 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 noon) that the barge and canoe left for the 
 lower country, Clark embarked with his 
 party for the forward journey — Lewis, who 
 craved the exercise, marching on shore to 
 the first night's camp, four miles up-stream. 
 The flotilla consisted of two large pirogues 
 and six small canoes. Writes Clark : " This 
 little fleet altho' not quite so respectable as 
 those of Columbus or Capt. Cook, was still 
 viewed by us with as much pleasure as those 
 deservedly famed adventurers ever beheld 
 theirs; and I dare say with quite as much 
 anxiety for their safety and preservation. 
 ... I could not but esteem this moment of 
 my departure as among the most happy of 
 my life." 
 
 136 
 
CHAPTEK IX 
 
 FKOM THE MANDANS TO THE SEA 
 
 A week out from Fort Mandan (April 
 14th), the expedition reached the mouth of 
 what the leaders named Charbonneau Creek. 
 This was the highest point on the Missouri 
 to which whites had thus far ascended, ex- 
 cept that two Frenchmen, having lost their 
 way, had proceeded a few miles farther up. 
 All beyond was unknown to civilized men. 
 
 On the twenty-sixth the mouth of the Yel- 
 lowstone was reached. Here, Lewis in his 
 journal recommends that a trading post be es- 
 tablished — eight hundred yards above the 
 junction, on a high, well-timbered plain, over- 
 looking a lake-like widening of the Missouri. 
 
 In these upper regions, where signs of coal 
 were frequently seen and in places alkali 
 whitened the ground like snow, " game is very 
 abundant and gentle " ; two hunters could, 
 
 137 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Lewis thinks, " conveniently supply a regi- 
 ment with provisions." Big-horns, monster 
 elk, black and grizzly bears, antelopes, and 
 great herds of buffaloes are daily met; they 
 feast off beavers, Lewis thinking " the tale a 
 most delicious morsel," and wondering great- 
 ly at the industry of these animals, which in 
 some spots fell for their numerous dams many 
 acres of timber as thick as a man's body ; 
 wolves increase, and the nimble coyotes be- 
 gin to interest them. 
 
 The huge and savage grizzly was, in some 
 respects, the most formidable obstacle en- 
 countered by the intrepid explorers; compared 
 with these bulky, ferocious beasts, Indians 
 occasioned small alarm. By the time the 
 party were a month out from the Mandans, 
 Lewis could write : " I find that the curiossity 
 of our party is pretty well satisf yed with ri- 
 spect to this anamal . . . [he] has stag- 
 gered the resolution [of] several of them." A 
 few days later came a disagreeable experi- 
 ence with a grizzly, in which he and seven of 
 his men, as yet unable to locate the vulner- 
 able parts, found it impossible to kill the 
 creature save after a persistent fusillade from 
 
 138 
 
Fighting Grizzlies 
 
 their short-range rifles. " These bear," he says, 
 " being so hard to die reather intimeadates 
 us all ; I must confess that I do not like the 
 gentlemen and had reather fight two Indians 
 than one bear." 
 
 Both Lewis and Clark were fond of hunt- 
 ing, and bne or the other of them, more 
 often Lewis, generally accompanied the 
 hunters on shore ; although, as in the lower 
 reaches, the captain often wandered far from 
 his party, collecting specimens or ascending 
 elevations to examine the country. Lewis, 
 when walking, was always armed both with 
 his rifle and a halberd (or spontoon), which 
 latter he found convenient as a weapon and 
 as a staff. One day he fell upon the edge of 
 a bluff whose surface had been rendered slip- 
 pery through rain; but a dexterous use of 
 the halberd saved him from a fall of ninety 
 feet, that no doubt would have been fatal. 
 
 At another time he had just shot a fat buf- 
 falo and, his rifle as yet unloaded, was watch- 
 ing the animal die, when he was startled to 
 find that a large grizzly had stealthily crept 
 within twenty paces of him. There were no 
 bushes within several miles, the nearest tree 
 
 139 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 was three hundred yards away, and the river- 
 bank, eighty yards distant, sloped down to a 
 height of not over three feet. At first he 
 slowly retreated toward the tree, but the 
 bear rushed at him with open mouth, at full 
 speed. By turning on his track, the captain 
 was able to reach the water, into which he 
 ran until waist deep. Flourishing the hal- 
 berd at the animal, the latter paused upon 
 the shore, twenty paces distant, and sudden- 
 ly showing alarm at this threatened attack, 
 wheeled and ran away as fast as he could to 
 the nearest woods. 
 
 But the enemy was not always thus easily 
 frightened. On one occasion, an immense 
 fellow so closely pursued two hunters who 
 had poured eight bullets into his body that 
 in their hasty retreat they cast aside their 
 guns and pouches, and threw themselves into 
 the river, over a perpendicular bank twenty 
 feet high. The infuriated bear plunged in 
 after them, only a few feet behind the second 
 man, when fortunately another hunter on the 
 shore shot the fellow through the head and 
 killed him. Such sport lent zest to the jour- 
 ney, but soon gave rise to an order that the 
 
 140 
 
Camp Perils 
 
 men must, when in open country, act only on 
 the defensive with this ferocious creature. 
 
 Once, at the dead of night, a large buffalo 
 bull invaded their camp. Apparently at- 
 tracted by the light, he swam the river, and 
 climbing over their best pirogue — but fortu- 
 nately not seriously injuring it — he charged 
 the fires at full speed, passing within a few 
 inches of the heads of the sleeping men, and 
 made for Lewis and Clark's tent. Lewis's 
 dog, his constant companion throughout the 
 expedition, caused the burly beast to change 
 his course, and he was off in a flash ; all this, 
 before the sentinel could arouse the camp, 
 which was now in an uproar, the men rush- 
 ing out with guns in hand, inquiring for the 
 cause of the disturbance. 
 
 Owing to the mismanagement of the steers- 
 man, a squall of wind caused the pirogue to 
 upset. Papers, instruments, books, medi- 
 cines, ammunition, and articles of merchan- 
 dise were wet and nearly lost — a narrow 
 escape from a disaster which might well have 
 meant the end of the expedition. A camp- 
 fire once crept into a tree overhanging the 
 captains' lodge. The guard awakened them, 
 
 141 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 and they removed the tent just in time to 
 escape being crushed by the falling trunk. It 
 would be easy to fill pages with experiences 
 of this sort — with bears, buffaloes, wolves, 
 tiger cats, and rattlesnakes, and with the 
 forces of inanimate nature — which daily and 
 nightly beset these hardy adventurers who, 
 first of all white men, were breaking a trans- 
 continental path westward to the Pacific. 
 
 " The succession of curious adventures," 
 wrote Lewis, "wore the impression on my 
 mind of inchantment, at sometimes for 
 a moment I thought it might be a dream." 
 But there were other trials which convinced 
 him of the reality of his existence : " Our trio 
 of pests still invade and obstruct us on all 
 occasions, these are the Musquetoes eye knats 
 and "prickly pears, equal to any three curses 
 that ever poor Egypt laiboured under, ex- 
 cept the Mahometant yoke." The labor of 
 navigation was of itself no holiday task. Oars 
 could seldom be used against the heavy cur- 
 rent, beset as it was with snags and sand-bars. 
 Towing-ropes and setting-poles were now more 
 frequently in use, the men finding the work 
 excessively fatiguing. Clark, as master of 
 
 142 
 
A Fateful Decision 
 
 navigation, toiled lustily each day; and Lewis, 
 when aboard the craft, encouraged his people 
 by assisting ; he assures us in his journal that 
 he has "learned to push a tolerable good 
 pole." 
 
 The third of June they came to where the 
 river " split in two," and were greatly puzzled 
 to know which way to go. To take the wrong 
 branch, that did not lead toward the Colum- 
 bia, would lose them the whole of the season, 
 and probably so dishearten the party that 
 the expedition might have to be abandoned. 
 The utmost circumspection was necessary in 
 order to arrive at the right decision. Both 
 streams were carefully investigated by advance 
 parties, being measured as to width, depth, 
 and character and velocity of current. The 
 men thought the north or right-hand fork the 
 larger of the two, and therefore the main 
 Missouri ; but Lewis and Clark were satisfied 
 that the other was the true channel, and by 
 common consent this was chosen. On this, as 
 on many other occasions, the joint judgment 
 of the captains proved to be superior to that 
 of their assistants. The right fork Lewis 
 named Maria's River, after his young cousin, 
 
 143 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Maria Wood. " It is true," he writes, " that 
 the hue of the waters of this turbulent and 
 troubled stream but illy comport with the 
 pure celestial virtues of that lovely fair one ; 
 but on the other hand it is a noble river." 
 
 It now being necessary to relieve them- 
 selves of a part of their burden, a consider- 
 able quantity of provisions, salt, tools, and 
 ammunition were secretly buried or "cached" 
 at the forks; and their large pirogue was 
 hidden upon an island, under a heap of brush. 
 After several days in camp, during which 
 they dried, or "jerked," a quantity of bear 
 and elk meat, the expedition again set forth, 
 and soon all were convinced that the proper 
 path had been selected. On the thirteenth, 
 Lewis, tramping on ahead, with a pack upon 
 his back, reached the Great Falls of the Mis- 
 souri. Here he selected a portage trail for 
 Clark, who arrived three days later with the 
 boats. Above the falls are many cascades, 
 involving a toilsome land journey of eighteen 
 miles; but this was successfully accomplished, 
 although it was the fifteenth of July before 
 the explorers could again start upon their river 
 journey, this time in new " dugout " canoes. 
 
 144 
 
The Three Forks 
 
 Upon the twenty-fifth, Clark, now in ad- 
 vance with the flotilla, arrived at the point 
 where the Missouri is again divided, this time 
 into three forks of nearly equal size. Puzzled 
 to know which was the better path, he finally 
 selected the southwest stream, as apparently 
 having more water and bearing more closely 
 to the west. Leaving a note for Lewis at- 
 tached to a conspicuously placed pole at the 
 junction, Clark ascended the southwest river 
 for twenty-five miles on foot ; but returned be- 
 cause Charbonneau gave out and all of the 
 party were suffering from excessive heat and 
 lack of good drinking water, for the roily 
 fluid of the Missouri is unfitted for this 
 purpose. 
 
 Upon Lewis's arrival, the two leaders 
 carefully examined the several forks, and 
 after a delay of five days — during which 
 Clark was ill with a high fever " & akeing in 
 all my bones " — fortunately decided to con- 
 tinue the ascent of the southwest stream; 
 this they called Jefferson River, " in honor of 
 that illustrious personage Thomas Jefferson, 
 the author of our Enterprise." The middle 
 fork was styled Madison, after the secretary 
 
 145 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 of state, and the southeast Gallatin, after the 
 secretary of the treasury ; rivers had already 
 been named by the expedition for the secre- 
 taries of war and the navy. 
 
 It was now of the utmost importance that 
 either Snake or Shoshoni Indians should be 
 found, as this tribe was then inhabiting the 
 country about the sources of the Missouri. 
 Their aid was essential in both pointing out 
 the overmountain path to the navigable 
 reaches of the Columbia and in furnishing 
 horses for the transport of the men and their 
 goods. It was at this point that Sacajawea 
 was expected to prove most useful. Five 
 years previous she had been taken prisoner 
 from a Shoshoni encampment not far above 
 the Three Forks of the Missouri, and carried 
 by her captors, the Minitarees, to the lower 
 Missouri, where, gaining her freedom, she be- 
 came united to the interpreter Charbonneau, 
 who frequently maltreated her. This man 
 had been employed chiefly because of his 
 squaw, who was to serve as interpreter to the 
 Snakes and Shoshoni and in some measure as 
 guide to their country. We have already 
 seen that she had proved of value to the party 
 
 146 
 
Sacajawea 
 
 as an interpreter, long before reaching the 
 upper waters, and on several occasions she had 
 been of considerable service in the exigencies 
 of camp life. The only member of the expedi- 
 tion who had previously been upon the upper 
 reaches of the Missouri, her memory was fre- 
 quently appealed to with relation to geograph- 
 ical questions — sometimes successfully, al- 
 though often her intellect appeared too dull to 
 have comprehended what she saw during her 
 descent of the river. In alluding to their ar- 
 rival at the scene of her captivity, Lewis writes : 
 " I cannot discover that she shews any immo- 
 tation of sorrow in recollecting this event, or 
 of joy in being again restored to her native 
 country ; if she has enough to eat and a few 
 trinkets to wear I believe she would be per- 
 fectly content anywhere." 
 
 Lofty mountains scantily clad with pitch- 
 pine soon began to approach closely to the 
 river, and shallows and rapids increased the 
 difficulties of navigation, rendering line and 
 pole now the only means of stemming the 
 fierce, boiling current ; riffles succeeded each 
 other every three or four hundred yards, and 
 
 the men were much of the time wading along 
 11 14 7 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 the bush-strewn shore, over slippery rocks, 
 wet to the skin, and weak from the extreme 
 labor of pushing and hauling under such un- 
 toward circumstances. It became evident 
 that it would not be long before the water- 
 way must be abandoned and the mountain 
 portage to the Columbia be undertaken. 
 While Clark remained in charge of the flo- 
 tilla, Lewis pushed ahead on foot with the 
 hunters, hoping to find a band of Indians; 
 yet in his eager quest ever filling the pages 
 of his journal with careful notes upon the 
 natural history of the region. 
 
 The land party, each man carrying his pack 
 on his back, also had their trials. On the up- 
 lands, thorns of prickly pear filled their mocca- 
 sins and rendered walking a painful exercise, 
 while on the river-bottoms they were harassed 
 by the dense brush of the pulpy-leaved thorn. 
 The hunters still continued to kill elk, bear, 
 antelopes, beaver, and now and then a pan- 
 ther, and occasionally to catch fish, but as a 
 whole the meat supply was now running 
 low. 
 
 One afternoon, Lewis, unaccompanied, and 
 frequently climbing the hills for views, worked 
 
 148 
 
 \ 
 
Forks of the Jefferson 
 
 ahead of his party, and though he fired his 
 gun and whooped, his companions, two miles 
 below, could not hear him ; he was therefore 
 obliged to spend the night alone. Killing a 
 duck and cooking it by his large fire, he 
 made a bed of willow-boughs and "amused 
 myself in combatting the musquetoes for the 
 ballance of the evening . . . should have 
 had a comfortable nights lodge but for the 
 musquetoes which infested me all night." 
 The running of a grizzly near his fire once 
 awakened him, causing him sharply to real- 
 ize the danger of the wilderness. In the 
 morning, his companions, concerned for his 
 safety, joined him at breakfast. 
 
 On the fourth of August, Lewis came to 
 where the Jefferson forks into three streams. 
 At first puzzled to know which to take, he de- 
 cided to follow the middle one, and left the 
 usual note to Clark on a pole at the junction. 
 But when Clark arrived with his boats there 
 was no pole, for being green the beavers had 
 carried it off; whereupon he ascended the 
 northwest fork, not being able to judge so well 
 as Lewis, who had the advantage of hill-top 
 views. But the difficulties of passage up this 
 
 149 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 rapid stream were so great, that after a day's 
 rough travel Clark returned to the forks, there 
 finding Lewis awaiting him. Naming the 
 northwest fork Wisdom, and the southeast 
 Philanthropy — virtues which they ascribed to 
 President Jefferson — they regarded the middle 
 stream as the Jefferson, and continued its as- 
 cent. Lewis kept on his way afoot, while Clark 
 — suffering from "the rageing fury of a turner 
 on my anckle musle" — followed with the craft. 
 
 The river now passed for much of the way 
 under perpendicular cliffs of rocks, infested 
 by rattlesnakes. The mountains were not 
 high, yet covered with snow, showing that 
 the altitude was great, although the ascent 
 had been scarcely perceptible. " I do not be- 
 lieve," writes Lewis, " that the world can fur- 
 nish an[other] example of a river runing to 
 the extent which the Missouri and Jefferson 
 rivers do through such mountainous country 
 and at the same time so navigable as they 
 are." 
 
 On the eleventh, a day above the now cele- 
 brated Beaver's Head cliff — with the river 
 only twelve yards wide, and often barred by 
 beaver dams — the Indian trail, which he had 
 
 150 
 
Tasting Western Waters 
 
 been following for many days, had thinned 
 out and soon vanished. Lewis, walking ahead 
 in search of the road, finally saw a Shoshoni 
 warrior on horseback. The savage stood 
 still, allowing the captain to approach within 
 a hundred paces, and show his white skin — 
 the faces and hands of the explorers were now 
 as dark as those of Indians — and make signs 
 of peace ; but the approach of Drouillard and 
 Shields frightened the horseman, and he gal- 
 loped off. 
 
 The following day Lewis reached the 
 source of the Missouri — a spring of ice-cold 
 water " issuing from the base of a low moun- 
 tain or hill." Two miles below this, " McNeal 
 had exultingly stood with a foot on each side 
 of this little rivulet and thanked his god that 
 he had lived to bestride the mighty & hereto- 
 fore deemed endless Missouri." A little later 
 in the day, the captain crossed the divide and 
 reached " a handsome bold runing Creek of 
 cold Clear water here I first tasted the 
 water of the great Columbia river " ; this was 
 the Lemhi, an upper tributary of the Co- 
 lumbia. 
 
 Next day (August 13th) Lewis discovered 
 
 151 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 a party of squaws whom lie made friendly 
 with presents of beads, moccasin awls, pewter 
 looking-glasses, and paint. They conducted 
 him to their camp, two miles farther down 
 the Lemhi, where the captain was introduced 
 to sixty warriors, who, on hearing the tale of 
 the exultant women, affectionately embraced 
 Lewis and his party — " we wer all carressed 
 and besmeared with their grease and paint 
 till I was heartily tired of the national hug." 
 
 After a day and night of feasting and danc- 
 ing, the Indians agreed to furnish horses for 
 the transport, from their large herds grazing 
 near by ; and in the morning a considerable 
 party of young men started out with their new 
 friends to meet Clark at the head of navigation. 
 Upon arriving at the place, on the fourteenth, 
 Clark was not to be seen, whereupon the sav- 
 ages at once suspected treachery. It required 
 courage and audacious diplomacy on Lewis's 
 part to prevent them from either running 
 away or killing the whites. Three days 
 later, Clark — delayed by the great toil of the 
 ascent and the grumbling of his men — ap- 
 peared and relieved the situation, which was 
 becoming serious. With him were Charbon- 
 
 152 • 
 
A Joyful Meeting 
 
 neau and the squaw, a welcome event, for 
 hitherto all communication between Lewis 
 and his hosts had been by means of the uni- 
 versal sign language of the Western tribes. 
 Sacajawea could not only serve as inter- 
 preter and communicate fully the objects 
 which brought the adventurous white men, but 
 to the great joy of all concerned she proved 
 to be the long-lost sister of Cameawhait, the 
 young head chief accompanying the horsemen. 
 Lewis says : " The meeting of those people 
 was really affecting, particularly between 
 Sah-cah-gar-we-ah and an Indian woman, who 
 had been taken prisoner at the same time 
 with her and who had afterwards escaped 
 from the Minnetares and rejoined her nation." 
 Council followed council, in the deliberate 
 manner of the Indians, so that it was several 
 days before negotiations for horses could be 
 concluded ; but in the end the Shoshoni gave 
 abundant promise of assistance. While Clark 
 pushed forward with eleven men to negotiate 
 for animals at the principal village, to exam- 
 ine the Lemhi, and ascertain its navigable 
 possibilities, also to select timber for dugout 
 canoes, Lewis arranged to cache the boats and 
 
 - 153 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 the supplies needed for the return trip, and 
 to bring on the party and their necessary bag- 
 gage to the first Shoshoni camp. 
 
 Bargaining with the Indians was attended by 
 many uncertainties. It was soon evident that 
 the subordinate chiefs were jealous of the at- 
 tentions naturally paid to Cameawhait, and 
 must be handled cautiously. The prices de- 
 manded for the horses were exorbitant; in 
 acquiring the twenty-nine animals finally se- 
 cured, the party were almost bereft of their 
 available stock of trading materials — knives, 
 pistols, ammunition, clothing, etc. The sav- 
 ages were fickle in their friendship ; sometimes, 
 like a herd of sheep, being overcome by cause- 
 less panic in their dealings with the mysterious 
 strangers, and ready to desert them in the 
 mountain passes. Great firmness and pa- 
 tience, and reliance in the good faith of Cam- 
 eawhait, to whose practical sense the cap- 
 tains never appealed in vain, in the end won, 
 and the reluctant Indians were kept to their 
 promise to see the explorers over the divide. 
 
 The Lemhi was soon abandoned by Clark 
 as unsuitable for their purpose. They there- 
 upon struck off to the northward, seeking 
 
 154 
 
On the Lolo Trail 
 
 " the great river which lay in the plains be- 
 yond the mountains." The route taken was 
 over the heavily timbered Bitterroot Moun- 
 tains, which are slashed by deep gorges, 
 down which rush torrential streams. This 
 formidable region, " a perfect maze of bewil- 
 dering ridges," was then and still is traversed 
 by the Lolo or Northern Nez Perce trail, 
 followed from time immemorial by Indians 
 traveling between the upper waters of the 
 Missouri and those of the Columbia. With 
 many convolutions, rendered necessary by the 
 uneven ground, this primitive highway fol- 
 lows the watershed between the north fork 
 and the middle or Lachsa fork of the Clear- 
 water River, and eventually reaches the bot- 
 toms of the Weippe Weeipe. 
 
 Having left the region of game, the party 
 were soon pressed for provisions, and were 
 obliged to kill several of their horses for 
 food. Blinding snowstorms in mid- Septem- 
 ber greatly impeded progress; the sides of 
 the mountains were steep and rocky, with in- 
 secure foothold, especially during the frequent 
 showers of sleet ; the nights were cold, raw, 
 and often wet ; great areas strewn with fallen 
 
 155 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 timber sometimes appeared almost impassable 
 barriers ; and not infrequently the rude path 
 was dangerously near the edges of steep 
 precipices, from which men or horses were in 
 constant fear of being dashed to pieces. Thus 
 they toiled on, through the dense and gloomy 
 forests of pine, sometimes scaling steep ridges, 
 at others descending rocky slopes at the peril 
 of their lives, or threading the thick timber 
 of marshy bottoms. Some of their horses fell 
 through exhaustion, to be at once used as 
 food ; and the men themselves were so dis- 
 heartened that Clark found it necessary to 
 forge ahead with a party of hunters to find 
 level country and game, by way of "reviving 
 ther sperits." 
 
 As they descended the mountains, the heat 
 increased, but on the twenty-second they wel- 
 comed the Weippe plain, where a band of 
 Chopunnish Indians — chief traders upon the 
 Clearwater branch of the Columbia system — 
 received them with cautious ceremony. Lewis 
 writes : " The pleasure I now felt in having 
 tryumphed over the rockey Mountains and 
 decending once more to a level and fertile 
 country where there was every rational hope 
 
 156 
 
Descending the Columbia 
 
 of finding a comfortable subsistence for my- 
 self and party can be more readily conceived 
 than expressed." 
 
 At the confluence of the Clearwater with 
 its north fork the expedition went into camp, 
 Lewis and most of the men being " weakened 
 and much reduced in flesh as well as Strength." 
 Clark, in addition to superintending the man- 
 ufacture of iive canoes — largely by the Indian 
 method of burning them out of solid trunks 
 of trees — busily ministered to his companions, 
 giving them " rushes Pills " and other strong 
 remedies of the day. The weather was hot, 
 in this closing week of September, and there 
 was little nourishing food to be had — chiefly 
 fish and roots, which latter were not to be in- 
 dulged in freely ; nevertheless, the sick re- 
 covered within a few days. 
 
 Caching their saddles and much of their 
 ammunition, they branded the horses — now 
 thirty-eight in number — which they left in 
 charge of a friendly chief, and upon the 
 seventh of October launched their canoes for 
 the descent to the Pacific. Rapids and islands 
 were now numerous, and Indian summer fish- 
 ing villages frequently appeared. The na- 
 
 157 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 tives of the Columbia Valley proved to be of 
 an inferior type, living chiefly on fish and 
 roots — a mild and friendly people, some of 
 whom, in the lower reaches, had met white 
 traders upon the seacoast ; while in other 
 camps the appearance of the explorers caused 
 great consternation, the impression being that 
 such strange visitors must have descended 
 from the clouds. 
 
 Fish not always agreeing with the adven- 
 turers, dogs were almost daily purchased for 
 food, Clark alone failing to relish this animal. 
 Now and then they were able to purchase 
 berries, but further than roots, fish, dog meat, 
 and berries, it was impossible to vary their 
 diet during the entire descent. The squalid 
 and flea-ridden natives, all busily engaged in 
 catching and drying fish for winter consump- 
 tion, crowded to see the newcomers, eager to 
 trade their fish, and even wood for cooking 
 with, for bits of ribbon and other knick- 
 knacks, and losing no opportunity adroitly to 
 pilfer from the camp. 
 
 On several occasions, despite the impossi- 
 bility of communicating save by signs, a con- 
 spiracy to kill them was detected, and only 
 
 158 
 
Tidewater Reached 
 
 checkmated by a show of force. This, how- 
 ever, required skilful diplomacy, for the ex- 
 plorers were under the necessity of returning 
 by the same route, and it was important to 
 keep on good terms with these slippery fel- 
 lows. The Frenchmen therefore frequently 
 played their violins and danced for the 
 amusement of the wondering tribesmen, 
 while the Kentuckians and Virginians sang, 
 York performed his feats of strength and 
 agility, and Lewis's air-gun gave them an ex- 
 ample of the sort of magic in which the white 
 men dealt. 
 
 After safely braving the formidable Short 
 Narrows of the Columbia — " swelling, boiling 
 <fcwhorling in every direction" — they passed 
 camps of savages who were more familiar 
 with white men, many of them being clad in 
 civilized clothing obtained from the coast 
 traders ; if possible, these were even more 
 tricky than their fellows above, and like them, 
 dwelt in mortal fear of the Snakes and 
 Shoshoni whom Lewis and Clark had met 
 upon the sources of the river. 
 
 On the first of November they reached 
 Pacific tide-water, and soon were amid rich 
 
 159 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 bottom-lands arid abundant elk, deer, and 
 other game, among which were sea-otters ; 
 and dense fogs frequently veiled the pleasing 
 landscape. On the fourth, the natives at one 
 village came in state to see them, tricked out 
 in scarlet and blue blankets, sailor- jackets, 
 overalls, shirts, and hats, in addition to their 
 usual costume — assuming, disagreeable, thiev- 
 ish fellows, freely laying their hands on 
 small things about the camp, but treated by 
 the diplomatic explorers " with every atten- 
 tion & friendship." Three days later (the 7th) 
 breakers could be heard during a storm, and 
 Clark exultantly writes : " Great joy in camp 
 we are in view of the Ocian." The river was 
 here from five to seven miles wide, with bold, 
 rocky shores, and " The Seas roled and tossed 
 the Canoes in such a manner this evening 
 that Several of our party were Sea sick." 
 
 In the midst of a pelting rainstorm of ten 
 days' duration, and such violent waves that 
 all hands were hard worked in preventing 
 their slender craft from being crushed upon 
 the rocky and drift-strewn beach, they were 
 able to make but slow progress toward the 
 seashore. "It would be distressing to See 
 
 160 
 
At the Ocean Side 
 
 our Situation," Clark's journal records, "all 
 wet and colde our bedding also wet, (and the 
 robes of the party which compose half the 
 bedding is rotten and we are not in a Situa- 
 tion to supply their places) . . . Fortu- 
 nately for us our men are healthy." 
 
 Finally, after being weather-bound for six 
 days in " a dismal niche scercely largely to 
 contain us, our baggage half a mile from us," 
 and canoes weighted down with stones to 
 prevent their dashing against the rocks, the 
 wind lulled, they proceeded (November 15th) 
 around a blustery point, and there found a 
 " butif ull Sand beech thro which runs a Small 
 river from the hills." 
 
 The continent had at last been spanned 
 by American explorers. 
 
 161 
 
CHAPTEE X 
 
 AT FORT CLATSOP, AND THE RETURN 
 
 The expedition had now reached what is 
 at present called Baker's Bay, discovered by 
 Vancouver in 1792. Personally he did not 
 find the Columbia, which Gray had made 
 known to him in that year ; later in the sea- 
 son, however, one of Vancouver's officers, 
 Broughton, ascended the stream to the Cas- 
 cades, and took possession of the country for 
 Great Britain. There was a strong, senti- 
 mental desire on the part of Lewis and 
 Clark's men to winter on the actual shore of 
 " this emence Ocian," and both of the leaders 
 headed side expeditions to find a favorable 
 camp. After much searching, a site was se- 
 lected upon Young's Bay, and thither the 
 party removed during the first week of De- 
 cember. A group of log houses protected by 
 a palisade were erected, the establishment be- 
 
 162 
 
At Fort Clatsop 
 
 ing called Fort Clatsop — from the local tribe 
 of Chinook Indians who inhabited the shore. 
 The remains of the cantonment were dis- 
 cernible sixty years after its constrnction. 
 
 Throughout the long and tiresome winter 
 each man in this hardy little band had his 
 regular round of duties. In addition to nego- 
 tiations for food and the general control of 
 the camp, both Lewis and Clark were much 
 occupied with writing in their voluminous 
 separate journals of the language, manners, 
 customs, religion, games, handiwork, and 
 other characteristics of the savages, who 
 daily thronged their little fortress, and to 
 whose villages they frequently paid compli- 
 mentary visits. The men were not only en- 
 gaged in their daily tasks of hunting, cooking, 
 preparing firewood, washing, mending, and 
 preserving some semblance of order among 
 the rapacious and often offensive native visit- 
 ors, but they dressed skins for clothing, and 
 in every possible way made preparations for 
 the return trip. Henceforth the explorers 
 were dressed almost wholly in leather. Dur- 
 ing two months a detail was engaged in labo- 
 riously boiling salt from sea-water, upon a 
 12 163 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 point thirty-five miles distant, the product 
 being twenty gallons. Fleas were so numer- 
 ous at both camps as to deprive the men of 
 half their sleep ; the first duty of each day 
 was to rid blankets and clothing of these 
 uncomfortable neighbors, with which all the 
 Indians of the Columbia Bivei were swarm- 
 ing. 
 
 Game was scarce, and the natives had but 
 small stores of fish that could be drawn upon. 
 Dogs were not infrequently bought for food, 
 Lewis thinking their flesh equal to beaver, 
 but Clark abhorring it. Lewis, a born phi- 
 losopher, in writing in his journal of this fact, 
 says : " I have learned to think that if the 
 chord be sufficiently strong, which binds the 
 soul and boddy together, it does not so much 
 matter about the materials which compose it." 
 Not seldom the explorers were at short com- 
 mons for provender, although most of the 
 party had become expert riflemen, and Drouil- 
 lard in particular was accounted one of the 
 best hunters of his day. Lewis writes (Janu- 
 ary 29th) : " A keen appetite supplys in a 
 great degree the want of more luxurious 
 sauses or dishes, and still renders my ordinary 
 
 164 
 
A Trading Center 
 
 meals not uninteresting to me, for I find my- 
 self sometimes enquiring of the cook whether 
 dinner or breakfast is ready." On one occa- 
 sion, he humorously records " an excellent sup- 
 per it consisted of a marrowbone a piece and 
 a brisket of boiled Elk that had the appear- 
 ance of a little fat on it — this for Fort Clat- 
 sop is living in high stile." Among their 
 grievances soon came to be the scarcity of 
 tobacco ; indeed, by the first of March it had 
 been wholly consumed — yet of the thirty- 
 seven composing the party, thirty smoked, 
 and were thereafter obliged to use the bark 
 of the crab-tree as a substitute. 
 
 The bay was from April to October an 
 important center of the fur-trade, the many 
 tribes of the Salish, Chinook, and Yakon 
 families resorting here not only for meeting 
 the English and American coast traders, 
 who came in vessels, but for fishing and hunt- 
 ing. Lewis estimated that thirty thousand 
 pounds of pounded salmon were annually 
 brought by the natives to this place, either 
 for disposal to the whites or to representatives 
 of other tribes. Although our explorers met 
 none of these traders, the influence of the 
 
 165 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 latter was evident on every hand — in the 
 dress, ornaments, and weapons of the 
 Chinooks, and in the " maney blackguard 
 phrases " which they had acquired from the 
 irreverent sea-dogs; but, curiously enough, 
 no liquor was in use among them. 
 
 The avaricious Chinooks were exceedingly 
 fond of barter, and although friendly, charged 
 liberally for services rendered or food sup- 
 plied. Their principal circulating medium 
 was blue and white beads, for which " they 
 will dispose [of] any article they possess." 
 Lewis says : " There is a trade continually 
 carryed on by the natives of the river each 
 trading some article or other with their 
 neighbors above and below them; and thus 
 articles which are vended by the whites at 
 the entrance of the river, find their way 
 to the most distant nations enhabiting its 
 waters." 
 
 Christmas was ushered in with " the dis- 
 charge of the fire arm[s] of all our party. 
 . . . Shouts and a song which the whole 
 party joined in under our windows " ; although 
 the customary yule-feast was impracticable, for 
 there was nothing " either to raise our Sperits 
 
 166 
 
Sample Journal Entries 
 
 or even gratify our appetites." But on the 
 evening of December 30th the fortification 
 was at last complete, and New Year's day 
 (1806) was fittingly noticed, notwithstanding 
 the condition of the larder was but slightly 
 bettered. The differences in temperament 
 and education between Lewis, who had a 
 poetic and sentimental turn of mind and 
 elaborated his thoughts upon paper, and 
 Clark, who expressed himself abruptly and 
 with slight show of sentiment, are well illus- 
 trated by their respective journal entries upon 
 this interesting occasion : 
 
 Lewis : This morning I was awoke at 
 an early hour by the discharge of a volley of 
 small arms, which were fired by our party in 
 front of our quarters to usher in the new 
 year; this was the only mark of rispect 
 which we had it in our power to pay this 
 celebrated day. our repast of this day tho' 
 better than that of Christmass, consisted 
 principally in the anticipation of the 1st 
 day of January, 1807, when in the bosom 
 of our friends we hope to participate in 
 the mirth and hilarity of the day, and 
 when with the zest given by the recollection 
 of the present, we shall completely, both 
 mentally and corporally, enjoy the repast 
 
 167 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 which the hand of civilization has prepared 
 for us. at present we were content with 
 eating our boiled Elk and wappetoe [roots], 
 and solacing our thirst with onr only bever- 
 age pure water. 
 
 Clark: This morning at Day we wer 
 Saluted from the party without, wishing us 
 a " hapy new Year " a Shout and discharge 
 of their arms. 
 
 By the first of March the explorers began to 
 be anxious to return. Upon the lofty moun- 
 tain barrier lying between them and the Mis- 
 souri snow lingers into early summer, and they 
 were quite aware that the passage could not be 
 made until June. But the difficulty of obtain- 
 ing proper food was a serious one upon the 
 coast. The Chinooks — " a rascally, thieving 
 set " — themselves none too well fed, charged 
 extravagantly for their small supplies of dogs, 
 roots, and dried fish ; and the common store 
 of small merchandise available for trading 
 was now reduced to two handkerchiefs full, 
 almost the sole dependence of the explorers 
 for the purchase of horses and subsistence 
 on the long overmountain trip — there being, 
 in addition, some blankets, a few old clothes, 
 and a uniform artillery coat and hat. The 
 
 168 
 
Returning Homeward 
 
 hope of meeting coast traders from whom 
 they might, through their general letter of 
 credit from President Jefferson, 1 obtain mer- 
 chandise for Indian trade was by this time 
 shattered ; and many of the men were now 
 unwell from lack of suitable nourishment. 
 An early departure from the coast was there- 
 fore decided upon, with the intention of 
 tarrying on the upper waters of the river, 
 where their horses had been left in charge 
 of the Indians. 
 
 After giving to the natives lists of the 
 names of the party, to which were appended 
 statements of their feat in crossing the conti- 
 nent and verbal instructions to deliver these 
 papers to the first traders arriving at the river, 
 the expedition left upon the twenty-third of 
 March. Heavy winds, excessive rains, and 
 high tides combined to render difficult the 
 early stages of their canoe journey. Higher 
 
 1 The original of this letter, together with many other MSS. 
 connected with the expedition, is now the property of Mrs. 
 Julia Clark Voorhis, of New York city, who obtained them 
 by gift and inheritance through her father, George Rogers Han- 
 cock Clark, a son of the explorer. The autograph copy of the 
 letter of credit, retained by Jefferson, is among the Jefferson 
 Papers in the State Department at Washington. 
 
 169 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 up, the now swollen rapids necessitated fre- 
 quent portaging, whereas in the descent these 
 had freely been shot. Horses were required 
 for this work, the purchase of which from the 
 Indians — present in large numbers fishing for 
 salmon, and sometimes having considerable 
 herds — soon exhausted the remaining stock 
 of trading material. 
 
 Food had also to be bought, with the rare 
 exceptions when native chiefs freely enter- 
 tained their visitors ; but soon it became im- 
 possible to offer any equivalent for horses, 
 dogs, and sometimes fuel — for long stretches 
 of the river-banks were treeless — save the 
 practise of medicine. The services of the two 
 captains as physicians and surgeons were at 
 once in much demand. Hordes of weak-eyed, 
 rheumatic, and bronchitic patients from a 
 wide belt of country almost daily sought the 
 great white medicine men; and both were 
 often busied from morning till night in ear- 
 nestly seeking to alleviate, with the simple 
 remedies at command, the miseries of their 
 squalid patients. 
 
 In this they were sufficiently successful for 
 the spread of their reputation, for the Indians 
 
 170 
 
Among the Nez Perces 
 
 were victims chiefly of the ills and accidents 
 incident to an outdoor life ; and for just such 
 practise the two leaders had fitted themselves 
 by study and long experience. Lewis tells us 
 that their eye-water was in especial demand, 
 a small vial being the price for " a very eli- 
 gant grey mare." He writes : " In our present 
 situation I think it pardonable to continue 
 this deseption for they will not give us any 
 provision without compensation in merchan- 
 dize and our stock is now reduced to a 
 mere handfull. we take care to give them 
 no article which can possibly injure them. 
 . . . I sincerely wish it was in our power 
 to give relief of these poor aff[l]icted 
 wretches." 
 
 At the mouth of Walla Walla River the 
 explorers disposed of their now useless canoes 
 to the Indians for beads and horses — the 
 former to trade with — and traveled overland 
 through East Washington by a well-worn 
 trail, until reaching the Clearwater, whose 
 bank they thenceforth ascended. Here they 
 were greeted by their friends of the preced- 
 ing autumn, the Nez Perces, and on the eighth 
 of May reached the village of chief Twisted 
 
 171 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Hair, who had essayed to winter their horses 
 and care for their saddles. Many of the ani- 
 mals had strayed afar, while others bore 
 evidence of hard treatment by the rough-rid- 
 ing Indian hunters who had freely used them 
 in the chase ; but eventually all were rounded 
 up and brought into fair condition by the 
 generous pasturage of the neighborhood. 
 
 The snow-clad peaks of the Rockies were 
 now in view from the high plains, but crossing 
 would be impossible for several weeks to come. 
 On the fourteenth a permanent camp was 
 formed on the Clearwater, not far from the 
 eastern boundary of the present Nez Perce 
 Indian Reservation, in Idaho. The local 
 chief, Broken Arm, gave them firewood, 
 several fat young horses for food, and lodges 
 for the use of the captains. "It is," says 
 Lewis, " the only act which deserves the ap- 
 pellation of hospitallity which we have wit- 
 nessed in this quarter." 
 
 On their part, the captains, making a brave 
 show of welcome, despite sentiments of dis- 
 gust at the unclean savages, would frequently 
 entertain their visitors with exhibitions of 
 magnetism ; and their spy-glass, compass, 
 
 172 
 
No Time for Delay 
 
 watch, and air-gun were novel and incompre- 
 hensible wonders. The Indians were partic- 
 ularly impressed by the white men's ability 
 to kill grizzlies, just then the chief meat of 
 the latter ; the natives themselves could con- 
 quer these beasts only upon the open plains, 
 by running them down on horseback and 
 shooting arrows into them. 
 
 On the tenth of June a second move was 
 made toward the mountains, ten miles farther 
 up, on the edge of Weippe prairie. The In- 
 dians still warned them not to attempt the 
 crossing ; but game was scarce, the trading 
 material had again been reduced to a hand- 
 ful, despite the ingenuity of the men in fash- 
 ioning trinkets out of bits of wire and rib- 
 bon, and the captains were concerned lest 
 they might not reach home by winter. " We 
 have not any time to delay," writes Lewis, 
 "if the calculation is to reach the United 
 States this season ; this I am determined to 
 accomplish if within the compass of human 
 power." 
 
 At last, on the fifteenth, the final start was 
 made. It was a slow, laborious march. The 
 timber was dense, and much of it fallen ; the 
 
 173 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 bared roads upon the steep hillsides were so 
 slippery from recent rains that the horses 
 frequently fell ; and in ravines the snow lay 
 eight and ten feet deep. " Winter with all 
 its rigors," records Lewis ; " the air was cold, 
 my hands and feet were benumbed." After 
 several days of rare hardship they were 
 obliged to return discomfited to the Weippe 
 flats — their first and only defeat. 
 
 Starting out afresh with better guides, sol- 
 emnly pledged to take them to the Falls of 
 the Missouri, they found that meanwhile the 
 snow had suddenly subsided four feet, and 
 the path was now discovered more easily. By 
 the first of July, after several narrow escapes 
 from disaster, the expedition was at the mouth 
 of Travelers' Rest Creek, the converging of 
 the mountain trails. Here they arranged to 
 divide their party, in an endeavor to ascer- 
 tain whether a better road to the Missouri 
 might not be found than that chosen in the 
 ascent of the previous year ; for the principal 
 object of the expedition was to discover the 
 most practicable transcontinental route. 
 
 Lewis, with a special detail, was — to use 
 his own words — "to go with a small party 
 
 174 
 
The Party Divided 
 
 by the most direct rout to the falls of the 
 Missouri, there to leave Thompson McNeal 
 and (jbodrich to prepare carriages and geer 
 for the purpose of transporting our canoes 
 and baggage over the portage, and myself 
 and six volunteers to ascend Maria's river 
 with a view to explore the country and ascer- 
 tain whether any branch of that river lie as 
 far north as Lat d . 50. and again return and 
 join the party who are to decend the Missouri, 
 at the entrance of Maria's river." 
 
 Clark agreed to take the others to the 
 head of Jeiferson's River, where, in the 
 ascent, they had cached sundry articles and 
 left their canoes; Sergeant Ordway and 
 nine men were to take the canoes down 
 to the Falls of the Missouri, there to meet 
 McNeal and Goodrich, who would be ready 
 to assist them over the long portage and 
 in opening the caches at its foot. Clark 
 and the remaining ten, among whom were 
 Charbonneau and York, proposed to pro- 
 ceed thence to the Yellowstone River, 
 build canoes, and descend it to the Missouri, 
 where they were to await Lewis's arrival. It 
 was planned to send Sergeant Pry or and two 
 
 175 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 others of Clark's party overland from the 
 Yellowstone to the Mandans ; thence to the 
 British posts on the Assiniboin, with a letter 
 to the trader Haney, whom they wished to 
 induce several Sioux chiefs to join Lewis and 
 Clark upon the Missouri, and accompany them 
 to visit the new Great Father in Washington. 
 On the third, the two friends took an affect- 
 ing leave of each other. " I could not avoid 
 feeling much concern on this occasion," Lewis 
 writes in his diary, " although I hoped this 
 seperation was only momentary." 
 
 After a cold, wet trip, in which, however, 
 there was a bountiful supply of game — one 
 of the buffalo herds numbering ten thousand, 
 which in this mating season kept up " one 
 continual roar " of bellowing — Lewis arrived 
 at the falls on the thirteenth, six days after 
 crossing the continental divide. There he 
 found that much of the material in the caches 
 had been destroyed by moisture. Leaving the 
 portage party, the captain descended to the 
 mouth of Maria's Eiver, which he reached 
 in two days. Ascending this stream, he had 
 several thrilling experiences with grizzlies, 
 was much tortured with mosquitoes, saw im- 
 
 176 
 
Hostile Minitarees 
 
 mense flocks and herds of game, and frequently 
 lost horses at the hands of prowling Mini, 
 tarees — u a vicious lawless and reather an 
 abandoned set of wretches." 
 
 On the twenty-sixth, while Lewis and his 
 companions were exploring a branch of 
 Maria's River — the main party were await- 
 ing them at the forks — they fell in with a 
 band of mounted Minitarees in charge of a 
 herd of some thirty horses. The whites 
 passed the night in the Indian camp, but 
 toward morning were attacked by their hosts, 
 who captured their guns and tried to run off 
 their horses. In the scuffle, Reuben Fields 
 stabbed one of the savages to the heart — the 
 only Indian killed by the expedition — and 
 there was an ineffectual exchange of shots. 
 While some of Lewis's horses were stolen, 
 the tribesmen chanced to leave better ones, 
 with which the party made a hasty retreat 
 to their waiting comrades, sixty-three miles 
 away. Lewis ordered on this forced march 
 that " the bridles of the horses should be tied 
 together and we would stand and defend them, 
 or sell our lives as dear as we could." For- 
 tunately, however, the Indians were quite as 
 
 m 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 alarmed as they, and gave no chase. This 
 affair long rankled in the hearts of the re- 
 vengeful Minitarees and their Blackf eet rela- 
 tives, and was the cause of many later at- 
 tacks by them upon white men. 
 
 Now reunited, Lewis's party continued the 
 descent of the Missouri in a pirogue and 
 five small canoes, hurrying as fast as might 
 be, from fear of attack by the incensed na- 
 tives. The river was high, and thick with 
 mud freshly washed down from the ravines 
 by heavy rains, which prevailed for several 
 days. The swift current often hurled their 
 craft upon the numerous snags which choked 
 the stream, and on several such occasions 
 some of the party had narrow escapes from 
 drowning. But "game is so abundant and 
 gentle that we kill it when we please." 
 
 August seventh they reached the mouth of 
 the Yellowstone. Here was found a note 
 informing them that Clark, tormented by 
 mosquitoes and finding no buffaloes at this 
 point, had departed thence a week before. 
 On the eleventh, while Lewis was hunting 
 elk, he was accidentally wounded in the left 
 thigh by a bullet from Cruzatte's gun, and 
 
 178 
 
Sacajawea's Services 
 
 suffered intense pain. Fortunately, the fol- 
 lowing day they overtook Clark, who dressed 
 the wound and made his friend as comfort- 
 able as possible, although for nearly a month 
 to come Lewis was to be incapacitated for 
 active duty, even for the writing of his 
 journal. 
 
 On his part, Clark had had a successful 
 although hazardous expedition. On the eighth 
 of July he arrived at the head of Jefferson 
 River, where the cache was opened, new ca- 
 noes were made and launched, and the party 
 descended to the mouth of Gallatin's River. 
 Here, Clark and his Yellowstone detachment 
 parted from the others, who were instructed 
 to join Lewis at the Forks of the Missouri. 
 With the captain went Charbonneau and 
 Sacajawea with their child, Sergeant Pryor, 
 York, and seven others, and a herd of forty- 
 nine horses and a colt. " The indian woman 
 who has been of great service to me as a pilot 
 through this country," continued to be an 
 important member of the party. 
 
 Beaver dams so impeded their travel on 
 the overflowed river-bottoms that it was nec- 
 essary to resort to the highlands. The hunt- 
 13 179 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 ers were sometimes chased, even on horseback, 
 by ferocious grizzlies. On the night of the 
 twentieth, twenty-four of their horses, while 
 grazing, were stolen by Indians, whose fires 
 they could see upon the hilltops, signals of 
 the white men's approach. Gibson was se- 
 verely injured by being thrown from his 
 mount, and for a long time had to be carried 
 on a horse-litter. Such are specimens of the 
 adventures which fill Clark's copious note- 
 book — all told in the most matter-of-fact 
 manner, but suggestive of a perilous under- 
 taking whose conduct daily required courage, 
 diplomacy, and executive ability in a high 
 degree. 
 
 July twenty-fourth, when some two or three 
 days above the Big Horn River, two canoes 
 were made and launched, being lashed to- 
 gether side by side. Upon this craft most of 
 the party embarked, two or three proceeding 
 by land in care of the horses. With these 
 they had much trouble on account of fre- 
 quent buffalo herds, which the Indian ponies 
 persisted in circling, as was the custom of the 
 savage hunters who had trained them. Buf- 
 faloes were so numerous that sometimes the 
 
 180 
 
Reunion of the Leaders 
 
 navigators were obliged to land in order to 
 allow great herds to cross the stream — the 
 burly beasts frequently drowning or miring 
 amid the wild, rushing scramble of their fel- 
 lows. Clark writes : " For me to mention or 
 give an estimate of the differant Species of 
 wild animals on this river particularly Buffa- 
 low, Elk Antelopes & Wolves would be in- 
 creditable. I shall therefore be silent on the 
 subject further." Bighorn sheep, deer, and 
 antelopes were frequently killed by the party 
 for their skins, from which the men made 
 clothing. 
 
 As already stated, it had been the inten- 
 tion of Clark to send three of his men, with 
 a dozen horses, to meet Haney on the Assini- 
 boin ; but for several reasons this proved im- 
 practicable and the project was abandoned. 
 The third of August he reached the Missouri, 
 but mosquitoes and a local deficiency of game 
 caused him to drop below and await Lewis 
 on more favorable ground. We have seen that 
 nine days after, "Cap* Lewis hove in Sight 
 with the party which went by way of the 
 Missouri as well as that which accompanied 
 him from Travellers rest on Clarks river." 
 
 181 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Two days later (the 14th) the reunited 
 expedition reached the principal villages 
 of the Mandans, where they were cordially 
 welcomed as old friends. John Colter, 
 one of their best hunters, was now released 
 from duty, as with two friends whom he met 
 there he wished to return upon a prolonged 
 trapping expedition to the upper waters of 
 the Missouri. Colter, a man with a remark- 
 able history as an explorer, remained in the 
 mountains until the spring of 1810, and had 
 many exciting experiences with the Indians. 
 Among other points to his credit, he is recog- 
 nized as the first white discoverer of what is 
 now Yellowstone National Park. Charbon- 
 neau and Sacajawea were also discharged, and 
 said good-by to their old-time comrades. They 
 settled among the Mandans, to them being 
 given the blacksmith tools of the expedition, 
 with instructions to use these in the service of 
 the natives. 
 
 In the place of their discharged servants, 
 Lewis and Clark took with them Big White 
 Chief, one of the prominent Mandan leaders, 
 together with his squaw and son, and Rene 
 Jussaume, an interpreter, with his squaw and 
 
 182 
 
News from Home 
 
 two children. This party eventually visited 
 Washington and other Eastern cities, carry- 
 ing back to their wilderness lodges strange 
 tales of the wonders of civilization. The 
 Minitarees, Arikaras, and Sioux, suspicious of 
 the whites, could not be prevailed on to send 
 delegates to the Great Father. 
 
 The thirtieth of August was memorable for 
 an attempt on the part of the Teton Indians 
 to prevent the descent. After a show of 
 force, during which Lewis hobbled out on his 
 crutches, the savages calmed down, and the 
 affair ended in " a big smoke," with the cus- 
 tomary ceremonials. 
 
 At the mouth of the Vermilion (Septem- 
 ber 3d) they met a trader named Aird, who 
 gave them not only needed supplies of tobacco 
 and flour, but news of the fatal Burr-Hamilton 
 duel, and tarried long at their camp-fire to 
 discuss other political and social gossip of the 
 past two and a half years. Three days later, a 
 little above the "Petite River de Secoux," was 
 encountered one of the boats belonging to their 
 old friend August Chouteau, a prominent St. 
 Louis fur-trader, bound for River Jacque to 
 trade with the Yanktons. From its master 
 
 183 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 they purchased " a gallon of whiskey . . . 
 and gave to each man of the party a dram 
 which is the first spiritious licquor which has 
 been tasted by any of them since the 4 of 
 July 1805. several of the party exchanged 
 leather for linen Shirts and beaver for corse 
 hats." On parting company, Chouteau's man 
 gaily saluted them with two shots from the 
 swivel on his prow, the captains repaying the 
 compliment in kind. 
 
 By the ninth, at the River Platte, which 
 was being entered by several French trading 
 boats, " My worthy friend Cap. Lewis has en- 
 tirely recovered his wounds are heeled up 
 and he can walk and even run." The next day 
 they heard of Lieutenant Zebulon M. Pike's 
 expedition to the Red and Arkansas Rivers. 
 Not long after, Lewis's old army friend Cap- 
 tain McClellan was met on a trading expedi- 
 tion to Santa Fe\ Thus daily were they now 
 greeted by traders or explorers going up the 
 great waterway ; for in their long absence a 
 flood of immigration had set in towards the 
 rapidly unfolding West, and was pouring far 
 into the new lands of the Louisiana Purchase. 
 The bronzed and tattered adventurers, fresh 
 
 184 
 
A Generous Welcome 
 
 from their great exploit, were welcomed as 
 men long thought by their fellow citizens to 
 have been lost ; supplies poured in upon them, 
 and from each fraternal meeting on the river 
 or in camp upon the shore they were sent on 
 their way with songs and applauding cheers. 
 
 Making a daily progress on the rapid cur- 
 rent of from forty to seventy -five miles, they 
 quickly approached their long-sought desti- 
 nation. At Chare tte (September 20th) Clark 
 reports that " every person, both French and 
 americans seem to express great pleasure 
 at our return, and acknowledged themselves 
 much astonished in seeing us return, they 
 informed us that we were supposed to have 
 been lost long since, and were entirely given 
 out by every person <fcc." Yet, amidst this 
 public thanksgiving, they were charged eight 
 dollars in cash for two quarts of whisky, 
 which the indignant diarist rightly dubs "an 
 imposition on the part of the citizen." 
 
 The following day they came in sight of 
 St. Charles^ whose people had so generous- 
 ly entertained them upon their departure. 
 " This day being Sunday," notes Clark, " we 
 observed a number of Gentlemen and ladies 
 
 185 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 walking on the banks, we saluted the Vil- 
 lage by three rounds from our blunderbuts 
 and the Small arms of the party, and landed 
 near the lower part of the town, we were 
 met by great numbers of the inhabitants," 
 and freely entertained in their homes. 
 
 At twelve o'clock noon of the twenty-third 
 they hove to at the St. Louis beach, and 
 greeted the waiting crowd with a salute. " We 
 were met by all the village and received a 
 harty welcom from its inhabitants &c," was 
 Clark's terse record of what must have been 
 a hilarious popular demonstration. Letters 
 briefly describing the expedition were at once 
 posted to President Jefferson at Washington, 
 and to General William Henry Harrison, 
 Governor of the Northwest Territory, at Vin- 
 cennes. On the twenty-fifth there was given 
 to them " in the evening a dinner & Ball " ; 
 and on the twenty-fifth we have the last 
 word in the journals — "a fine morning we 
 commenced wrighting &c." Thus, they had 
 no sooner returned and greeted their friends 
 than the two great explorers began with com- 
 mendable promptness to revise their field 
 notes for publication. 
 
 186 
 
Story of the Journals 
 
 Unfortunately, both men soon receiving 
 public appointments, they were obliged to 
 leave their literary task unfinished. Biddle's 
 well-known narrative, which is but a para- 
 phrase of their journals, did not appear until 
 1814; and not until the winter of 1903-04, 
 a century after the event, were the complete 
 records of what was in many ways the most 
 important and interesting of Rocky Mountain 
 explorations laid before the reading public. 1 
 
 1 Lewis had intended to be the editor of the journals ; but on 
 his way to Philadelphia, in 1810, to undertake this work, he died 
 in a log tavern in Tennessee — whether by murder or suicide is 
 still a moot question. Nicholas Biddle, of Philadelphia, a lawyer 
 friend of Jefferson, undertook the task, and published his Nar- 
 rative in two volumes, in 1814. It was for its day an excellent 
 piece of editorial work, but omits much of interest and scientific 
 value. In 1818 Jefferson rescued the original note-books — save 
 five that Biddle had returned to Clark — and deposited them with 
 the American Philosophical Society at Philadelphia. The five 
 Clark books are now the property of Mrs. Julia Clark Voorhis, 
 of New York city, a granddaughter of the explorer. 
 
 187 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 THOMPSON, FRASER, THE ASTORIANS, AND PIKE 
 
 In the treaty of peace with Great Britain 
 (1782-83) the northern boundary of the 
 United States was defined as running from 
 the northwest point of the Lake of the 
 Woods "on a due- west course to the river 
 Mississippi " ; thence down the main channel 
 of that river until it was crossed by the line 
 of Louisiana (31° North latitude). There 
 was, however, some reason to suspect that the 
 source of the Mississippi might be within 
 British possessions, which led to the clause 
 specifying that, however this might be, citizens 
 of both nations should enjoy the free naviga- 
 tion of the river. The Jay treaty (1794) pro- 
 vided for an "amicable negotiation" to settle 
 whatever questions might arise should the 
 Mississippi be found to extend northward of 
 the due-west line from the Lake of the Woods. 
 
 188 
 
David Thompson 
 
 It is not necessary, in the present connec- 
 tion, to follow the protracted discussion of 
 this and other questions which arose in con- 
 nection with the northwest boundary, further 
 than to state that not until 1818 was the 
 source of the Mississippi found to lie consider- 
 ably south of the Lake of the Woods ; and 
 not until the Webster-Ashburton treaty 
 (1846) and the confirmatory decision of the 
 German Emperor in 1872, that the United 
 States was at last given the forty -ninth paral- 
 lel of latitude as its northern limit, west of the 
 lake. The purchase of Louisiana (1803) had 
 placed our northern boundary in an entirely 
 new light, by giving us vast but undefined 
 rights westward to the crest of the Rocky 
 Mountains, and northward to include the 
 territory visited by the French fur-traders. 
 
 Lack of knowledge regarding the source of 
 the Mississippi led to the introduction upon 
 our stage of David Thompson, one of the 
 most picturesque of Rocky Mountain explor- 
 ers. An astronomer and surveyor of much 
 merit, Thompson had been in the employ of 
 the Hudson's Bay Company ; but as that 
 conservative corporation discouraged his 
 
 189 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 marked tendency to explore, lie went to 
 Grand Portage, the Lake Superior head- 
 quarters of its great rival, the North West 
 Company, and there offered his services. 
 Being promptly employed, he was sent out in 
 August, 1796, to explore the source of the 
 Mississippi — for the boundary question was 
 a matter of much importance to the Canadian 
 traders, who during the unsettled condition 
 of affairs were freely trading with and influ- 
 encing the Indians throughout the vast region 
 west and southwest of Lake Superior. He 
 was also to visit the Mandan villages on the 
 Missouri, to make inquiries relative to fossils 
 and prehistoric remains, and to establish the 
 latitude and longitude of each of the com- 
 pany's posts which he should visit. 
 
 His long winter journey to the Mandans, 
 by way of Kainy Lake, Lakes Manitoba and 
 Winnipeg, and the Saskatchewan and Assini- 
 boin Kivers, was similar in character to that 
 undertaken by Verendrye in 1738. In his 
 company was Rene Jussaume, the interpreter 
 who ten years later accompanied Lewis and 
 Clark down the Missouri. Leaving the Man- 
 dans, Thompson crossed in the spring (1797) 
 
 190 
 
Thompson's Crossing 
 
 to the Eed Kiver of the North with three 
 French Canadians and an Indian guide. Later 
 in the season he reached Lake Superior by 
 descending St. Louis River, and in due course 
 arrived by canoe at Grand Portage, after one 
 of the most venturesome journeys on record, 
 which brought him wide-spread fame. 
 
 In 1805, after the fusion of the North 
 West and X Y corporations into the United 
 Company, Thompson was sent up the Sas- 
 katchewan, with orders to cross the Rockies 
 over to the Columbia and examine the moun- 
 tains on the Pacific coast. At the same time, 
 Simon Fraser, of whom we shall presently 
 hear, was despatched up Peace River, and 
 directed to explore the western region from 
 the northern approach. Thompson crossed 
 the divide in 1806, discovered the upper 
 waters of the Columbia, and the following 
 year established there the trading-post of 
 Kootenay House, where he wintered (1807- 
 08). 
 
 Returning to the Saskatchewan the next 
 summer, he recrossed the mountains with 
 horses, and was back at Kootenay House in 
 November. Continuing his explorations 
 
 191 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 upon the Columbia, and once more passing a 
 winter there, the persistent traveler was at 
 Lake Athabasca in the autumn of 1810. 
 Again descending the Columbia the year fol- 
 lowing, this time as far as Lewis River, he 
 attached a note to a pole, claiming the coun- 
 try for Great Britain ; for news had reached 
 the "Nor'- Westers" that the Americans were 
 about to open a trading-post at the mouth of 
 the river. Upon reaching the sea, he was 
 keenly disappointed to find that the Ameri- 
 cans had preceded him, by building Astoria. 
 Thompson, however, at once erected a rival 
 fort at Spokane. He soon after drifted to 
 eastern Canada, where he was later employed 
 on important surveys, dying (1857) at the 
 age of eighty-seven, a very poor man, but one 
 deserving much at the hands of his country- 
 men. 
 
 Fraser, one of the most daring of the fur- 
 traders of his day, was the son of American 
 loyalists, and in youth became a clerk in the 
 North West Company. In 1797 we find him 
 the company's agent at Grand Portage, and 
 later he was at Athabasca. Accompanied by 
 John Stuart, a North West clerk, whose friends 
 
 192 
 
Simon Fraser 
 
 claimed that he was the leading spirit in the 
 expedition, Fraser crossed the mountains in the 
 spring of 1806. Stopping to barter with the 
 Indians — for the explorers of that time were 
 traders as well — it was not until May 22, 1807, 
 that he made his final start for the Pacific. 
 With Stuart, a trader named Quesnel, nine- 
 teen voyageurs, and two Indians, all in four 
 canoes, he descended the Tacouche Tesse 
 (afterward known as Fraser River). It was 
 an enterprise abounding in peril, for the 
 stream is studded with whirling rapids, down 
 which the intrepid explorers plunged with an 
 apparent recklessness which almost hourly 
 threatened the demolition of their canoes, if 
 not loss of life. But the river often surges be- 
 tween frowning cliffs ; portages are long and 
 difficult, and frequently quite impracticable 
 without immense outlay of labor ; so that a 
 wild dash through a dizzy gorge seemed some- 
 times the only solution of the problem. In- 
 dian turbulence prevented Fraser from actu- 
 ally reaching the sea, but his trip stands on 
 record as one of the most notable of Rocky 
 Mountain exploits. Returning to the Red 
 River of the North (1808), he served his com- 
 
 193 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 pany for several years in the Lake Superior 
 region, and subsequently died on the Ottawa. 
 
 Among the men first to grasp the advan- 
 tage of the transcontinental route up the Mis- 
 souri and down the Columbia was John 
 Jacob Astor, of New York. Astor had at 
 first been an independent fur-trader at Mon- 
 treal, shipping to London. When Jay's 
 treaty removed the restriction on exporting 
 furs from British possessions, Astor consigned 
 his peltries to New York and opened a trade 
 with China, where prices for furs were high. 
 Soon himself removing to New York, he 
 sought under the encouragement of the 
 Federal Government to obtain a monopoly of 
 the fur-trade in the United States. Founding 
 the American Fur Company in 1809, two 
 years later he bought out several large 
 Mackinac traders and organized the South 
 West Company. 
 
 A part of his great scheme was to estab- 
 lish a line of posts along Lewis and Clark's 
 entire route, and control the trade of the Co- 
 lumbia basin. The North West Company was 
 now operating to the north of this point, and 
 we have seen that for several years trading 
 
 194 
 
The Astorians 
 
 vessels had regularly called at the native coast 
 villages. Astor shrewdly obtained a good 
 footing with the Russian Fur Company, to 
 the far north, and then proposed to plant a 
 station at the mouth of the Columbia. For 
 this purpose he organized the Pacific Fur 
 Company, in which Canadians freely took 
 stock and employment, and made arrange- 
 ments for two expeditions to the Northwest 
 Coast. One proceeded by sea from New 
 York around Cape Horn, starting in Sep- 
 tember, 1810; the other followed, in the 
 main, Lewis and Clark's trail — from Montreal 
 (June 10,1811) up the Great Lakes to Mack- 
 inac, thence by the Fox- Wisconsin route to 
 the Mississippi, then up the Missouri and 
 overland to the Columbia. The sea party, 
 after constant troubles between the com- 
 pany's employees and the captain, arrived at 
 the Columbia in March, and built the stout 
 post of Astoria ; the land party, who had suf- 
 fered innumerable hardships, reached their 
 destination the following February (1812). 
 
 The Nor' -Westers, jealous of this move- 
 ment, promptly despatched Thompson to fore- 
 stall the Astorians upon the lower Columbia ; 
 14 195 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 but we have seen that he arrived too late, al- 
 though the post which he planted farther up- 
 stream greatly annoyed Astor's agents. News 
 of the outbreak of the War of 1812-15 reached 
 Astoria in June, 1813. In October following 
 there appeared on the scene a vessel bearing 
 North West Company's goods and traders. 
 The latter contracted for the purchase of the 
 Pacific Company's " establishments, furs, and 
 stock in hand" for about fifty-eight thousand 
 dollars — a very considerable sacrifice; but As- 
 tor's local representatives were largely Cana- 
 dians, who had a strong personal leaning to- 
 wards the Nor'- Westers. While the transfer 
 was being made, a British sloop of war put 
 in an appearance, bearing orders "to take 
 and destroy everything American on the 
 north-west coast," and prepared to capture 
 Astoria. But the trade having been made, 
 its terms were respected. The American flag 
 was replaced by the British, and Astoria re- 
 christened Fort George. 
 
 The name of Zebulon Montgomery Pike will 
 always be associated with those of Lewis and 
 Clark in the history of early exploration beyond 
 the Mississippi. Pike was some twenty-five 
 
 196 
 
ZEBULOX M. PIKE. 
 
# 
 
Zebulon M. Pike 
 
 years of age and a first lieutenant in the same 
 infantry regiment (the First) in which Lewis 
 held a captaincy. In July, 1805, he was de- 
 tailed by General James Wilkinson to ex- 
 plore the Mississippi from St. Louis to its 
 source ; report on sites for military posts; make 
 treaties with the native tribes ; bring about a 
 peace between the Chippewas and Sioux ; and 
 ascertain all he could concerning the trading 
 operations within American territory of the 
 North West Company, and its influence upon 
 the Indians. There was then no settlement 
 above Prairie du Chien, the country to the 
 north being still practically in control of the 
 British traders and their savage allies. 
 
 Building a stockade at Little Falls, the 
 limit of navigation for his boats, Pike pushed 
 on with a few men to Cass Lake, and ex- 
 amined Turtle and Leech Rivers and Leech 
 Lake. Returning overland in the early spring 
 to his stockade and its winter garrison, he 
 embarked for the south with his entire party 
 and reached St. Louis in April. He executed 
 an admirable map of the region traversed. 
 Throughout this difficult expedition, Pike, 
 who despite his " gentle and retiring disposi- 
 
 197 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 tion" proved to be a man of great daring and 
 executive ability, " performed the duties of 
 astronomer, commanding officer, clerk, spy, 
 guide, and hunter." He was at once promoted 
 to a captaincy. 
 
 The following summer Wilkinson de- 
 spatched Pike upon another and far more im- 
 portant and difficult exploration. Its primary 
 object was to return to their friends fifty -one 
 Osage Indians, some of whom had been upon 
 a deputation to Washington, and the others 
 but lately redeemed from captivity among 
 the Potawatomis. This task completed, he 
 was to accomplish a peace between the 
 Kansas and Osages, to " establish a good un- 
 derstanding" with the Yanktons and Co- 
 manches, to " ascertain the direction, extent, 
 and navigation of the Arkansaw and Ked 
 rivers," to report upon various scientific phe- 
 nomena, and to collect natural history speci- 
 mens. 
 
 The exploration of Eed Eiver was just then 
 " an object of much interest with the execu- 
 tive," as it was part of the proposed boundary 
 between Spanish and American possessions 
 and was erroneously supposed to have its 
 
 198 
 
Red River 
 
 source but a short distance east of Santa Fe, 
 the capital of New Mexico. In the preceding 
 February President Jefferson had — together 
 with letters and other data from the Lewis 
 and Clark expedition 1 — published interesting 
 reports from Dr. John Sibley, a Revolution- 
 ary surgeon and now an Indian agent, who 
 had (March, 1803), under Government aus- 
 pices, ascended the Red from its mouth to 
 the Louisiana town of Natchitoches — then 
 " a small, irregular, and meanly built village " 
 of " forty families, nearly all French " — and 
 obtained much valuable information regard- 
 ing the upper reaches, as well as concerning 
 the Indians " residing in and adjacent to the 
 territory of Orleans;" also from William 
 Dunbar, of Natchez, " a citizen of distin- 
 guished science," who in connection with Dr. 
 Hunter made an official tour of exploration 
 (October 16, 1804-January 31, 1805) from 
 Natchez down to Red River, and thence up 
 that stream and its tributaries the Black and 
 
 1 Message from the President of the United States, communi- 
 cating Discoveries made in exploring the Missouri, Red River 
 and Washita, by Captains Lewis and Clark, Doctor Sibley, and 
 Mr. Dunbar (Washington, 1806). 
 
 199 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 the Washita, to " the hot springs in the prox- 
 imity of the last mentioned river." 
 
 But a short time before Pike's own depar- 
 ture, a party " consisting of Captain Sparks, 
 Mr. Freeman, Lieutenant Humphrey, and Dr. 
 Custis," with twenty men, followed the Dun- 
 bar-Hunter route to Natchitoches ; they were 
 there reenf orced by thirteen soldiers and their 
 officers. Two hundred and thirty miles up 
 the Red the party were halted (July 29th) by 
 a Spanish guard, and " reluctantly consented 
 to relinquish their undertaking." 
 
 Leaving the mouth of the Missouri on the fif- 
 teenth of July (1806), Pike — accompanied by 
 Lieutenant James B. Wilkinson, Dr. John H. 
 Robinson (a volunteer surgeon), one sergeant, 
 two corporals, sixteen privates, and one inter- 
 preter — ascended that river in rowboats to 
 the Osage. Horses were procured at the 
 principal Osage village, for thenceforth the 
 journey was to be by land. 
 
 Proceeding over the Kansas prairies, then 
 gay with the flowers of early autumn, Pike 
 (late in September) reached the Republican 
 River, on the lower edge of what is now Ne- 
 braska — the country of the dreaded Pawnees. 
 
 200 
 
Pike's Expedition 
 
 These lusty savages, whose animosities to- 
 ward Americans had recently been inflamed 
 by Spanish emissaries — sent thither because 
 of jealousy of Pike's expedition — took no 
 pains to conceal their anger at his intrusion 
 on their domain, rightly judging his party to 
 be merely the pioneers of an army of occupa- 
 tion. They sneered, however, at his travel- 
 worn squad of followers, and made invidious 
 comparisons between them and the glittering 
 cavalry squadron sent out as the ambassadors 
 of the Spaniards. Notwithstanding this re- 
 ception, the astute captain succeeded in imbu- 
 ing his unwilling hosts with a certain sense of 
 the importance of the Government that had 
 sent him. The head chief sought to stop his 
 farther progress by a show of force ; but was 
 told that " the young warriors of his great 
 American father were not women, to be turned 
 back by words," that they " would sell our 
 lives at a dear rate to his nation," and if van- 
 quished would be succeeded by others who 
 would "gather our bones and revenge our 
 deaths on his people." 
 
 With these brave words as a parting salute, 
 Pike advanced southwest to the Arkansas, 
 
 201 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 which he reached near Pawnee Fork. Send- 
 ing Lieutenant Wilkinson down that river to 
 explore it to its junction with the Mississippi, 
 the commander ascended the stream to where 
 it debouched from the mountains. 
 
 Pike appears to have been the first to de- 
 scribe the fine grazing plains of Nebraska and 
 western Kansas as a " desert " — " a barrier," 
 he says, " placed by Providence to keep the 
 American people from a thin diffusion and 
 ruin." It took over half a century to destroy 
 this myth of the Great American Desert, for 
 which Pike was responsible. When more 
 gigantic systems of irrigation than now exist 
 shall slake the thirst of these parched plains 
 lying upon the eastern slope of the Rockies ; 
 when what is at present being done for com- 
 paratively narrow districts at the base of the 
 hills shall be extended as far east as the 
 rainy belt, this desert will everywhere blos- 
 som as the rose. The cattle ranches are fast 
 being subdivided into homesteads, and the 
 cultivable area is rapidly growing before our 
 eyes. We hear now and then the cry of the 
 alarmist, that the limit of settlement in the 
 great West is clearly in sight ; but there is 
 
 202 
 
The Arkansas Canon 
 
 still room for tens of millions of vigorous 
 colonists in the upper valleys of the Missouri, 
 the Platte, and the Arkansas, and the great 
 plains stretching north and south between 
 them. The Great American Desert of our 
 childhood may yet become the garden of the 
 land. 
 
 It was the middle of November by the 
 time Pike had ascended the inclined plane 
 which leads gently upward for nearly a thou- 
 sand miles, from the Mississippi to the 
 Colorado foothills. The Arkansas Kiver, 
 which the expedition was ascending, had now 
 become a narrow torrent gushing forth from 
 lofty mountains white with the snows of 
 early winter. To the south the Spanish 
 Peaks stood out in bold relief against the 
 leaden sky; while to the north there was 
 reared a mighty pile far overtopping the 
 mountain wall which suddenly blocked the 
 path of progress from the east. Taking a 
 side tour from his camp at Pueblo, Pike set 
 out to scale this forbidding height, and thus 
 to obtain a view of the country beyond. In 
 this enterprise he failed, declaring that " no 
 human being could have ascended to its pin- 
 
 203 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 nacle." Nevertheless, this storied hill, long 
 after a landmark for emigrants going over- 
 land across the plains, has ever since borne 
 the name of "Pike's Peak." In our time, a 
 railway conveys each summer thousands of 
 tourists to the top of the great mountain 
 which Pike himself could not climb. 
 
 On every hand the ravines were now 
 choked with snow, and the roaring rivers 
 were bridged with frozen spray or gushed 
 from beneath monster drifts. The Arkansas 
 was ascended to the vicinity of the present 
 Leadville ; but to follow up the stream to its 
 ultimate source in the mountains appeared 
 impracticable. Pike expressed the opinion 
 in his journal 1 that " scarcely any person but 
 a madman would ever purposely attempt to 
 trace further than the entrance of those 
 mountains which had hitherto secured their 
 sources from the scrutinizing eye of civilized 
 man." 
 
 The party had, among other orders, been 
 directed to find the sources of the Red River 
 of the South, and to follow that stream down 
 to a more genial climate. But all attempts to 
 
 1 Edited by Elliott Coues (New York, 1895). 
 
 204 
 
A Desperate Struggle 
 
 discover it proved in vain. Foiled in every 
 venture, frequently lost among the hills, 
 and experiencing many a narrow escape from 
 death at the hands of savage nature, the 
 little band — "marching through the snow 
 about two and a half feet deep, silent and 
 with downcast countenances " — finally turned 
 back, " for the first time in the voyage, dis- 
 couraged." They long sought for the trail 
 which had been taken by the Spaniards in 
 their journey from Santa Fe* to the Pawnee 
 villages on the Platte. But the snows had 
 covered the plains, the trail was obliterated, 
 and so they wandered back and forth, east 
 and west, north and south, battling for life — 
 a strange, weird story, indeed, for us to hear ; 
 for the canons and mesas where Pike's sorry 
 crew were beating to and fro in their des- 
 perate struggle for existence are to-day among 
 the best known and most easily accessible of 
 Rocky Mountain summer resorts. 
 
 Finally, by crossing the Sangre de Cristo 
 Eange by way of Sand Hill Pass into San Luis 
 Valley, they reached (January 30th, 1807) the 
 upper waters of the Rio Grande del Norte, 
 which Pike then thought to be the long- 
 
 205 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 sought Red. In a " luxuriant vale " at the 
 mouth of the Rio Conejos he built a cotton- 
 wood stockade, and for a brief time reveled 
 in " a terrestrial paradise shut out from the 
 view of man." 
 
 Dr. Robinson " having some pecuniary de- 
 mands in the province of New Mexico," this 
 was used as a pretext for sending that able 
 lieutenant forward to the Spanish capital of 
 Santa Fe. While ostensibly seeking to collect 
 a debt for a friend — which he had a right to 
 do under the Spanish- American treaty — the 
 doctor was really to "gain a knowledge of 
 the country, the prospect of trade, force, etc." 
 In other words, he was a military spy. 
 
 A few days later, Spanish spies arrived, 
 reporting that Robinson had been kindly re- 
 ceived by Allencaster, the Spanish Governor 
 of New Mexico. On the twenty-seventh of 
 February a troop of a hundred horsemen 
 galloped into the camp, its commander tell- 
 ing Pike that he was upon New Mexican 
 territory and suspected of a project to seize 
 the province — the assumption being that this 
 expedition, following closely, as it did, on the 
 heels of Captain Sparks's venture, was in 
 
 206 
 
Imprisoned by Mexicans 
 
 some way connected with Aaron Burr's fili- 
 bustering scheme in the Southwest, against 
 which the Mexican authorities had already 
 been warned. 
 
 Prisoners, although treated with great con- 
 sideration, Pike and his party proceeded with 
 the Spaniards to Santa Fe, intending to ex- 
 plain their trespass on the ground of being 
 lost in the mountains. Their appearance cer- 
 tainly spoke for the truth of their assertions, 
 for Pike writes in his report : " When we 
 presented ourselves in Santa Fe, I was dressed 
 in a pair of blue trousers, mockinsons, blanket 
 coat, and a cap made of scarlet cloth lined 
 with fox-skin ; my poor fellows were in leg- 
 gins, breech cloths and leather coats, and 
 there was not a hat in the whole party. This 
 appearance was extremely mortifying to us 
 all, especially as soldiers; although some of 
 the officers used frequently to observe to me, 
 that ' worth makes the man/ etc., with a vari- 
 ety of adages to the same amount. Yet the 
 first impression made on the ignorant is hard 
 to eradicate ; and a greater proof cannot be 
 given of the ignorance of the common people, 
 than their asking if we lived in houses, or 
 
 207 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 camps like the Indians, or if we wore hats in 
 our country." 
 
 The Falstaffian crew were not detained 
 long in Santa Fe, being sent on to Governor 
 Salcedo, at Chihuahua. This official, on polite 
 pretense of wishing to study the papers and 
 sketches of the expedition, retained the greater 
 part of them ; thus compelling the captain to 
 make up his report and map largely from 
 memory, without those scientific details which 
 he otherwise would have been able to pre- 
 sent. This was indeed a cruel and unneces- 
 sary blow to the ambitious explorer, and a 
 distinct loss to the world. 
 
 Thus poor Pike, sent home with Robinson 
 in this beggarly fashion, under Spanish es- 
 cort — northward through Coahuila and San 
 Antonio — was in no happy frame of mind 
 when on the first of July he reached Natchi- 
 toches, then the southwesternmost limit of 
 American settlement. Eight of his party had 
 been detained in Mexico, but eventually all 
 were returned to the United States. 
 
 208 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 THE SOUTH PASS 
 
 Duking and for several years succeeding 
 the second war with Great Britain there was 
 no scientific exploration in the Rockies on 
 either side of the international boundary. 
 The rival fur companies maintained a warm 
 and often bloody competition on the dis- 
 puted Oregon border ; while their trappers 
 and agents roamed freely from New Mexico 
 to Alaska, although seldom penetrating the 
 innermost fastnesses of the mountains. In 
 1821 the Hudson's Bay and North West 
 Companies combined under the name of the 
 former, the expensive rivalry ceased, and 
 peace reigned among the roving bands. 
 Thereafter this semi-military trading corpora- 
 tion opposed only the common enemy — their 
 customers and neighbors, the often hostile 
 aborigines, and the American settlers advanc- 
 ing into our far Northwest. 
 
 209 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 By 1819 the tide of American emigration 
 had begun to flow toward the Missouri Val- 
 ley and beyond — far less pronounced than 
 a generation later, yet of enough impor- 
 tance to warrant official attention. The 
 woods of Kentucky and Tennessee were fill- 
 ing up. Men of the Daniel Boone type, who 
 panted for " more elbow room " when new- 
 comers appeared in sight of their rude 
 cabins, were pulling stakes and resuming 
 their march toward the ever-shifting fron- 
 tier — uncouth, unlettered backwoodsmen, but 
 hardy sires of a vigorous and progressive 
 race, unwittingly blazing the paths of prog- 
 ress for that civilization which they sought 
 to avoid, but which with the certainty of 
 Fate followed closely upon their heels. 
 
 Prom the reports of trappers, it had begun 
 to be suspected by topographers that the 
 Platte might possibly flow from some pass in 
 the center of the Rockies, which would be 
 easier of access and more practicable than the 
 circuitous and difficult path by which Lewis 
 and Clark and the Astorians had approached 
 the Pacific. In 1819, Major Stephen H. Long, 
 a topographical engineer who had made trips 
 
 210 
 
Stephen H. Long 
 
 to the Red and Washita Rivers in 1817-18, 
 was deputed by President Monroe to discover, 
 if possible, this desirable South Pass, and on 
 his return to make an attempt to determine 
 the sources of Red River. 1 
 
 Steamboats were now coming into use, and 
 the well-appointed expedition, including sev- 
 eral military officers and scientific attaches, 
 had a small craft of this character at its com- 
 mand — the Western Engineer. 2 Setting out 
 from Pittsburg early in April, the party 
 descended the Ohio, and wintered at (old) 
 Council Bluffs on the Missouri, near the junc- 
 
 1 Long's party was the scientific branch of an expedition de- 
 signed, primarily, to establish a strong military post at the 
 mouth of the Yellowstone. But the military arm, under Colo- 
 nel Henry Atkinson, although elaborately equipped, was badly 
 managed, and after a sorry experience in the winter camp this 
 feature was abandoned. Long, returning from Washington 
 after this fiasco, carried new instructions, to make a scientific 
 expedition to the mountains only, as related in the text. 
 
 2 A letter written at St. Louis, June 19, 1819, ten days after 
 the arrival of the strange craft at that town, says : u The bow 
 of this vessel exhibits the form of a huge serpent, black and 
 scaly, rising out of the water from under the boat, his head as 
 high as the deck, darted forward, his mouth open, vomiting 
 smoke, and apparently carrying the boat on his back." — Chit- 
 tenden's History of the American Fur Trade of the Far West 
 (New York, 1902), p. 571. It is thought to have been the first 
 stern-wheeler made. 
 
 15 211 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 tion of the Platte. Long's experiences on 
 " the Great Muddy " differed strangely from 
 those of Lewis and Clark, only sixteen years 
 before. They had laboriously pushed and 
 hauled open row- and sail-boats against the 
 fierce flood and through the snags and saw- 
 yers, at the rate of about nine miles a day. 
 Long, while proceeding some three miles an 
 hour, could from under the awning of his 
 upper deck obtain a bird's-eye view of the 
 country, and with equanimity study the 
 printed journals of his harassed predecessors. 
 
 Long and a companion descended the river 
 in a canoe, and spent the winter in Washing- 
 ton. He returned to camp in May (1820), 
 with several accessions to the party, having 
 proceeded overland on horseback from St. 
 Louis to Council Bluffs. Sending the steam- 
 boat home, the expedition, now composed of 
 twenty persons, was thereafter mounted on 
 horses, " and equipped for a journey in the 
 wilderness," progress being resumed on the 
 sixth of June. 
 
 Proceeding up the Platte, through the 
 country of the Pawnees, they found these 
 haughty savages, in view of the growing 
 
 212 
 
Long's Peak 
 
 power of the American Government, disposed 
 to assume a more reasonable attitude than 
 hitherto. By way of the South Fork they 
 reached the base of the mountains on the 
 sixth of July, after a journey of about a thou- 
 sand miles from the Missouri. The path these 
 explorers thus struck out was afterward fol- 
 lowed from Omaha west to the mountains, by 
 the overland stages, and finally by the Union 
 Pacific Railway. The lofty mountain now 
 known as Long's Peak was seen and named, 
 although not scaled ; but Dr. Edwin James, 
 the botanist, geologist, and annalist of the 
 expedition, 1 with two men, made the first 
 ascent to the summit of Pike's Peak. 2 The 
 Arkansas River to the south was reached a 
 
 1 Account of the Expedition . . . under the Command of 
 Major Stephen H. Long . . . Compiled by Edwin H. James 
 (Philadelphia, 1823, 2 vols.). 
 
 2 Long says in his notes: "From the information received 
 from hunters and trappers, it was believed that no one, either 
 civilized or savage, had ever ascended it before. . . . Dr. 
 James having accomplished this difficult and arduous task, I 
 have thought proper to call the peak after his name. " But 
 Fremont, in the report and map of his explorations (1843-44), 
 named it Pike's Peak, because locally known as that; and such 
 it has ever since been called. 
 
 Long's nearest approach to the peak named in his honor was 
 St. Vrain's fort, forty miles distant. 
 
 213 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 few days later. A detachment ascended this 
 noisy stream as far as the Eoyal Gorge, where 
 the perpendicular walls of rock ascend for 
 upward of half a mile into mid-air, and the 
 human voice can with difficulty be heard 
 amidst the din of whirling waters. 
 
 Small wonder that the explorers were dis- 
 mayed. It was sixty years later before the 
 railroad engineers, who now stop at few bar- 
 riers, ventured to pierce the Royal Gorge of 
 the Arkansas and connect Pueblo and Lead- 
 ville by a road of steel. Tools, materials, 
 provisions, mules, and men were lowered into 
 the awful chasm by ropes dangling from the 
 cliffs above. In one place, the gap between 
 the mountain walls is so narrow that there 
 was found no room for even the railway-bed ; 
 for some distance, therefore, the track passes 
 over a suspended bridge anchored in the 
 mountain on either side, the boiling torrent 
 plunging madly beneath. The screech of the 
 locomotive brought new echoes to mingle 
 with the old ; and now tens of thousands 
 of tourists are each summer swept through 
 this mighty gorge in luxurious observation- 
 cars. As he turned back, baffled and dis- 
 
 214 
 
A Dreary March 
 
 mayed from the terrors of the Arkansas 
 canon, Major Long, in his wildest flights of 
 fancy, could have foreseen no such extrava- 
 gances as these. 
 
 "This morning," Dr. James writes under 
 July nineteenth, " we turned our backs upon 
 the mountains, and began to move down 
 the Arkansa. It was not without a feeling 
 of regret, that we found our long contem- 
 plated visit to these grand and interesting 
 objects, was now at an end. More than one 
 thousand miles of dreary and monotonous 
 plain lay between us and the enjoyments and 
 indulgences of civilized countries. This we 
 were to traverse in the heat of summer, but 
 the scarcity of game about the mountains 
 rendered an immediate departure necessary." 
 
 Dividing their forces, one branch of the 
 party, under Captain J. K. Bell, descended 
 to the Mississippi by way of the Arkan- 
 sas Valley ; the other, under Long himself, 
 sought a homeward route in what was at first 
 supposed to be the valley of the Ked, but 
 which proved to be the Canadian, the chief 
 tributary of the Arkansas — thus ending the 
 third attempt of the Federal authorities to 
 
 215 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 discover the sources of Red River. A side 
 trip was made by Long (in October) to the 
 hot springs of the Washita, which had been 
 visited by Hunter and Dunbar in 1804. In 
 the two large volumes which resulted from 
 this notable expedition through many thou- 
 sands of miles of wilderness, Long and his 
 annalist, James, lay particular stress on the 
 desert character and barrenness of the plains 
 around the upper waters of the Platte and the 
 Arkansas, adopting Pike's view that they 
 were unfit for human occupation. 1 
 
 Now that Long had led the way up the 
 
 1 Three years later (1823) Long headed a small expedition 
 which proceeded from Pittsburg overland to Chicago, a village 
 then consisting " of a few miserable huts, inhabited by a miser- 
 able race of men, . . . perhaps, one of the oldest settled 
 places in the Indian country." Thence they went to Prairie 
 du Chien and ascended the right bank of the Mississippi to Fort 
 Snelling, which he had previously visited in 1817. Here, fitted 
 out with a party of thirty-three men, he made the first accurate 
 exploration of the sources of St. Peter's (or Minnesota) River. 
 Continuing down the valley of the Red River of the North, he 
 went to Winnipeg Lake and River; and by the Lake of the 
 Woods, Rainy River, and Grand Portage route reached Lake 
 Superior, along whose " dreary northern shore " he finally 
 reached Sault Ste. Marie, the terminus of the expedition. The 
 annalist of this tour was William H. Keating, mineralogist and 
 botanist. See his Travels in the Interior of North America 
 (London, 1828, 2 vols.). 
 
 216 
 
The Santa Fe Trail 
 
 valley of the Platte, emigration to the far 
 West received a new impetus. It was many 
 years before the Government again attempt- 
 ed any extended scientific exploration in the 
 Rockies ; but the public soon became familiar 
 with the trans-Missouri country from the re- 
 ports of trappers, traders, emigrants, rovers, 
 and occasional Government officials, who sur- 
 mounted countless obstacles reared by savage 
 man and untamed nature in threading the 
 valleys on the eastern slopes of the moun- 
 tains and tracing the more accessible of the 
 gorges. By way of illustration, let us glance 
 at a few of these many exploits ; the space 
 at our command in this series will not permit 
 of specific mention of all. 
 
 In 1825-27, Benjamin Reeves, George C. 
 Sibley, and Thomas Mather surveyed and 
 marked out a road u from the western frontier 
 of Missouri, near Fort Osage, to San Fer- 
 nando de Taos, near Santa Fe " — the Santa 
 Fe trail, that had already long been used by 
 merchant adventurers into the Southwest. 
 
 In 1832 Ross Cox published an account of 
 u six years of adventures on the western side 
 of the Rocky Mountains among various tribes 
 
 217 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 of Indians hitherto unknown" — a valuable 
 work in connection with the history of the 
 fur-trade, describing the author's ascent of 
 the Columbia to one of its northern sources, 
 and his crossing of the Eockies at the head 
 of Athabasca Eiver, near Mount Hooker. In 
 the summer of the same year (1832) Lieuten- 
 ant James Allen, of the United States army, 
 accompanied by Henry E. Schoolcraft, Indian 
 agent at Mackinac, made " the first topograph- 
 ical and hydrographical delineation of the 
 source of the Mississippi." In the course of 
 the tour they traveled two thousand miles — 
 going out from Lake Superior by St. Louis 
 Eiver, and returning thereto by way of the 
 St. Croix and the Bois Brule. 
 
 In 1822 General William H. Ashley, of 
 St. Louis, organized the Eocky Mountain Fur 
 Company, whose parties erected posts and 
 traded far and wide through the mountains 
 and in the Columbia basin. Two years later 
 Ashley personally attempted — so far as we 
 know, first of all white men — to navigate 
 Green Eiver near South Pass, but failed. 
 Three years later he entered the basin of 
 Great Salt Lake, which he extensively ex- 
 
 218 
 
Trading Expeditions 
 
 plored, amid adventures by land and flood 
 which it is a sore trial not to be able to relate 
 in the present volume. Upon descending 
 the Missouri with a cargo of furs, Ashley met 
 near the mouth of the Yellowstone General 
 Henry Atkinson and Major Benjamin O'Fal- 
 lon, commissioners who, accompanied by a 
 large military escort, had been negotiating 
 treaties with the Missouri tribes and collect- 
 ing information regarding the country. It 
 had been the intention of the Government to 
 plant several garrisoned posts in the trans- 
 Mississippi country. But Atkinson having 
 reported that he found no evidence of Brit- 
 ish intrigue among the Western Indians, the 
 project was delayed — Fort Leavenworth, es- 
 tablished in 1827 near the mouth of the Little 
 Platte, remaining the extreme Western garri- 
 son until after 1843. 
 
 Among the most interesting trading expe- 
 ditions of the first third of the nineteenth 
 century was that headed by Joshua Pilcher, 
 a member of the Missouri Fur Company, who 
 in 1827-28 wintered on Green Biver with 
 forty-five men and over a hundred horses. 
 After a long journey with nine companions 
 
 219 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 through the Columbia region, "to ascertain 
 its attractions and capabilities for trade," he 
 returned to St. Louis (June, 1830) by way 
 of the Athabasca, the Saskatchewan, the Red, 
 the Mandan villages, and the Missouri. 
 
 Alexander Philipp Maximilian, Prince of 
 Neuwied, a German naturalist of considerable 
 reputation, visited North America between 
 1832 and 1834, and spent much of his time 
 studying the natives of the upper Missouri. 
 He was accompanied by Charles Bodmer, a 
 competent artist, whose illustrations accom- 
 panying Maximilian's book of travels 1 are in 
 some respects the best extant, representing 
 the American Indian in a state of uncontam- 
 inated savagery. The student of Lewis and 
 Clark finds in these pictures the best obtain- 
 able illustrations of the Missouri Valley and 
 its aborigines as seen by the explorers them- 
 selves ; for during the intervening quarter of 
 a century the tribesmen had remained prac- 
 tically unchanged. 
 
 Eminent among the mountain explorers 
 who diffused information concerning the 
 Western wilds and stimulated popular inter- 
 
 ' Travels in the Interior of North America (London, 1843). 
 
 220 
 
Yellowstone Park 
 
 est in them was James O. Pattie, another St. 
 Louis fur-trader, who in 1832 published a 
 modest narrative of adventure and discovery 
 (1824-30) along the Colorado Kiver and the 
 then mysterious Gulf of California. Pattie is 
 thought to have been the first white man to 
 cross the continent to California, just as Lewis 
 and Clark were first to cross over to Oregon. 
 
 William L. Sublette, who had been con- 
 nected with Ashley's operations, was also, 
 from 1826 to 1842, a prominent character 
 among the mountain traders, explorers, and 
 Indian fighters. By aid of posts on the 
 Platte and the Missouri, he and his three 
 brothers conducted an active opposition to 
 the American Fur Company. Joseph Meek, 
 a trapper in Sublette's employ, becoming lost 
 from his party (1829), wandered into what 
 is now Yellowstone Park, which Colter had 
 discovered twenty-seven years before (p. 182); 
 and in 1834 an American Fur Company clerk 
 also visited this American Wonderland, in 
 our time annually visited by nearly ten thou- 
 sand tourists, from every land in Christendom. 
 
 Captain Benjamin Eulalie de Bonneville, 
 of the regular army, inspired by a hope of 
 
 221 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 profit in the far Western far-trade, in 1832 led 
 over a hundred men with wagons and goods 
 from the Missouri to South Pass and on to the 
 Columbia. He spent two years in trapping, 
 trading, and exploring, with financial results 
 that hardly paid the wages of his men. But 
 his notes of the novel journey, brimming 
 with romantic adventure, were edited by 
 Washington Irving, who skilfully wrought 
 from them one of the most interesting and 
 exhilarating books in American literature. 1 
 
 Bonneville's chief assistant, I. E. Walker, 
 conducted (1833) a subsidiary trapping ex- 
 pedition of thirty-six men to Great Salt Lake 
 and to California, over the Sierras. They suf- 
 fered severely from famine, exposure, and the 
 Indians, but claimed to have been the first 
 white visitors to the Valley of the Yosemite. 2 
 The return was made the following year, 
 although several of the men decided to remain 
 permanently in California. 
 
 Attractive, although often extravagant, 
 narratives were published by several of Bonne- 
 
 1 Not always strictly accurate, however, for Irving himself 
 was unacquainted with the West. 
 
 2 Chittenden's Fur Trade, p. 417. 
 
 222 
 
Wyeth's Scheme 
 
 ville's contemporaries. These books, closely 
 succeeding one another, were widely read 
 throughout this country and in England, and 
 awakened among all classes of people an en- 
 thusiasm which greatly stimulated the spirit 
 of ambitious adventure. In the same year 
 that Bonneville went West a party of twenty- 
 two Bostonians, imbued with a desire for 
 roving, and wishing to partake of the occa- 
 sionally great profits of the fur-trade, formed 
 a company to proceed overland to the Pacific 
 coast. Their leader was Nathaniel J. Wyeth, 
 who had evolved a trading scheme quite simi- 
 lar to Astor's. Cooperating with his land 
 party was a small vessel which sailed by way 
 of Cape Horn to the mouth of the Columbia ; 
 this was to carry to market the products of 
 Wyeth's enterprise. 
 
 The overland contingent, for ten days pre- 
 vious to starting, practised frontier hardships 
 on one of the islands in Boston harbor, at- 
 tracting no small degree of popular wonder- 
 ment by their showy and attractive uniform 
 suits, a feature of which was a broad belt 
 from which dangled bayonet, knife, and ax. 
 Among other novelties, the expedition was 
 
 223 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 provided with an amphibious machine, which 
 when bottom up was a wagon, and the other 
 side up a boat. This curious device occa- 
 sioned high merriment at Harvard College, of 
 which Wyeth was an alumnus, the students 
 dubbing it a "Nat-Wyethium." 
 
 The cumbersome omnibus-boat crossed the 
 Alleghanies successfully, and greatly aston- 
 ished the simple settlers along the route; 
 but at St. Louis it was abandoned, together 
 with other fantastic notions. After many 
 strange adventures and much genuine hard- 
 ship and peril on the plains and in the moun- 
 tains, the saddened and weary Bostonians 
 finally established themselves in the basin of 
 the Columbia, where they became practical 
 and valuable settlers ; but Wyeth's commer- 
 cial dreams came to naught. 
 
 Connected with a second expedition under 
 Wyeth, in 1834, were two scientists, Thomas 
 Nuttall, botanist, and John Kirk Townsend, 
 naturalist, and four Methodist missionaries 
 under Reverend Jason Lee. They accom- 
 panied Wyeth as far as Snake River, but 
 from there to the Willamette traveled with 
 another party. Two years later (1836) 
 
 224 
 
Whitman and Spalding 
 
 Marcus Whitman, physician and clergyman, 
 appeared on the Willamette, together with 
 his wife and Reverend and Mrs. H. H. 
 Spalding. They had ascended the Platte and 
 reached Western waters through the South 
 Pass, chiefly in company with parties of the 
 American Fur Company. The wives of these 
 two missionaries were the first white women 
 known to have crossed the Rockies, their 
 children being, so far as we can ascertain, the 
 first whites born in Oregon. 
 
 Several small governmental expeditions 
 were undertaken at about this time, which 
 deserve at least a passing mention. In 1833 
 Colonel James B. Many headed a column of 
 rangers as far as the head of Little River. 
 Colonel Henry Dodge, of the dragoons, led his 
 men the following year to visit the Comanches 
 and Pawnees, and made an excursion into the 
 country between the Red and Canadian Riv- 
 ers, some seventy miles west of the Wichita 
 Range. The next season (1835) he proceeded 
 up the Platte and South Fork to its source, 
 went south to the Arkansas, and returned to 
 Fort Leavenworth by way of the Santa Fe 
 trail. 
 
 225 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 In 1841 General Hugh McLeod with six 
 companies of troops escorted a trading cara- 
 van to Santa Fe ; the party were captured by 
 the Spaniards, and had some rough experi- 
 ences, but, first of Americans, contrived to 
 visit the source of Red River. 
 
 A naval expedition under Commander 
 Charles Wilkes visited Oregon in the same 
 year, and sent out land parties through the 
 Columbia basin. One of these crossed the 
 Cascade Range, and reached the mouth of the 
 Spokane; another surveyed the Columbia as 
 far up as Walla Walla, ascended the Willa- 
 mette, and crossing to the sources of the 
 Sacramento, descended it to the Bay of San 
 Francisco. 
 
 Several explorations were made in the basin 
 of the upper Mississippi (1836-40) 1 by J. N. 
 Nicollet, a distinguished French astronomer 
 and geographer, who was assisted (1838-40) 
 by Lieutenant John C. Fremont, of the to- 
 pographical engineers, concerning whom we 
 shall presently hear. Mcollet was first to 
 
 *In 1836-37 Nicollet was privately occupied in this work; 
 but in 1838 he was employed by the Federal Government to con- 
 tinue his task, Fremont being assigned as his assistant. 
 
 226 
 
Nicollet's Services 
 
 discover the true source of the Mississippi ; 
 and his astronomical observations and conse- 
 quent map were among "the greatest con- 
 tributions ever made to American geography." 
 
 16 227 
 
CHAPTEE XIII 
 
 THE CONQUEST OF CALIFOKNIA 
 
 In May, 1843, several hundred bold and 
 restless pioneers, heavily armed, set out from 
 Missouri with their women and children 
 — over a thousand persons all told — and in 
 wagons and on foot, accompanied by herds of 
 neat cattle and horses, slowly traversed the 
 broad plain which lies between the Missouri 
 and the foot of the Rockies. Crossing the 
 lofty mountain barrier amid many privations 
 and perils, under Whitman's guidance they 
 reached the verdant valley of the Willamette, 
 and subsequently the Columbia, both of which 
 were now rapidly filling with settlers who 
 were dissatisfied with conditions in the East- 
 ern States. The following year two thou- 
 sand emigrants of a like character followed 
 in their wake, to meet with the same experi- 
 ences en route, and to share in the destitution 
 
 228 
 
The Oregon Trail 
 
 which in the first year or two usually befalls 
 agricultural settlers in a new land. In 1845 
 three thousand took up the line of march over 
 the Oregon trail, a number nearly doubled in 
 1847. 
 
 The Hudson's Bay Company, whose traders 
 and trappers still ruled with despotic sway 
 over the far Northwest, was the violent en- 
 emy of these newcomers, who were destroy- 
 ing the hunting-grounds. Not infrequently 
 the agents of the great corporation incited 
 the Indians to infamous outrages upon the 
 settlers — an easy task, for the tribesmen en- 
 tertained a natural hatred for the land-grab- 
 bing Americans, who were transforming the 
 forests into farms, and in this rude process 
 evincing no disposition to consider the rights 
 of the aboriginal owners. Congress, with the 
 question of political proprietorship in Oregon 
 still in the diplomatic stage — and entertain- 
 ing toward the new country an apathy long 
 displayed in our day toward Alaska — was 
 averse to taking measures of active protection 
 in behalf of these distant frontiersmen. But 
 at length, largely through the exertions of 
 the irrepressible Senator Thomas H. Benton, 
 
 229 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 of Missouri, the matter of the Western Terri- 
 tories and other remote domains of the United 
 States was brought before Congress in a 
 manner in which the question must be dis- 
 posed of. In 1848, after a protracted strug- 
 gle, Oregon — its northern boundary estab- 
 lished by the treaty with England two years 
 previous — was created a Territory. 
 
 Benton was a far-seeing, patriotic states- 
 man, and foremost in his day in aiding the 
 development of the great West. Wishing 
 to facilitate emigration thither, he was con- 
 cerned to know whether the South Pass, now 
 the favorite transcontinental highway, was 
 really the best. Nicollet, the French astron- 
 omer and engineer, had just returned from 
 his trip to the sources of the Mississippi, men- 
 tioned in the preceding chapter. We have 
 seen that in Nicollet's party was a young to- 
 pographical engineer, Lieutenant John C. Fre- 
 mont. Upon their return to Washington, 
 Benton met Fremont and became interested 
 in him. Both were men of enterprise ; both 
 had lofty ideas of the possibilities of the 
 West. Fremont had, while with Nicollet, 
 cultivated a keen desire for exploration ; on 
 
 230 
 
John C. Fremont 
 
 his part, Benton had been seeking for an ex- 
 plorer. The young lieutenant and the vet- 
 eran statesman became warm friends ; Fre- 
 mont wooed and won the Missouri Senator's 
 fascinating and accomplished daughter, Jes- 
 sie ; * and so it came about that early in 1842 
 this gallant engineer was selected by Presi- 
 dent Harrison to explore the South Pass " in 
 aid of and auxiliary to the Oregon emigra- 
 tion." 
 
 Fremont's companions were twenty -one 
 French Creole voyageurs, familiar with the 
 Indian country through service for the fur 
 companies ; Charles Preuss, a topographical 
 assistant ; Maxwell, a crack hunter ; and, last 
 but not least, the guide was Kit Carson, of 
 Taos, who was to become world-famous from 
 his connection with Fremont's explorations. 
 
 The expedition of 1842 was well supplied 
 with scientific instruments and other para- 
 phernalia. Leaving the mouth of the Kansas 
 in June, it proceeded up that, the Big Blue, 
 and the Platte valleys and on through the 
 
 1 They were married October 19, 1841. Fremont received 
 the first intimation of Harrison's intention at the White House, 
 New Year's following. 
 
 231 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 South Pass. The lieutenant ascended Fre- 
 mont's Peak, in the Wind River Range, and 
 at the dizzy height of 13,570 feet "unfurled 
 the national flag to wave in the breeze where 
 never flag waved before." In the course of 
 his journey he traveled two thousand miles, 
 experienced much hardship, was frequently 
 attacked by Indians, but succeeded in making 
 very considerable additions to the existing 
 stock of information concerning the Rockies. 
 His report was a perfect narrative, clear, full, 
 and lively, with an appendix abounding in 
 minute scientific detail. 
 
 In May, 1843, this time accompanied by 
 twenty-nine frontiersmen, his scientific assist- 
 ant Preuss, two young gentlemen who wished 
 to see the country, and the redoubtable Kit 
 Carson, Fremont started from St. Louis upon 
 his second expedition. His proposed path was 
 through the South Pass, and on to the country 
 about the lower reaches of the Columbia. 
 He had intended to be absent about eight 
 months, but it was fourteen before he again 
 set foot in St. Louis, where, in her father's 
 home, he had left his brilliant wife. 
 
 Kansas City, then a small village, was the 
 
 232 
 
c 
 
 W 
 
A Strange Request 
 
 general rendezvous, and here the party were 
 to wait several weeks for the prairie grass to 
 get its full strength. A few days after their 
 arrival, however, Fremont received a letter 
 from his wife urging him to proceed at once 
 to Bent's Fort, a Hudson's Bay fur-trading 
 station, away out on the Santa Fe* trail, in 
 southern Colorado, near where La Junta is 
 now situated, and in that day far beyond the 
 frontiers of civilization. It was a long march, 
 seven hundred miles to the westward, with 
 preparations incomplete and the grazing 
 meager. There were no explanations, and 
 Fremont tells us in his Memoirs that he mar- 
 veled at the reason for this sudden move ; but 
 having implicit confidence in his wife's judg- 
 ment in all matters, promptly obeyed. Upon 
 his return home the following year he first 
 learned the reason for this strange request. 
 It was well known that Fremont had 
 started out with a wider purpose, and accom- 
 panied by a larger and better-equipped force 
 than he had had the year before. He was 
 ambitious and enthusiastic, and entertained a 
 scheme of exploration covering the entire Pa- 
 cific slope of the United States, which then 
 
 233 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 was, south of Oregon, Mexican territory. 
 The memory of Aaron Burr's attempted con- 
 spiracy to set up an empire in the Southwest 
 had not yet faded. The air was filled with 
 conflicting rumors of Fremont's purpose. It 
 was the day when the proposed annexation 
 of Mexico was being everywhere discussed — 
 over the game of checkers in the corner gro- 
 cery, in the village debating clubs, in chambers 
 of commerce, in the corridors of the national 
 Capitol. The young lieutenant was charged 
 with being bent on carnage and conquest ; it 
 was pointed out that he had with him a small 
 brass howitzer or mountain cannon — in short, 
 he was pictured as a political adventurer, a 
 filibuster whom it were folly to allow to 
 depart. There came, therefore, an official 
 order from the Secretary of War for Fremont 
 to at once return to Washington and explain 
 why he was armed with a howitzer in addi- 
 tion to ordinary arms, the secretary pointing 
 out that it was a scientific expedition, not 
 military, and must not be armed as if for war. 
 It has often happened in the world's 
 history that Fate has been outwitted by a 
 woman. This was a case in point. Mrs. 
 
 234 
 
A Woman's Strategy 
 
 Fremont had been charged with discretionary- 
 care of her husband's correspondence. When 
 the order came, and was opened by her, she 
 at once realized that there had been reached 
 a crisis in his career. She saw that the pre- 
 text for recalling Fremont to Washington 
 was flimsy, and meant the abandonment of 
 the expedition in obedience to senseless popu- 
 lar clamor. Grasping the situation, and with- 
 out consulting another person, she suppressed 
 the order, and sent a messenger in hot haste to 
 warn her husband to winter at a point far be- 
 yond the reach of mail connections. She knew 
 that as a military officer his sense of duty 
 would not permit him to disobey the official 
 order were he aware of its existence. She 
 therefore sent him a woman's reason — he must 
 fly because she willed it. Thus did the pres- 
 ence of mind of daring Jessie Benton Fre- 
 mont save the far West from another decade 
 of neglect ; but for her, the expedition would 
 surely have been given up, and her husband 
 probably never have become a hero, a gen- 
 eral, a senator, and a presidential candidate. 
 Fremont sped westward. By the Santa 
 Fe trail he reached Fort Bent. Thence de- 
 
 235 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 fleeting northward, he visited St. Vrain's 
 Fort, another Hudson's Bay post on the South 
 Fork of the Platte, near where Denver now 
 is. North of Long's Peak, by following up 
 the Cache-a-la-Poudre Eiver, he forced a new 
 pass through the outlying barrier of hills, and 
 from here sought the Bear Kiver, which was 
 descended into the basin of Great Salt Lake, 
 a portion of which he also explored. From 
 here he crossed over to the Columbia, reach- 
 ing Pacific tidewater in November, having 
 scientifically examined and mapped the whole 
 intervening country. 
 
 After visiting the Oregon settlers — who 
 were gaining a foothold despite the fierce and 
 often bloody opposition of the British fur- 
 traders and the apathy of our own Govern- 
 ment — the intrepid "Pathfinder," regardless 
 of the oncoming of winter in the unexplored 
 Sierras, turned southward to the Sacramento. 
 He hoped to obtain supplies at Sutter's Fort, 
 in that valley, 1 so as to enable his party to 
 return homeward. 
 
 1 Established in 1838-39, upon a grant obtained by Captain 
 Sutter from the Mexican Government. Extensive agricultural 
 operations were here carried on, with Indians as farm laborers. 
 
 236 
 
Pioneers of Science 
 
 The topography of the vast region which 
 Fremont now entered had hitherto been 
 qnite unknown. Previous conjectures as to 
 it proved erroneous. Deep snows and rigor- 
 ous weather were almost constantly encoun- 
 tered. Along the edges of appalling preci- 
 pices ; over rugged mountains ; through awe- 
 some gorges with walls apparently reaching 
 to the skies; scaling chasms; wearily climbing 
 precipitous peaks whose summits extended 
 beyond the clouds ; often narrowly escaping 
 great avalanches miles in extent, apprehensive 
 that at any moment a yielding snowfield 
 might prove but a treacherous bridge over 
 some unseen abyss, the daring pioneers of 
 science plodded on through the dreary wil- 
 derness, the extent and outcome of which 
 were as little known to them as was the mys- 
 terious Western Ocean to the adventurous 
 Columbus of old. 
 
 Indians refused to serve as guides in so in- 
 hospitable and dangerous a region. Horses 
 and men succumbed to the horrors of the sit- 
 uation. " The slow and mournful procession 
 of feeble, starving skeletons, crawled like a 
 disabled serpent along their dangerous way, 
 
 237 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 surrounded by the deep snows of the Sierra 
 Nevada and by all the awful incidents of 
 March among the rudest solitudes of nature." 
 But throughout these half thousand painful 
 miles the leader was undaunted ; his wonder- 
 ful endurance, unconquerable determination, 
 and masterly management have never been 
 surpassed by any explorer. 
 
 At last Fremont and his companions ar- 
 rived (March 8th) and recruited at Sutter's 
 settlement. Resuming their journey south, 
 the valley of the San Joaquin was explored ; 
 thence, recrossing the mountains through a 
 gap, they skirted the Great Basin, journeying 
 through a comparatively unknown world and 
 making rich scientific collections. Great Salt 
 Lake, Utah Lake, Little Salt Lake, and the 
 great features of the western slope of the 
 Sierra Nevada were all examined and ex- 
 plored. For months, away above the ver- 
 dant valleys, never out of sight of snow and 
 ice, the expedition continued with unfaltering 
 energy. Crossing the continental divide at 
 an elevation of eight thousand feet, near the 
 head of Pullman's Fork of the Platte, North 
 and South Forks were visited, and the moun- 
 
 238 
 
Fruits of Toil 
 
 tains again crossed to the Arkansas, by which 
 the plains were eventually reached. On the 
 last of July (1844) the explorers were once 
 more encamped at Kansas City, on the Mis- 
 souri. All accomplished, Fremont returned 
 home, Bearing rich fruits of his toil, danger, 
 and heroism in an enlarged and satisfactory 
 acquaintance with the resources of those vast 
 and unappropriated mountain realms, and 
 contributions to every department of science. 
 His own narrative of the expedition 1 is charm- 
 ingly written and singularly modest. 
 
 Captain Fremont's third expedition (1845- 
 47), for the purpose of finding the shortest 
 route for a railroad to San Francisco Bay, 
 closed with incidents of a most romantic and 
 unexpected character. The summer of 1845 
 was spent in exploring the watershed of the 
 continental divide. In midwinter (January) 
 Fremont, with a few followers, again crossed 
 the Sierra Nevada Kange and went to Mon- 
 terey, the capital of California, where per- 
 mission was obtained from the Mexican Gov- 
 ernor, General Jose Castro, to explore the 
 
 1 Published by order of the United States Senate in 1845 ; and 
 again in Fremont's Memoirs (Chicago, 1887), vol. i. 
 
 239 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Oregon and California hinterland. This per- 
 mission was soon withdrawn, and Fremont 
 ordered to leave the country. But the stub- 
 born captain was not at first disposed to obey, 
 and entrenched himself against a threatened 
 attack from Castro. After a few days, how- 
 ever, he retreated into Oregon. 
 
 While upon the march (May 9, 1846) 
 secret despatches arrived from Federal offi- 
 cials, notifying Fremont that the country 
 was about to be transferred to Great Britain, 
 and that the now large American settlements 
 on the Sacramento were threatened by Cas- 
 tro. The explorer, with his little band of ad- 
 herents, turned back and took a prominent 
 part in the popular American revolt against 
 Mexico ; and on July fourth he was elected by 
 his fellow countrymen as their governor — a 
 choice soon confirmed by Commodore Robert 
 F. Stockton, who had arrived at Monterey 
 with a frigate designed to capture California 
 from Mexico. A treaty signed by Fremont 
 with the Mexicans (January 13, 1847), re- 
 sulted in the withdrawal of the latter, leav- 
 ing the Americans practically in possession 
 of the country. 
 
 240 
 
Incredible Hardships 
 
 General Stephen W. Kearny having ar- 
 rived in California with a force of dragoons, 
 fresh from his conquest of New Mexico, a 
 dispute arose between him and Stockton as 
 to who was to command in California. Fre- 
 mont decided to obey the orders of the latter, 
 although Kearny was his superior officer in 
 the army. The captain-governor accompanied 
 Kearny homeward in the spring of 1847, and 
 on arrival at Fort Leavenworth was arrested 
 for mutiny. The trial took place at Washing- 
 ton, resulting in Fremont's conviction on tech- 
 nical grounds. The penalty was remitted by 
 President Polk, but the young officer forth- 
 with resigned from the army. 
 
 In October, 1848, Fremont organized a 
 fourth expedition, of thirty-three men, at his 
 own charge, this time seeking a practicable 
 route to the Pacific through the Valley of the 
 Rio Grande. While crossing the mountains 
 the party were lost and suffered incredible 
 hardships from hunger and cold, and some 
 of them even practised cannibalism. Re- 
 treating to Santa Fe, with the loss of all 
 his animals and a third of his men, Fremont 
 recruited a fresh party and successfully 
 
 241 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 reached Sacramento the following spring. 
 He now settled permanently in California, 
 and for a long term of years the " Pathfinder " 
 was one of the most active and distinguished 
 residents of the Pacific coast. 
 
 Fremont's several explorations, supple- 
 mented by those of Major William H. Emory 
 (1846-47), Captain W. H. Warner (1847-49), 
 Colonel William W. Loring (1849), Captain 
 H. Stanbury (1849-50), and other army offi- 
 cers, who crossed the backbone of the con- 
 tinent by different routes, intensified public 
 interest in the land beyond the Missouri. 
 Although the vast interior spaces of the plains 
 and mountains were as yet unknown save to 
 roving bands of explorers, trappers, and In- 
 dian traders, already considerable definite in- 
 formation had become disseminated among 
 the people concerning the principal passes of 
 the mountains ; while the narrow belts of the 
 overland trails had become quite familiar to 
 the residents of the " States." Each year 
 parties of considerable size made the trans- 
 continental trip. In many cases, however, 
 they suffered hardship and privation of the 
 most painful character. Of their struggles 
 
 242 
 
Struggles with the Elements 
 
 with the elements, their contests with Indians, 
 their hunger, thirst, and toil, but little has 
 been formally recorded, although traditions 
 exist of horrors fortunately having few equals 
 in the history of the world. 
 
 n 243 
 
CHAPTEE XIV 
 
 THE CONTINENT SPANNED BY SETTLEMENT 
 
 Two months after the signing of the 
 treaty with Mexico, which definitively gave 
 to us California, the world was startled 
 (April, 1848) by news that gold had been 
 found in deposits of fabulous value at 
 Sutter's Fort, Fremont's rendezvous in the 
 Sacramento Valley. The American El Do- 
 rado, so long sought in vain by Spanish wan- 
 derers, had at last been discovered. The 
 year previous, Brigham Young had led the 
 Mormon vanguard to Salt Lake, seeking in 
 its desert basin an isolated asylum from the 
 hostile Gentiles. But the opening of the 
 gold diggings led to a mighty westward rush 
 along the overland trail that passed the very 
 door of the Saints. During the spring and 
 summer of 1849, 1,500 wagons, 40,000 oxen 
 and mules, and 27,000 men were ferried across 
 
 244 
 
The Passing Throng 
 
 the Missouri, at the towns between Independ- 
 ence and Council Bluffs. During each of 
 the three succeeding years 100,000 persons 
 from both hemispheres crossed the great river, 
 probably half of them at St. Joseph. 
 
 This enormous movement of population 
 quickly resulted in the establishment west of 
 the Missouri of ferries, trading-posts, and 
 military stations, to accommodate and pro- 
 tect the passing throng. A monthly mail- 
 route was soon opened between the Missouri 
 and the Pacific by way of Salt Lake ; in- 
 creased to a weekly service in 1858 as far 
 westward as Salt Lake. Another route was 
 opened on the Santa Fe trail, from Inde- 
 pendence to Albuquerque. It was 1858 
 when St. Louis and San Francisco became 
 connected by the Southern Overland Mail 
 Company's expresses, which made the dis- 
 tance in a month. 
 
 California had for ten years been basking in 
 a flood of golden glory, when (July, 1858) the 
 precious metal was also found in the bed of 
 Cherry Creek, at the base of the Colorado hills, 
 where the progressive city of Denver now lies. 
 
 By the following spring tens of thousands 
 
 245 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 of men, of every age, color, and race, were 
 pouring into the valley of Cherry Creek, or 
 "the Pike's Peak country," as it was then 
 called. The Peak itself is fifty miles to the 
 south; but being the most prominent land- 
 mark in the region, gave name to it all. Some 
 came across the plains on foot, their worldly 
 possessions on their backs ; others were har- 
 nessed to hand-carts laden with their belong- 
 ings ; one man trundled a wheelbarrow all 
 the way out from Kansas City, a distance of 
 nearly eight hundred miles. Daily stages 
 were put on between Leavenworth and Den- 
 ver — the " Leavenworth and Pike's Peak Ex- 
 press " — a journey which occupied from ten 
 to fifteen days, the fare being $100 for the 
 687 miles. But the majority of the immi- 
 grants, unable to meet this expense, came by 
 "prairie-schooners," sighting the glistening 
 mountain height for over a hundred miles to 
 the east, and by it guiding their white-winged 
 barks across the dreary plain. Up the val- 
 leys of the Platte, the Smoky Hill, and the 
 Arkansas, they came singly or in caravans, 
 often insufficiently provided with the articles 
 necessary for so hazardous a journey; hun- 
 
 246 
 
Railroad Surveys 
 
 dreds either perished miserably by the way or 
 arrived at their goal half dead from fatigue, 
 starvation, and the wounds of Indian arrows. 
 Upon the sides of their canvas-covered wagons 
 was often crudely traced in charcoal the jaunty 
 motto of the day, " Pike's Peak or Bust ! " 
 Many there were that "busted." The reports 
 of the miseries and sufferings of the overland 
 trail did not in the least, however, check the 
 human tide which had set in the direction of 
 the everlasting hills. 
 
 The need for a transcontinental railroad 
 was early recognized. We have seen that one 
 of Fremont's objects in 1845 had been the 
 survey of a railroad route to San Francisco 
 Bay ; but the expedition ended in a manner 
 little anticipated. From 1852 to 1854 the 
 Federal Government sent out five surveying 
 parties " to ascertain the most practicable and 
 economical route for a railroad from the 
 Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean": 
 
 1. In 1853-54, Isaac Ingalls Stevens, a 
 topographical engineer and then Governor of 
 Washington Territory, headed a large party 
 which surveyed a route from St. Paul to 
 Puget Sound, along the forty-seventh parallel 
 
 247 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 — a line now followed in the main by the 
 Northern Pacific, the construction of which 
 was not, however, completed until 1883. 
 
 2. Lieutenant E. G. Beckwith, in 1854 5 
 explored a route between the forty-first and 
 forty-third parallels, which formed a basis for 
 the work of the Union Pacific and Central 
 Pacific, continuous systems which were phys- 
 ically joined during May, 1869. 
 
 3. Captain A. W. Whipple surveyed, in 
 1853, the line opened by the Atlantic and Pa- 
 cific road — the Pacific outlet of the Atchison, 
 Topeka and Santa Fe, which connected with 
 the Southern Pacific, completed in 1882. 
 
 4. The Southern Pacific's line was de- 
 lineated by Captain John Pope in 1854. 
 
 5. A route for the Denver and Rio Grande, 
 now running between Pueblo, Salt Lake City, 
 Denver, and other points in the mountains, 
 was surveyed by Captain J. W. Gunnison and 
 Lieutenant Beckwith in 1853-54 — the former 
 losing his life at the hands of Indians, or pos- 
 sibly of both Mormons and tribesmen. 
 
 Among other notable expeditions — to men- 
 tion but a few of the many contemporane- 
 ous surveys during this period of activity 
 
 248 
 
Government Expeditions 
 
 — were : The opening of a road from Puget 
 Sound to Walla Walla, by Lieutenant R. 
 Arnold (1854) ; the search by F. W. Lander 
 (1854), at the request of citizens of Oregon 
 and Washington Territories, for a railroad 
 route through the Columbia Valley, and by 
 way of South Pass and the Platte River to 
 the Missouri ; Lieutenant R. W. Williamson's 
 railroad survey through the passes of the 
 Sierra Nevada and Coast Range and over the 
 Colorado desert (1854) ; a railroad survey by 
 Lieutenant J. G. Parke (1854-55) from San 
 Jose to Fort Fillmore, New Mexico ; explora- 
 tions of the Brazos and Big Wichita Rivers, 
 by Captain R. B. Marcy (1854) ; the march 
 from Fort Leavenworth to California by way 
 of Salt Lake and the Oregon trail, by Colonel 
 Edward J. Steptoe (1854-55); a mounted 
 punitive expedition against the Indians, by 
 Major G. P. Haller (1855), from the Columbia 
 and through South Pass to Fort Boise ; a 
 reconnaissance on the Missouri and Yellow- 
 stone Rivers by Lieutenant G. K. Warren 
 (1856) ; and the first Government expedition 
 to Yellowstone National Park, in charge of 
 Captain W. F. Raynolds (1859-60). 
 
 249 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 The governmental surveys of the bound- 
 ary between Mexico and the United States, 
 undertaken at intervals between 1849 and 
 1856, by Captain Whipple, ColonelJ. D. Gra- 
 ham, Major Emory, and others, are also de- 
 serving of mention in this connection; the 
 country being carefully examined by these 
 parties from the mouth of the Rio Grande to 
 the Pacific, and much interesting scientific 
 information obtained. During 1857 several 
 Government expeditions were in the field — 
 one of them, under Lieutenant Parke, was 
 employed on the Canadian- American bound- 
 ary-line ; others improved mountain surveys 
 previously made ; while new wagon roads 
 were opened up, the navigation of im- 
 portant streams investigated, and territorial 
 boundaries definitively established. A con- 
 temporary report significantly declares, also, 
 that "the Land Office surveys along the 
 whole frontier are advancing steadily." 
 
 By the opening of the war between the 
 States the North American continent had at 
 last been spanned by Anglo-Saxon settlement. 
 The story of Rocky Mountain exploration had 
 
 250 
 
Civilization Triumphant 
 
 practically reached its end. The overland 
 stages were quickly withdrawn upon the ad- 
 vance of the Pacific railways. The buffalo 
 and the grizzly soon disappeared. The In- 
 dian, stoutly standing for his birthright, was 
 cowed at last. There are no longer any Kit 
 Carsons ; the French-Canadian voyageur and 
 the Rocky Mountain trapper can only be seen 
 in literature ; the explorers of to-day are 
 the engineer armed with his level, the geolo- 
 gist with his hammer, and the botanist with 
 his tin box. Thrifty farms now abut each 
 other to the uttermost limit of the rainy belt 
 and are creeping along the irrigable bases of 
 the mountains. Rapidly growing towns and 
 cities besprinkle the map of the trans-Mis- 
 souri. Subsidiary railways spider-web the 
 land, while reaching out to gather sustenance 
 for the main transcontinental thoroughfares. 
 The broad, rolling plains where Coronado 
 marched of old, where Pike, and Long, and 
 Fremont made heroic records by combating 
 nature, are the seat of gigantic cattle in- 
 dustry — or perhaps we should say were, for 
 we live fast in America and a decade may 
 with us be the span of an epoch ; cowboys 
 
 251 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 and range cattle are fast being crowded out 
 by homesteaders from every Eastern State and 
 European land. In the picturesque mountain 
 passes, canons, and parks, where the pioneers 
 of civilization suffered martyrdom in the 
 cause of human progress, are now palace-like 
 hotels for the tourists of the world. Upon 
 the hillsides and in the gulches, where in- 
 dividual adventurers once won fortunes with 
 the pick and the pan, giant corporations 
 armed with costly and intricate machinery 
 dig and delve for deeply hidden riches, the 
 innumerable human ants in their employ 
 being handled with the discipline, the regu- 
 larity, and the system of an army corps. 
 There are now peace and plenty. The Dark 
 Continent of our grandfathers is the Light 
 Continent of our day. The Far West has 
 become the Great West. 
 
 252 
 
INDEX 
 
 Aird, , Indian trader, 183. 
 
 Alaska, 209, 229; explored by 
 Spain, 17. 
 
 Albuquerque (N. Mac), 245. 
 
 Alkali, on Upper Missouri, 137. 
 
 Allen, Lieutenant James, ex- 
 plores source of Mississippi, 
 218. 
 
 Allencaster, , governor of 
 
 New Mexico, 206. 
 
 American Antiquarian Society, 
 Proceedings, 67. 
 
 — Fur Company, organized, 194 ; 
 opposition to, 221 ; traders of, 
 225. 
 
 — Historical Association, He- 
 port, 78. 
 
 — Philosophical Society, au- 
 thorizes exploration, 74, 75, 77, 
 93 ; owns Lewis and Clark jour- 
 nals, 110, 187. 
 
 Amherst, General Jeffrey, cap- 
 tures Montreal, 46, 47, 
 
 Arctic Ocean, reached by Hearne, 
 50 ; by Mackenzie, 56, 57. 
 
 Arikara Indians, Lewis and 
 Clark among, 124-126, 183. 
 
 Arizona, explored by Spanish, 7- 
 10, 13 ; missions in, 13. 
 
 Armstrong, Captain John, at- 
 tempts Western exploration, 73. 
 
 Arnold, Lieutenant R., opens 
 wagon road, 249. 
 
 Ashley, General William H. , ex- 
 plorer, 218, 219, 221. 
 
 Assiniboin Indians, guide Veren- 
 drye, 33. 
 
 Astor, John Jacob, fur-trader, 
 194-196, 223. 
 
 Astoria, built, 192, 195; trans- 
 ferred to British, 196. 
 
 Atchison, Topeka & Santa Pe 
 Railway, 248. 
 
 Athabasca country, fur-trade in, 
 53,55,57,192. 
 
 Atkinson, Colonel Henry, de- 
 tailed for exploration, 211 ; 
 treats with Indians, 219. 
 
 Atlantic & Pacific Railway, 
 248. 
 
 Aulneau, Father Jean Pierre, 
 Jesuit missionary, 31. 
 
 Balboa, Vasco Nunez, crosses 
 
 Darien, 3. 
 Barbe-Marbois, Francois de, 
 
 French minister, 85, 86. 
 Bay, Baker's, 162. 
 — , Green, Indians upon, 22. 
 — , Hudson, discovered, 37 ; given 
 
 to Hudson's Bay Company, 38 ; 
 
 supposed passage to Pacific, 
 
 253 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 41, 47, 50 ; expeditions on, 41- 
 43, 50, 51. 
 Bay, Monterey, discovered, 11. 
 
 — of San Francisco, 226, 239, 
 247. 
 
 — of Tampa, Spanish posses- 
 sion, 6. 
 
 — , Youngs, site of Fort Clatsop, 
 162. 
 
 Beads, used as currency, 166, 
 171. 
 
 Bears, black, first encountered by 
 Lewis and Clark, 115, 119 ; on 
 Upper Missouri, 138, 142, 148 ; 
 flesh used, 144. 
 
 — , grizzly, met by Lewis and 
 Clark, 120, 138-141, 149, 176 ; 
 Indians hunt, 173 ; used for 
 meat, 173, 180 ; disappearance 
 of, 251. 
 
 Beauharnois, Charles de la 
 Boische, marquis de, governor 
 of New France, 28, 35. 
 
 Beavers, eaten by Lewis and 
 Clark, 138, 148, 164 ; carry off 
 pole, 149 ; dams impede naviga- 
 tion, 179. 
 
 Beaver's Head Cliff, Lewis and 
 Clark at, 150. 
 
 Becker, Sefior Jeronimo, Spanish 
 writer, 82. 
 
 Beckwith, Lieutenant B. G. , sur- 
 veys railway route, 248. 
 
 Bell, Captain J. R, descends 
 Arkansas, 215. 
 
 Benton, Thomas H., champions 
 the West, 229, 230 ; meets Fre- 
 mont, 230, 231. 
 
 Bering, Vitus, proves insularity 
 of America, 2, 23. 
 
 Biddle, Nicholas, edits Lewis and 
 Clark journals, 187. 
 
 Bienville, Jean Baptiste le 
 Moyne, sieur de, governor of 
 Louisiana, 64. 
 
 Bighorn Range, seen by Ve'ren- 
 drye, 34. 
 
 Big-horns (sheep), on Upper 
 Missouri, 138; on Yellowstone, 
 181. 
 
 Bigot, Francois, intendant of New 
 France, 35. 
 
 Big White, Mandan chief, ac- 
 panies Lewis and Clark, 182, 
 183. 
 
 Bismarck (N. Dak.), Lewis and 
 Clark near, 126. 
 
 Bitterroot Mountains, crossed by 
 Lewis and Clark, 155-157, 173- 
 175. 
 
 Blaek Hills, early reports con- 
 cerning, 49. 
 
 Blackfeet Indians, angered by 
 Lewis and Clark, 178. 
 
 Bodmer, Charles, pictures Amer- 
 ican Indians, 220. 
 
 Bonaparte, Joseph, opposes 
 Louisiana sale, 85. 
 
 — , Lucien, opposes Louisiana 
 sale, 85. 
 
 Bonneville, Captain Benjamin 
 Bulalie de, explorer, 221-223. 
 
 Boone, Daniel, emigrates to Mis- 
 souri, 88, 89, 115, 210. 
 
 Boston, its fur-trade in North- 
 west, 19. 
 
 Bratton, William, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 
 Broken Arm, Chopunnish chief, 
 172. 
 
 254 
 
Index 
 
 Broughton, , claims the Co- 
 lumbia for England, 162. 
 
 Buffaloes, seen by Coronado, 9 ; 
 first seen by Lewis and Clark, 
 115 ; abundant, 118, 119 ; hunt- 
 ed, 131, 132 ; on Upper Missouri, 
 138, 142 ; invade camp of expe- 
 dition, 141 ; mating season, 176 ; 
 on Yellowstone, 180, 181 ; dis- 
 appearance of, 251. 
 
 Burr, Aaron, Southwest conspir- 
 acy, 207, 234 ; kills Hamilton, 
 183. 
 
 Cabra (wild goat), on Missouri, 
 119. 
 
 Cabrillo, Juan Roderiguez, ex- 
 plores Northwest Coast, 11. 
 
 Caches, made by Lewis and 
 Clark, 144, 153, 154, 157, 175, 
 176, 179. 
 
 Cahokia (111.), military post, 109. 
 
 Calgary, French post near, 35. 
 
 California, missions in, 14-17 ; 
 traders visit, 19 ; first overland 
 travelers to, 221, 222 ; Mexican 
 territory, 234, 236, 239; Fre- 
 mont in, 238-240, 242; con- 
 quered by Americans, 87, 240, 
 241 ; overland passage to, 242, 
 243, 248, 249 ; gold discovered 
 in, 244, 245 ; rush to, 244, 245. 
 
 Cameawhait, brother of Saca- 
 jawea, 153, 154. 
 
 Canada, interested in exploration, 
 22-24 ; source of revenue, 24 ; 
 fur-trade of, 25-31 ; conquest 
 of, 36, 40, 81 ; connected with 
 Louisiana, 40 ; boundary of, 
 250. 
 
 Canadians, in fur-trade, 45, 55, 
 
 100, 124, 127, 128, 190, 195, 196, 
 
 231. 
 Cape Horn, rounded by English, 
 
 12 ; Lewis to return by, 101 ; 
 
 Astor's expedition rounds, 195 ; 
 
 Wyeth's, 223. 
 
 — of Good Hope, Lewis to re- 
 turn by, 100. 
 
 — Mendocino, Cabrillo reaches, 
 11. 
 
 Carolinas, seat of Genet's in- 
 trigue, 77. 
 
 Carson, Kit, with Fremont, 231, 
 232, 251. 
 
 Carver, Jonathan, explores North- 
 west, 46-50 ; Travels, 49. 
 
 Cascade Mountains, crossed, 226. 
 
 Castro, Jos6, governor of Cali- 
 fornia 239, 240. 
 
 Catherine II, Empress of Russia, 
 turns Ledyard back, 70, 71. 
 
 Cat Island, Columbus at, 1. 
 
 Cavendish, Thomas, English ex- 
 plorer, 12. 
 
 Central Pacific Railway, sur- 
 veyed, 248. 
 
 Champlain, Samuel de, sends 
 Nicolet to Wisconsin, 22. 
 
 Charbonneau, Toussaint, inter- 
 preter for Lewis and Clark, 11 , 
 130, 145, 146, 152, 175, 179 ; dis- 
 charged, 182. 
 
 Charles II, charters Hudson's 
 Bay Company, 37, 38, 40. 
 
 Charleston (S. C.),Michaux's nur- 
 sery near, 74, 78 ; Genet at, 77. 
 
 Charlevoix, Pierre Francois 
 Xavier de, French traveler, 
 25, 26, 46. 
 
 255 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Chicago, Indian village, 216. 
 
 Chickasaw Indians, habitat, 65. 
 
 Chihuahua (Mex.), Pike sent to, 
 208. 
 
 China, American trade with, 20, 
 53, 63, 194. 
 
 Chinook lndians,on Pacific Coast, 
 163, 165, 166, 168. 
 
 Chippewa Indians, Pike among, 
 197. 
 
 Chittenden, Henry M., History 
 of American Fur Trade, 211. 
 
 Chopunnish (NezPerces) Indians, 
 met by Lewis and Clark, 156 ; 
 care for their horses, 157, 172 ; 
 greet them on return, 171. 
 
 Chouteau, Auguste, fur-trader, 
 183. 
 
 Cibola, Seven Cities of, sought by 
 Spanish, 5-10. 
 
 Cincinnati, military post, 72. 
 
 Claiborne, William C. C, gov- 
 ernor of Louisiana, 90. 
 
 Clark, General George Rogers, 
 selected for Western explora- 
 tion, 68, 92 ; intrigues with 
 Genet, 68, 69, 77, 78 ; Illinois 
 campaign, 103. 
 
 — , George Rogers Hancock, 169. 
 
 — , John, removes to Kentucky, 
 103. 
 
 — , William, early life, 102-105 ; 
 joins Lewis, 102, 104 ; com- 
 missioned, 104 ; in winter quar- 
 ters, 109 ; embarks, 110 ; as 
 physician, 116, 133, 157, 170, 
 171,179; describes the Sioux, 
 118 ; attitude toward Canadi- 
 ans, 128 ; practical woodsman, 
 130 ; aids Mandans, 131 ; goes 
 
 hunting, 135 ; master of navi- 
 gation, 142, 143, 148-150; at 
 Three Forks of Missouri, 145 ; 
 ill, 145, 150 ; explores the Lem- 
 hi, 153, 154 ; advance guard 
 of party, 156 ; temperament of, 
 167, 168; returns by Yellow- 
 stone, 175, 179-181; rejoined 
 by Lewis, 179. See also, Lewis 
 and Clark. 
 
 Clatsop Indians, Lewis and Clark 
 among, 163-169. 
 
 Coahuila (Mex.), Pike in, 208. 
 
 Coal, on Upper Missouri, 137. 
 
 Coast Range, surveyed, 249. 
 
 Collins, John, accompanies Lewis 
 and Clark, 111. 
 
 Colorado, foot-hills of, 203 ; des- 
 ert, 249; explored by French, 
 64; posts in, 233, 235; gold 
 discovered, 245 ; emigration to, 
 246, 247 ; railways through, 
 248, 249. 
 
 Colter, John, accompanies Lewis 
 and Clark, 111 ; later history, 
 182. 
 
 Columbia Valley, natives of, 158, 
 160,170; game, 160, 164; cli- 
 mate, 160 ; treeless, 170 ; ex- 
 plored, 220 ; trading-posts in, 
 218 ; Wyeth's party, 224 ; ex- 
 plored by Wilkes, 224 ; settled, 
 228 ; railway through, 249. See 
 also, River Columbia. 
 
 " Columbia," ship on Northwest 
 Coast, 19, 20. 
 
 Columbus, Christopher, discovers 
 America, 1, 2, 136. 
 
 Comanche Indians, Pike among, 
 198 ; Dodge, 225. 
 
 256 
 
Index 
 
 Congress, grants funds for Lewis 
 and Clark expedition, 95, 99 ; 
 disposes of Oregon question, 
 230. 
 
 Cook, Captain James, English 
 explorer, 16, 17, 19, 67, 70, 136 ; 
 Ledyard accompanies, 69, 71. 
 
 Coronado, Francisco Vasquez de, 
 Spanish explorer, 8-10, 12, 251. 
 
 Cortez, Fernando, conquers Mex- 
 ico, 3, 6 ; explorations of, 3, 4 ; 
 returns to Spain, 8. 
 
 Coues, Elliott, Lewis and Clark, 
 104 ; Pike's Journals, 204. 
 
 Council Bluffs (la.), 245; Long 
 at, 211, 212. 
 
 Cox, Ross, story of adventures, 
 217, 218. 
 
 Coyotes, on Upper Missouri, 138. 
 
 Creek, Beargrass, 103. 
 
 — , Charbonneau, 137. 
 
 — , Cherry (Colo.), 245, 246. 
 
 — , Travelers' Rest, 174, 181. 
 
 Cruzatte, Peter, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111 ; wounds 
 Lewis, 178. 
 
 Cuadra (Quadra), , Spanish 
 
 explorer, 16-18. 
 
 Curry, Thomas, Scotch fur-trad- 
 er, 45, 46. 
 
 Custis, Dr. , explorer, 200. 
 
 Darien, Isthmus of, crossed by 
 Balboa, 3. 
 
 Davis, Andrew McFarland, 
 American antiquarian, 67. 
 
 De Bourgmont, Etienne Ven- 
 yard, French commandant, 64. 
 
 Deer, on Missouri, 118, 1 19 ; Co- 
 lumbia, 160 ; Yellowstone, 181. 
 
 De Gonnor, Father Nicolas, Jes- 
 uit missionary, 26, 28. 
 
 De Lassus, Charles Dehault, gov- 
 ernor of St. Louis, 90, 91, 107. 
 
 Denver (Colo.), 236, 245, 246, 248. 
 
 Denver & Rio Grande Railway, 
 surveyed, 248. 
 
 Desert, Great American, de- 
 scribed by Pike, 202, 203, 216. 
 
 Dobbs, Arthur, 50 ; attacks Hud- 
 son's Bay Company, 42-44; 
 governor of North Carolina, 44. 
 
 Dodge, Colonel Henry, explorer, 
 225. 
 
 Dogs, used for food, 158, 164, 168. 
 
 Dominguez, , Spanish ex- 
 plorer, 16. 
 
 Dourion, Pierre, joins Lewis and 
 Clark, 115, 117. 
 
 Drake, Sir Francis, English ex- 
 plorer, 12, 47. 
 
 Draper, Lyman C, manuscript 
 collection, 68. 
 
 Drouillard, George, interpreter 
 for Lewis and Clark, 111, 151, 
 164. 
 
 Ducks, upon the Missouri, 119. 
 
 Du Luth, Daniel Greysolon, 
 French trader, 24. 
 
 Dumont, , Memoir es de la 
 
 Louisiane, 65. 
 
 Dunbar, William, explorer, 199, 
 200, 216. 
 
 Du Pratz, Le Page, Histoire de 
 la Louisiane, 65. 
 
 Du Tisne, , French explorer, 
 
 64. 
 
 East Indian Company, monop- 
 olizes China trade, 20, 53. 
 
 257 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Elk, on Missouri River, 118, 119, 
 138 ; on Jefferson, 148 ; on Co- 
 lumbia, 160, 165 ; on Yellow- 
 stone, 181 ; flesh used as meat, 
 144, 168. 
 
 Emory, Major William H., ex- 
 plorer, 242, 250. 
 
 English, seek South Sea, 2, 3; 
 explore Atlantic Coast, 10, 41 ; 
 in the Pacific, 12; explore 
 Northwest Coast, 16, 17, 20; 
 secure Northwest Coast, 18 ; in 
 fur-trade, 27, 36, 127, 165; 
 found Hudson's Bay Company, 
 37-40 ; acquire North America, 
 44, 81 ; forward North Amer- 
 ican exploration, 68. 
 
 Escalante, Father , Spanish 
 
 missionary, 16. 
 
 Eskimos, massacred, 50 ; visited 
 by Mackenzie, 57. 
 
 Fallen Timbers, battle of, 103. 
 
 Falls, Great, of Missouri, 144, 
 174-176. 
 
 — , Little, Pike at, 97. 
 
 — of St. Anthony, Carver at, 
 48. 
 
 Federalists, oppose Louisiana 
 Purchase, 86, 87. 
 
 Fields, Joseph, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 
 — , Reuben, accompanies Lewis 
 and Clark, 111, 177. 
 
 Finlay, James, Scotch fur- 
 trader, 46. 
 
 Florida, Spanish possessions, 
 6, 82; visited by Michaux, 
 74 ; acquired by United States, 
 87. 
 
 Floyd, Sergeant Charles, with 
 Lewis and Clark, 111 ; death, 
 111, 117. 
 
 Font, Father , Spanish mis- 
 sionary, 16. 
 
 Ford, Paul Leicester, Writings 
 of Thomas Jefferson, 70-72, 75, 
 98. 
 
 Fort Beauharnois, French post, 
 26. 
 
 — Bent, Fremont at, 233, 235. 
 
 — Boise, Indian expedition at, 
 249. 
 
 — Bourbon, French post, 32. 
 
 — Chepewyan, in Athabasca 
 country, 55, 57, 58. 
 
 — Clatsop, Lewis and Clark at, 
 162-169. 
 
 — Dauphin, French post, 32. 
 
 — Fillmore, railway survey to, 
 249. 
 
 — George, Astoria, English at, 
 196. 
 
 — La Jonquiere, built by St. 
 Pierre, 35. 
 
 — La Reine, French post, 32, 33. 
 
 — Leavenworth, explorers at, 
 219, 225, 241, 249. 
 
 — McLeod, on Peace River, 58 , 
 60. 
 
 — Mandan, Lewis and Clark at, 
 111, 119, 126-136. 
 
 — Massac, Lewis at, 106. 
 
 — Maurepas, built by Veren- 
 drye, 31, 32. 
 
 — Niagara, British post, 47. 
 
 — Orleans, on Missouri, 64. 
 
 — Osage, road from, 217. 
 
 — Prince of Wales, Hudson 
 Bay, 50, 51, 54. 
 
 258 
 
Index 
 
 Fort Rouge, French post, 32. 
 
 — St. Charles, built by Veren- 
 drye, 30-32. 
 
 — St. Pierre, built by Veren- 
 drye, 30, 32. 
 
 — St. Vrain, Long at, 213 ; 
 Fremont, 236. 
 
 — Snelling, Long at, 216. 
 
 — Sutter, Fremont's base, 236, 
 238, 244. 
 
 Fox Indians, French contend 
 with, 26. 
 
 Fox-Wisconsin route, 195. 
 
 Franciscans, as explorers, 12 ; 
 as missionaries in Southwest, 
 13 ; in California, 14-16. 
 
 Fraser, Simon, on Peace River, 
 191 ; early life, 192 ; explores, 
 192-194. 
 
 Frazier, Robert, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 
 Freeman, , explorer, 200. 
 
 Fremont, Jessie Benton, 231, 
 234. 
 
 — , John C, 251 ; with Nicol- 
 let, 213, 226, 230 ; meets Ben- 
 ton, 230, 231 ; commissioned 
 for exploration, 231, 247; 
 first expedition of, 231, 232; 
 report, 232 ; second expe- 
 dition, 232-239; ordered to 
 Washington, 234, 235; third 
 expedition, 239-241 ; aids Cali- 
 fornia revolt, 240, 241 ; court- 
 martialed, 241 ; fourth expedi- 
 tion, 241, 242; Memoirs, 233, 
 239. 
 
 Fremont's Peak, named, 232. 
 
 French, explore Mississippi Val- 
 ley, 22, 23, 62; posts in North- 
 
 west, 24-26, 30-32, 35, 36, 40 ; 
 explorations toward Pacific, 2, 
 24-36 ; missions, 13, 14 ; on 
 Northwest Coast, 20 ; war with 
 Foxes, 26 ; explore Missouri, 
 63-67, 137 ; lose American pos- 
 sessions, 81 ; recover Louisi- 
 ana, 81, 88, 94 ; send expedition 
 to Santo Domingo, 82 ; surren- 
 der Louisiana, 90. 
 
 Frobishers, Benjamin and Jo- 
 seph, fur-trade house, 52, 54. 
 
 Frontiersmen, desire navigation 
 of Mississippi, 83 ; join Lewis 
 and Clark expedition, 106 ; 
 advance civilization, 210 ; in 
 Oregon, 229, 230. 
 
 Fur-trade, French in, 24, 25, 27- 
 31, 109; English, 27, 44-46, 
 127-129, 190; Americans, 19, 
 21, 129, 194, 195, 218, 219, 
 222; competition, 51, 54, 209, 
 221 ; on Northwest Coast, 18- 
 21, 165, 192; at mouth of Co- 
 lumbia, 165 ; on Missouri, 183, 
 184. See also, the several com- 
 panies. 
 
 Galissoniere, Michel Rolland 
 Barrin, marquis de, governor 
 of New FraDce, 35. 
 
 Gallatin, Albert, river named 
 for, 146. 
 
 Gass, Sergeant Patrick, with 
 Lewis and Clark, 111, 117. 
 
 Geese (wild), on Missouri, 119. 
 
 Genet, Charles, French envoy, 
 69, 77, 78. 
 
 Georgia, seat of Genet's in- 
 trigue, 77. 
 
 18 
 
 259 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Germans, in fur-trade, 55 ; emi- 
 grants in Missouri Valley, 64. 
 
 Gibson, George, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111 ; hurt, 
 180. 
 
 Goats (wild). See Cabra. 
 
 Goodrich, Silas, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111, 175. 
 
 Graham, Colonel J. D., explorer, 
 250. 
 
 Grand Portage, route of, 216 ; 
 Carver at, 49 ; center for fur- 
 trade, 53, 190, 191; Fraser 
 agent at, 192. 
 
 Gray, Captain Robert, discovers 
 Columbia, 19, 162. 
 
 Great Lakes, French on, 2, 40 ; 
 fur-trading expedition, 195. 
 
 Grijalva, Juan de, Spanish ex- 
 plorer, 4. 
 
 Grimm, Friedrich Melchior, 
 baron von, cooperates with 
 Jefferson, 71. 
 
 Groseilliers, Medard Chouart, 
 sieur des, discovers Lake Su- 
 perior, 37. 
 
 Grosventre Indians, Lewis and 
 Clark among, 130, 132, 135. 
 
 Guignas, Father Michel, Jesuit 
 missionary, 26. 
 
 Gulf of California, Spanish on, 2, 
 7, 12 ; explored by Americans, 
 221. 
 
 — of Mexico, explored by 
 Spanish, 3; Mississippi emp- 
 ties into, 62 ; Spanish posses- 
 sions on, 77. 
 
 — of St. Lawrence, explored, 41. 
 Gunnison, Captain J. W., sur- 
 veys for railway, 248. 
 
 Guzman, Nunez Beltran de, 
 Spanish explorer, 5-8. 
 
 Hall, Hugh, accompanies Lewis 
 and Clark, 111. 
 
 Haller, Major G. P., leads In- 
 dian expedition, 249. 
 
 Hamilton, Alexander, subscribes 
 for Western exploration, 75 ; 
 killed by Burr, 183. 
 
 Haney, , Indian trader, 176, 
 
 181. 
 
 Harmar, General Josiah, West- 
 ern commandant, 72, 73. 
 
 Harper's Ferry (Va.), Lewis at, 
 99. 
 
 Harrison, William Henry, gov- 
 ernor of Northwest Territory, 
 186 ; president, 231. 
 
 Hawaii, Americans trade in, 21. 
 
 Hearne, Samuel, explores for 
 Hudson's Bay Company, 50, 
 51, 55. 
 
 Heceta, , Spanish explorer, 
 
 16, 17. 
 
 Henry, Alexander (elder), Scotch 
 fur-trader, 45. 
 
 — , Alexander (younger), 45. 
 
 Hooke, Lieutenant Moses, Clark's 
 alternative, 102. 
 
 Howard, Thomas P., accompan- 
 ies Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 
 Hudson, Hendrik, seeks Western 
 Ocean, 3. 
 
 Hudson's Bay Company, organ- 
 ized, 37, 38 ; opposes explora- 
 tion, 39, 189, 190 ; methods of, 
 38-40 ; territory, 38, 44 ; expe- 
 ditions, 41-43, 50, 57; attacked, 
 41-44 ; rivalry with, 27, 53, 57, 
 
 260 
 
Index 
 
 128; combines with North 
 West Company, 209 ; opposes 
 Oregon settlement, 229, 236 ; 
 trading-posts in Colorado, 233, 
 235. 
 
 Humphrey, Lieutenant , ex- 
 plorer, 200. 
 
 Hunter, Dr. , explorer, 199, 
 
 200, 216. 
 
 Idaho, Lewis and Clark in, 154- 
 156, 172-175. 
 
 Independence (Kans.), emigrant 
 center, 245. 
 
 Indian Territory, crossed by 
 Spanish, 7. 
 
 Indians, in savage state, 220; 
 customs, 49, 131 ; ceremonies, 
 116, 118, 122, 152 ; as hunters, 
 131, 132, 173, 180; in pueblos, 
 7, 8 ; intertribal barter, 166 ; 
 vocabularies, 131 ; sign lan- 
 guage, 153 ; invent geographic 
 tales, 63; make maps, 24, 28, 
 63 ; in missions, 15, 16 ; de- 
 bauched by traders, 52, 54; 
 fond of whisky, 122, 125; 
 act establishing trading-houses 
 among, 93; steal horses, 177, 
 180 ; hate frontiersmen, 229 ; 
 in Columbia Valley, 158, 159, 
 164. 
 
 Irish, in fur-trade, 127. 
 
 Irrigation, need for, 202, 203. 
 
 Irving, Washington, Astoria, 53 ; 
 Bonneville's Adventures, 222. 
 
 James, Dr. Edwin H, with 
 Long, 213-216 ; account of 
 Long's expedition, 213, 216. 
 
 Jefferson, Thomas, plans West- 
 ern exploration, 26, 67-80, 92- 
 95 ; subscribes for Western 
 exploration, 75 ; instructs 
 Michaux, 75-77; relation to 
 Genet intrigue, 78, 79 ; at- 
 tempts to purchase New Or- 
 leans, 82-84 ; scruples against 
 Louisiana acquisition, 86, 87; 
 friendship for Lewis, 96-98; 
 sends out Lewis and Clark ex- 
 pedition, 86, 92-95, 99-102, 131, 
 135, 169, 186 ; rivers named 
 for, 145, 150; deposits journals 
 of expedition at Philadelphia, 
 187; message of, 199; his 
 own papers, 169 ; " Autobiog- 
 raphy," 70. 
 
 Jesuit missionaries, Spanish, 13- 
 15 ; French, 25, 26, 30. 
 
 Jiminez, , Spanish explorer, 
 
 4. 
 
 Jolliet, Louis, French explorer, 
 23, 62. 
 
 Jussaume, Rene, interpreter, 182, 
 183, 190. 
 
 Kamchatka, Ledyard en route 
 for, 70, 71, 92. 
 
 Kaministiquia, post on Lake Su- 
 perior, 36, 45. 
 
 Kansas Indians, Pike among, 198. 
 
 — , crossed by Spanish explor- 
 ers, 9 ; by Pike, 200, 202. 
 
 — City (Mo.), 246; Fremont's 
 rendezvous, 232, 233, 239. 
 
 Kaskaskia Indians, in Philadel- 
 phia, 75. 
 
 — (111.), captured by Clark, 68 ; 
 military post, 90, 106, 109. 
 
 261 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Kearny, Stephen W. , in Califor- 
 nia, 241. 
 
 Keating, William H., Travels in 
 Interior of North America^ 
 216. 
 
 Kentucky, Genet's intrigue in, 
 77, 78 ; frontier posts, 96 ; 
 well settled, 210. 
 
 Kino, Father , Jesuit mis- 
 sionary, 13. 
 
 Knox, General Henry, promotes 
 Western exploration, 72, 73, 
 92. 
 
 — County (Nebr.), Lewis and 
 Clark in, 117. 
 
 Kootenay House, trading-post, 
 191. 
 
 Labiche, Francis, accompanies 
 
 Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 La Charette (Mo.), Lewis wishes 
 
 to winter at, 107; Boone's 
 
 settlement, 115 ; welcomes 
 
 Lewis and Clark, 185. 
 La Chine, La Salle's settlement, 
 
 22. 
 " Lady Washington," on North- 
 west Coast, 19. 
 La Harpe, Benard de, French 
 
 explorer, 64. 
 Lahontan, Armand Louis de 
 
 Delondarce, baron de, French 
 
 traveler, 63. 
 La Jemeraye, Christophe Dufros 
 
 de, French explorer, 2, 30. 
 La Jonquiere, Jacques Pierre de 
 
 Taffanel, marquis de, governor 
 
 of New France, 35. 
 La Junta (Colo.), Fremont near, 
 
 233. 
 
 Lake Athabasca, explorers on, 
 50, 55-57, 192. 
 
 — Cass, Pike on, 197. 
 
 — , Great Salt, 222, 245 ; basin 
 explored by Spanish, 16; by 
 Ashley, 218 ; by Fremont, 236, 
 238 ; Mormons on, 244. 
 
 — , Great Slave, fur-trade on, 
 55, 56. 
 
 — , Leech, Pike at, 197. 
 
 — , Little Salt, Fremont at, 238. 
 
 — Manitoba, 190; French post 
 on, 32. 
 
 — Nepigon, French explorations 
 on, 24 ; post on, 27. 
 
 — Pepin, French post on, 26. 
 — , Rainy, French on, 28, 190. 
 
 — Superior, discoverers of, 37; 
 French explorations near, 23, 
 25, 29, 40 ; trade on, 31, 45 ; 
 posts, 36, 53, 190; Carver at, 
 48, 49 ; waterways from, 28, 49, 
 53, 63, 191, 218; Fraser on, 
 194 ; Long, 216. 
 
 — Utah, discovered, 16, 238. 
 
 — Winnipeg, French on, 28, 30- 
 32, 190, 216. 
 
 — of the Woods, 28, 30, 32, 188, 
 189, 216 ; massacre upon, 31 ; 
 to be located by Lewis, 100. 
 
 La Libert^, , accompanies 
 
 Lewis and Clark, 111, 116, 117. 
 
 Lancaster (Pa.), Lewis at, 99. 
 
 Lander, F. W., railroad surveyor, 
 249. 
 
 La Perouse, Jean Francois de 
 Galaup, comte de, French ex- 
 plorer, 17. 
 
 La Perriere, Rene Boucher de, 
 French commandant, 26, 46. 
 
 262 
 
Index 
 
 La Salle, Robert Cavelier, sieur 
 de, at La Chine, 22 ; explores 
 Mississippi, 23. 
 
 Laussat, Pierre Clement, French 
 envoy, 90. 
 
 Leadville (Colo.), 214; Pike at, 
 204. 
 
 Leavenworth (Kans.), 246. See 
 also, Fort Leavenworth. 
 
 Ledyard, John, American ex- 
 plorer, 67, 69-72, 92; Journal 
 of Cook's voyage, 67, 69. 
 
 Lee, Rev. Jason, missionary, 224. 
 
 Lepage, Baptiste, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 
 Le Roux, , Canadian fur- 
 trader, 55, 56. 
 
 Lery, Gaspard Chaussegros de, 
 Canadian engineer, 29. 
 
 Lewis, Meriwether, early life, 
 95-99, 197; Jefferson's private 
 secretary, 95, 96, 98; receives 
 instructions for Western ex- 
 pedition, 86, 99-102 ; prepara- 
 tions, 98, 99; invites Clark, 
 102 ; winters at River Dubois, 
 91; at St. Louis, 109, 110; 
 witnesses transf erof Louisiana, 
 91, 109 ; joins expedition at St. 
 Charles, 112 ; letter to mother, 
 113 ; collects botanical speci- 
 mens, 114, 115 ; as physician, 
 116, 133, 170, 171; attitude 
 toward British, 128 ; concil- 
 iates Indians, 130, 154, 159, 
 183 ; accompanies hunters, 139 ; 
 adventures with a grizzly, 139, 
 140 ; helps navigation, 143 ; 
 discovers Great Falls of the 
 Mi«souri, 144 ; at Three Forks 
 
 of Missouri, 145 ; searches for 
 Indians, 148-151; spends soli- 
 tary night, 149 ; meets Indians, 
 151, 152; returns to Falls of 
 Missouri, 174-176 ; explores 
 Maria's River,176,177; quarrels 
 with Minitarees, 177 ; escapes 
 from Indians, 177, 178 ; wound- 
 ed, 178, 179 ; rejoins Clark, 179, 
 181 ; healed, 184 ; later life, 187 ; 
 temperament, 167; Jefferson's 
 tribute, 97, 98. 
 Lewis and Clark's expedition, 
 planned, 93-95 ; instructions, 
 99-102; recruiting, 106; per- 
 sonnel, 111,169; descends Ohio, 
 102, 105-107; winters at River 
 Dubois, 107-110; starts up 
 Missouri, 67, 110, 111; lives 
 upon country, 114; up the 
 Missouri, 111-128; adventures 
 with Indians, 121, 123 ; arrives 
 at Fort Mandan, 32. 126; op- 
 posed by traders, 128, 129 ; life 
 at Fort Mandan, 132-135 ; de- 
 serters returned, 135; leaves 
 Fort Mandan, 136 ; on Upper 
 Missouri, 137-145 ; provisions 
 cached, 144 ; portages, Falls of 
 Missouri, 144 ; at Three Forks 
 of Missouri, 145; up Jefferson 
 River, 145-150 ; at source of 
 Missouri, 151 ; crosses the 
 divide, 155-157; down the 
 Columbia, 157-161 ; reaches 
 tide- water, 159 ; reaches Pacific, 
 160, 161 ; winters at Fort Clat- 
 sop, 162-169; prepares for re- 
 turn, 168, 169 ; up the Columbia, 
 169-171 ; on Clearwater trail, 
 
 263 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 171; in camp on Clearwater, Lugtenberg, 
 172, 173 ; recrosses the moun- 63. 
 
 tains, 173, 174; divided, 174- 
 176 ; recruited, 179, 181 ; dressed 
 in skins, 181, 184; returns to 
 St. Louis, 181-187; welcomed, 
 185, 186 ; manuscript journals 
 cited, 105, 107, 110, 163, 164, 
 169, 179, 180, 186, 187 ; Biddle 
 narrative, 78, 97, 199. 
 Livingston, Robert R., minister 
 
 to France, 84-86. 
 Lolo trail, followed by Lewis and 
 
 Clark, 155-157, 174. 
 Long, Major Stephen H., 251; 
 seeks South Pass, 210 ; prepara- 
 tions, 211, 212; in Rockies, 
 213-215 ; return journey, 215 ; 
 later life, 216. 
 Long's Peak, 236; discovered, 213. 
 Loring, Colonel William W., ex- 
 plorer, 242. 
 Lotbiniere, Sir Henry Joli, 
 lieutenant-governor of British 
 Columbia, 18. 
 Louis XV, cedes Louisiana to 
 
 Spain, 81. 
 Louisiana, connected with Can- 
 ada, 40; ceded to Spain, 81; 
 retroceded to France, 81, 88; 
 purchased by United States, 
 85, 86, 105, 107, 189; transfer 
 of, 89, 90, 110, 112, 128 ; results 
 of purchase, 87, 88 ; population 
 of, 88; boundaries, 188, 189. 
 See also, Orleans Territory. 
 Louisville (Ky.), 103; military 
 
 post, 73. 
 Lower California, claimed by 
 Spain, 4, 11. 
 
 264 
 
 cartographer, 
 
 McClellan, Captain , trad- 
 ing expedition, 184. 
 
 Mackay, Alexander, companion 
 of Mackenzie, 58. 
 
 Mackenzie, Alexander, 92 ; organ- 
 izes X Y Company, 54 ; passion 
 for exploration, 55, 57 ; reaches 
 Arctic Ocean, 56, 57 ; returns, 
 57 ; in London, 57 ; seeks 
 Pacific Ocean, 58-60; returns? 
 60, 61 ; Voyages, 46, 56, 61. 
 
 MacKenzie, Charles, fur-trader, 
 128. 
 
 Mackinac, French post, 30, 31 ; 
 English post, 45, 47-49 ; head- 
 quarters for fur-trade, 53, 194, 
 195 ; Indian agent at, 218. 
 
 McLean County (N.Dak.), Lewis 
 and Clark in, 126. 
 
 McLeod, General Hugh, captured 
 by Spanish, 226. 
 
 McNeal, Hugh, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111, 151, 175. 
 
 McTavish, Simon, Canadian fur- 
 trader, 52, 54. 
 
 Madison, James, river named for, 
 145, 146. 
 
 Mail service, in far West, 245. 
 
 Maldonado, , Spanish ex- 
 plorer, 4. 
 
 Mallet, , French explorer, 64. 
 
 Mandan Indians, location, 115, 
 126; physiognomy of, 33; 
 visited by Verendrye, 32, 33 ; 
 by traders, 109, 128, 176; by 
 Lewis and Clark, 125-129, 131, 
 182 ; by Thompson, 190. 
 
Index 
 
 Manitoba, English fur-trade in, 
 45. 
 
 Many, Colonel James B. , explorer, 
 225. 
 
 Maps, drawn by Indians, 24, 28, 
 63 ; of North America, 63, 67. 
 
 Marbois. See Barbe-Marbois. 
 
 Marcy, Captain R. B., explorer, 
 249. 
 
 Marquette, Father Jacques, 
 French explorer, 23, 62; 
 Journals, 62. 
 
 Mather, Thomas, marks Santa 
 Fe trail, 216. 
 
 Maurepas, Jean Frederic Phelip- 
 peaux, marquis de, French 
 minister, 31. 
 
 Maximilian, Alexander Philipp, 
 Prince of Neuwied, Travels 
 in North America, 220. 
 
 Maxwell, , accompanies Fre- 
 mont, 231. 
 
 Meany, Prof. Edmund S., dedi- 
 cates monument at Nootka 
 Sound, 18. 
 
 Meek, Joseph, in Yellowstone 
 Park, 221. 
 
 Mesaiger, Father Charles Michel, 
 Jesuit missionary, 30. 
 
 Methodist missionaries, in Ore- 
 gon, 224. 
 
 Mexico, Spanish in, 2-18 ; annexa- 
 tion discussed, 234 ; withdraws 
 from California, 240, 244; 
 boundary of, 250. 
 
 Michaux, Andre, French botan- 
 ist, early life, 73-75; to ex- 
 plore West, 73-78, 93, 96 ; in- 
 structions for, 75-77 ; departs 
 for Kentucky, 77 ; becomes 
 
 Genet's agent, 77-79; later 
 
 life, 79, 80. 
 Middleton, Captain Christopher, 
 
 English navigator, 43. 
 Minitaree Indians, 146, 153, 177, 
 
 178, 183. See also, Grosventres. 
 Minneapolis (Minn.), site of, 48. 
 Minnesota, French post in, 26. 
 Missions, Spanish, in Southwest, 
 
 13; in California, 14, 17; 
 
 methods of, 14-16 ; French, 26. 
 Missouri, Fur Company, Pilch- 
 
 er's expedition, 219. 
 
 — Indians, visit Lewis and 
 Clark, 116. 
 
 — River Indians, intertribal 
 war, 73, 92, 134; trade de- 
 sired, 93, 100 ; to be studied, 
 100 ; feared, 110, 113 ; treaties 
 with, 219 ; Maximilian studies, 
 220. 
 
 Moncacht-Ape, legend concern- 
 ing, 65-67. 
 
 Monroe, James, American en- 
 voy, 82-85. 
 
 Monterey (Cal.), missions at, 14 ; 
 capital of California, 239, 240. 
 
 Montezuma, Aztec chief, alleges 
 existence of strait, 3-5. 
 
 Monticello (Va.), Jefferson's 
 home, 135. 
 
 Montreal, English merchants at, 
 44, 54, 67 ; captured, 46 ; Astor 
 at, 194 ; fur-trade expedition 
 from, 195. 
 
 Moqui Indians, visited by Span- 
 ish, 13. 
 
 Mormons, in Utah, 244. 
 
 Mosquitoes, wilderness pest, 56, 
 119, 120, 142, 149, 176, 181. 
 
 265 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Mount Hooker, Boss Cox at, 218. 
 Mulberry Hill, Clark's home- 
 stead, 103. 
 
 Napoleon, recovers Louisiana 
 for France, 81, 89 ; desires colo- 
 nial empire, 82; sells Louis- 
 iana, 84. 
 
 Narvaez, Panfilo, Spanish ex- 
 plorer, 6, 7. 
 
 Natchez (Mies.), home of Dun- 
 bar, 199. 
 
 Natchitoches (La.), limit of 
 Southwest settlement, 199, 200, 
 208. 
 
 Nebraska, plains of, 202; In- 
 dians, 200. 
 
 New France. See Canada. 
 
 — Galicia, Mexican province, 
 10. 
 
 — Mexico, 209; explored by 
 Spanish, 6-10, 12, 13; settled 
 by Spanish, 13; missions in, 
 13 ; capital, 199 ; American 
 spy in, 206; conquered by 
 Americans, 241 ; mail service 
 to, 245 ; railways through, 248, 
 249. 
 
 — Orleans, goal of Genet's in- 
 trigue, 78 ; ceded to Spain, 81 ; 
 retroceded to France, 81, 82; 
 abandoned French expedition 
 to, 82 ; key to Mississippi Val- 
 ley, 82 ; American attempts 
 to purchase, 83, 84 ; Spanish 
 officers at, 88; transferred to 
 United States, 89, 90. 
 
 — Spain. See Mexico. 
 
 — York City, fur-trade expe- 
 ditions from, 195. 
 
 Newman, John, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111, 125, 135. 
 
 Nez Perces Indians, met by 
 Lewis and Clark, 171, 172; 
 reservation, 172. See also, 
 Chopunnish. 
 
 Nicolet, Jean, discovers Wiscon- 
 sin, 4, 5, 22, 23. 
 
 Nicollet, J. N., discovers source 
 of Mississippi, 226, 227, 230. 
 
 Niza, Marcos de, Spanish ex- 
 plorer, 5. 
 
 Nootka Sound, location, 18 ; epi- 
 sode at, 18 ; Americans on, 21. 
 
 North America, width, 22, 23, 
 47 ; maps of, 63 ; controlled by 
 British, 44 ; northern crossing, 
 60 ; crossed by Americans, 161, 
 190-192, 224, 225, 228, 236; 
 by railways, 248, 249 ; spanned 
 by settlement, 250-252. 
 
 — Carolina, provincial governor 
 of, 44. 
 
 — West Company, formed, 52, 
 53, 67; rivalry with X Y 
 
 Company, 54 ; with Hudson's 
 Bay Company, 53, 57, 128 
 with Americans, 195, 196 
 among Mandans, 128, 132 
 employs Thompson, 190-192, 
 195 ; unites with X Y Com- 
 pany, 191 ; with Hudson's Bay 
 Company, 209; employs Fraser, 
 192; territory, 194,197. 
 
 Northern Pacific Railway, 248. 
 
 Northwest Coast, explored, 16- 
 21 ; fur-trade of, 70, 165, 194, 
 195. 
 
 — Passage, origin of theory, 
 1 ; sought by French, 2, 24 ; by 
 
 266 
 
Index 
 
 John Smith, 2 ; Hudson, 3 ; 
 
 Spanish, 10-12; English, 10, 
 
 16, 17, 41-44, 47; revival of 
 
 interest in, 67. 
 Northwest Territory (U. S.), 
 
 Harrison's governorship, 186. 
 Nuttall, Thomas, botanist, 224. 
 
 Ochagach, draws map for Ver- 
 endrye, 28. 
 
 O'Fallon, Major Benjamin, In- 
 dian commissioner, 219. 
 
 Ohio, frontier posts in, 96. 
 
 Oklahoma, crossed by Spanish 
 explorers, 7. 
 
 Omaha Indians, Lewis and Clark 
 among, 116. 
 
 — , stage line from, 213. 
 
 Ofiate, Juan de, invades New 
 Mexico, 13. 
 
 Ordway, Sergeant John, accom- 
 panies Lewis and Clark, 111, 
 175. 
 
 Oregon, visited by traders, 19, 
 209 ; first white women in, 225 ; 
 explored by Wilkes, 226 ; set- 
 tlers in, 228, 229, 236; title 
 undecided, 229, 230; a terri- 
 tory, 230, 249; Fremont in, 
 236, 240. See also, Lewis and 
 Clark, Wyeth, and Whitman. 
 
 Orleans, territory of, Indians in, 
 199. See also, Louisiana. 
 
 Osage Indians, location, 200; 
 accompany Pike, 198. 
 
 Oto Indians, visit Lewis and 
 Clark, 116. 
 
 Pacific Fur Company, or- 
 ganized, 195 ; purchased, 196. 
 
 Pacific Ocean, discovered by Bal- 
 boa, 3 ; Spanish explorations 
 of American coast, 3, 4, 10-12, 
 16-18 ; sought by French, 22- 
 36, 40 ; English on, 12, 16-20, 
 58-60 ; reward for discovery 
 of, 43 ; reached by Lewis and 
 Clark, 161. 
 
 Panthers, killed by Lewis and 
 Clark, 148. 
 
 Parke, Lieutenant J. G., gov- 
 ernment surveyor, 249, 250. 
 
 Pattie, James O., fur-trader, 220, 
 221. 
 
 Pawnee Indians, met by ex- 
 plorers, 64,200, 201, 205, 212, 
 213, 225. 
 
 Peale's Museum, Philadelphia, 
 Lewis and Clark's specimens 
 in, 135. 
 
 Pennsylvania, frontier posts in, 
 96; Whisky Rebellion, 96. ^ 
 
 Perez, Juan, Spanish explorer, 
 16. 
 
 Philippine Islands, Spanish in, 
 11. 
 
 Pike, Zebulon M., 251 ; early life, 
 
 196, 197 ; explores Mississippi, 
 
 197, 198 ; conciliates Indians, 
 198 ; Southwest expedition, 
 184, 200 ; among Pawnees, 201 ; 
 among Rockies, 201-205 ; on 
 Rio Grande, 205, 206 ; arrested 
 by Spaniards, 206-208 ; sent 
 home, 208 ; Journals, 204, 208. 
 
 Pike's Peak, 203, 204 ; ascended, 
 213 ; country of, 246, 247. 
 
 Pilcher, Joshua, fur-trader, 219, 
 220. 
 
 Pilgrim Fathers, at Plymouth, 3. 
 
 267 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Pittsburg, Lewis at, 102, 105, 
 106; Long, 211, 216. 
 
 Polk, James K., remits Fre- 
 mont's penalty, 241. 
 
 Pope, Captain John, surveys rail- 
 way route, 248. 
 
 Portage la Prairie, French post, 
 32. 
 
 Portuguese, on Northwest Coast, 
 20. 
 
 Potawatomi Indians, hold cap- 
 tive Osages, 198. 
 
 Potts, John, accompanies Lewis 
 and Clark, 111. 
 
 Prairie dogs, seen by Lewis and 
 Clark, 118. 
 
 — du Chien (Wis.), explorers at, 
 48, 197, 216. 
 
 Preuss, Charles, accompanies 
 Fremont, 231, 232. 
 
 Prickly-pears, pest to explorers, 
 142, 148. 
 
 Pryor, Sergeant Nathaniel, ac- 
 companies Lewis and Clark, 
 111, 175, 176, 179. 
 
 Pueblo (Colo.), 214, 248 ; Pike at, 
 203. 
 
 Puget Sound, explorations on, 
 247, 249. 
 
 Quadra. See Cuadra. 
 
 Quatrefages de Breau, Jean 
 Louis Armand de, French nat- 
 uralist, 67. 
 
 Quebec, capital of New France, 
 27 ; English merohants at, 44. 
 
 Quesnel, , fur-trader, 193. 
 
 Radisson, Pierre d'Esprit, sieur, 
 explorer, 37. 
 
 Railways, routes for transconti- 
 nental lines, 247-249. 
 
 Rattlesnakes, on Missouri, 142 ; 
 on Jefferson River, 150. 
 
 Raynolds, Captain W. F., ex- 
 plores Yellowstone Park, 249. 
 
 Reed, M. B., deserts Lewis and 
 Clark, 116, 117; returned to 
 St. Louis, 111, 135. 
 
 Reeves, Benjamin, marks Santa 
 Fe trail, 217. 
 
 Republicans, favor Louisiana 
 Purchase, 86, 87. 
 
 Review of Reviews, cited, 78, 88. 
 
 Revue oV Anthropologic, cited, 67. 
 
 Ricarees. See Arikaras. 
 
 Rio Grande, explored by Span- 
 ish, 10, 12; Pike on, 205, 
 206 ; surveyed, 241, 250. 
 
 River, Arkansas, French explor- 
 ers on, 64, 65 ; Pike, 184, 198, 
 201-204 ; Wilkinson, 202 ; Bell, 
 215; Dodge, 225; Fremont, 
 239; waterway to West, 246; 
 colonists on, 203 ; sources dis- 
 covered, 213-216; gorge of, 
 214. 
 
 — , Assiniboin, 28, 32, 53, 128, 
 190 ; British posts on, 176, 181. 
 
 — , Athabasca, Cox on, 218 ; Pil- 
 cher, 220. 
 
 — , Big Blue, Fremont ascends, 
 231. 
 
 — , Big Horn, Clark reaches, 180. 
 
 — , Big Wichita, explored, 249. 
 
 — , Bear, Fremont on, 236. 
 
 — , Black, Dunbar and Hunter 
 on, 199. 
 
 — , Bois Brule, Allen and School- 
 craft on, 218. 
 
 268 
 
Index 
 
 River, Brazos, explored, 249. 
 
 — , Cache-a-la-Poudre, Fremont 
 on, 236. 
 
 — , Canadian, Long on, 215; 
 Dodge, 225. 
 
 — , Cannon Ball, Clark on, 135. 
 
 — , Chippewa (Wis.), explored, 48. 
 
 — , Churchill, British post on, 50. 
 
 — , Clark, Lewis on, 181. 
 
 — , Clearwater, Lewis and Clark 
 on, 155-157, 171-173. 
 
 — , Colorado, grand cafion of, 10 ; j 
 explored by Spanish, 10, 31 ; 
 missions on, 13 ; Pattie, 221. 
 
 — , Columbia, width, 160 ; nar- 
 rows, 159 ; cascades, 162 ; rap- 
 ids, 170 ; mouth explored, 16, 
 18, 19 ; named, 19 ; sources 
 sought, 48 ; surveyed, 226 ; 
 Lewis and Clark on, 157-161, 
 169-171 ; explored by English, 
 162, 191, 192, 195 ; Astoria on, 
 195 ; Cox, 218 ; Bonneville, 222; 
 Fremont, 236. 
 
 — , Conejos, Pike on, 206. 
 
 — , Coppermine, Hearne on, 50, 
 55. 
 
 — , Dubois, location, 107 ; Lewis 
 and Clark winter at, 91, 108- 
 110. 
 
 — , Elk (Minn.), explored, 48. 
 
 — , Fox (Wis.), Carver on, 47, 
 48. 
 
 — , Fraser, (Tacouche Tesse), ex- 
 plored by Mackenzie, 59; by 
 Fraser, 193. 
 
 — , Gallatin, Lewis and Clark on, 
 146, 179. 
 
 — , Gila, explored by Spanish, 10, 
 12 ; missions on, 13. 
 
 River, Grand, fort near, 64. 
 
 — , Green, Ashley on, 218; Pil- 
 cher, 219. 
 
 — , Hudson, supposed route to 
 Western Ocean, 3, 41. 
 
 — , Jacque, fur-trade on, 183. 
 
 — , James, John Smith on, 2. 
 
 — , Jefferson, named, 145; naviga- 
 tion of, 147, 148, 150 ; forks of, 
 149, 150; head, 179. 
 
 — , Kansas, Lewis and Clark at, 
 119 ; Fre'mont ascends, 231. 
 
 — , Knife, Lewis and Clark at, 126. 
 
 — , Lachsa, Lewis and Clark on, 
 155. 
 
 — , Leech, Pike on, 197. 
 
 — , Lemhi, Lewis and Clark on, 
 152-154. 
 
 — , Lewis, Thompson on, 192. 
 
 — , Little, Many at, 225. 
 
 — , Little Platte, Fort Leaven- 
 worth near, 219. 
 
 — , Little Sioux (Petite River de 
 Secoux), Lewis and Clark at, 
 183. 
 
 — , Mackenzie, discovered, 56. 
 
 — , Madison, named, 145, 146. 
 
 — , Maria, named, 143, 144 ; ex- 
 plored, 175-177. 
 
 — , Minnesota. See St. Peter' a 
 
 — , Mississippi, heard of by 
 Nicolet, 4, 5 ; explored by 
 French, 2, 23, 41, 62 ; French 
 post on, 26 ; Carver on, 48 ; 
 free navigation desired, 83, 
 188 ; military posts on, 106 ; 
 explored by Pike, 197, 198; 
 Long ascends, 216 ; source un- 
 known, 100, 188, 190, 197; 
 source explored, 218 ; source 
 
 269 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 discovered, 226, 227,230; Eng- 
 lish acquire source, 44. 
 
 River, Missouri, source of, 151 ; 
 forks, 143-146, 179; falls, 144, 
 174-176 ; Indians, 32, 33, 146, 
 190; known to whites, 137; 
 difficulties of navigation, 112; 
 114, 142, 178, 212 ; Spanish on, 
 10 ; French, 26, 46, 63-65, 109 ; 
 path to Pacific, 63-67, 92, 97 ; 
 American explorations planned, 
 72-78 ; Lewis and Clark on, 
 109-152, 174-186; Astorians, 
 195; Long, 211, 212; Ashley, 
 219; Pilcher, 220; Warren, 
 249 ; fur-trade posts, 221 ; early 
 settlements on, 64, 76, 112, 115, 
 210 ; emigration to, 203, 216, 
 228, 244, 245. 
 
 — , Ohio, Lewis and Clark on, 102, 
 105-107 ; Long, 211 ; military 
 posts, 106. 
 
 — , Osage, Lewis and Olark at, 
 119 ; Pike on, 200. 
 
 — , Ottawa, Fraser on, 194. 
 
 — , Pawnee, Wilkinson on, 201, 
 202. 
 
 — , Peace, Mackenzie on, 58, 60 ; 
 Fraser, 191. 
 
 — , Philanthropy, named, 150. 
 
 — , Pigeon, route to West, 28, 49, 
 53. 
 
 — , Platte, empties into Mis- 
 souri, 114, 211 ; flows from 
 Rockies, 210 ; Indians of, 205 ; 
 early explorers on, 64; Lewis 
 and Clark at, 116, 119, 184; 
 Long ascends, 212, 213 ; Fre- 
 mont on, 236, 238; fur-trade 
 posts, 221, 236 ; emigration to, 
 
 203; waterway to West, 225, 
 231, 246, 249. 
 
 River, Potomac, supposed route 
 to South Sea, 3, 41. 
 
 — , Pullman's Fork, of Platte, 
 Fremont on, 238. 
 
 — , Rainy, Verendrye on, 28, 30 ; 
 Long, 216. 
 
 — , Red (North) ,191, 193, 216,220. 
 
 — , Red (South), early explorers 
 on, 199, 200 ; attempts to dis- 
 cover sources, 184, 198, 204, 
 211, 215, 216, 225, 226. 
 
 — , Republican, Pike on, 200. 
 
 — , Roanoke, supposed route to 
 South Sea, 3, 41. 
 
 — , Sacramento, explored, 226» 
 236, 240, 244. 
 
 — , St. Croix (Wis.), 48 ; Carver 
 on, 48 ; Allen and Schoolcraft, 
 218 
 
 — , St. Louis (Lake Superior), 
 Thompson on, 191 ; Allen and 
 Schoolcraft, 218. 
 
 — , St. Peter's (Minn.), ex- 
 plored, 48, 216. 
 
 — , Saguenay, Michaux on, 74. 
 
 — , San Joaquin, Fremont at, 
 238. 
 
 — , Saskatchewan, 32, 35, 190, 
 220 ; French post on, 35, 40, 
 46 ; English explore, 46, 53 ; 
 Thompson on, 191, 192. 
 
 — , Savannah, explored by Mi- 
 chaux, 74. 
 
 — , Sioux, Lewis and Clark at, 
 119. 
 
 — , Slave, Mackenzie on, 58. 
 
 — , Smoky Hill, emigration to, 
 246. 
 
 270 
 
Index 
 
 River, Snake, Mackenzie on, 56 ; 
 Methodist missionaries, 224. 
 
 — , Spokane, explored, 226. 
 
 . — , Tacouche Tesse. See Fraser. 
 
 — , Teton, Lewis and Clark at, 
 122. 
 
 — , Turtle, Pike at, 197. 
 
 — , Vermilion, Lewis and Clark 
 at, 183. 
 
 — , Walla Walla, Lewis and 
 Clark at, 171 ; as a survey 
 point, 226. 
 
 — , Washita, Dunbar and Hunter 
 at, 200, 216; Long, 211, 216. 
 
 — , White, Lewis and Clark at, 
 119. 
 
 — , Willamette, early settlers on, 
 224-226, 228. 
 
 — , Winnipeg, Verendrye on, 31, 
 32 ; Long, 216. 
 
 — , Wisconsin, Carver on, 48. 
 
 — , Wisdom, named, 150. 
 
 — , Yellowstone, 178 ; mouth of, 
 137; Lewis and Clark at, 
 137 ; Clark on, 175, 176, 178- 
 181 ; Ashley near, 219 ; recon- 
 naissance of, 249. 
 
 Robinson, Dr. John H., accom- 
 panies Pike, 200 ; at Santa Fe, 
 206 ; sent home, 208. 
 
 Rocky Mountains, snow on, 168, 
 172, 174, 204, 205 ; first seen, 
 34; desire for path through, 
 92, 191 ; crossed by Lewis and 
 Clark, 155 - 157, 173, 174 ; 
 Thompson, 191, 192; Fraser, 
 193; Pike among, 203-205; 
 Long visits, 213-215 ; crossed by 
 Cox, 218 ; explored by Fre- 
 mont, 232, 236-239, 241; crossed 
 
 by early settlers, 225 , 228 ; 
 
 passes generally known, 242, 
 
 243 ; railway surveys, 248, 249 ; 
 
 as boundary of Louisiana, 189 ; 
 
 summer resorts of, 205. 
 Rocky Mountain Fur Company, 
 
 218. 
 Rupert's Land, location, 38. 
 Russia, explores Northwest 
 
 Coast, 16, 17 ; Ledyard in, 70- 
 
 72, 92. 
 Russian Fur Company, Astor 
 
 conciliates, 195. 
 
 Sacajawea (bird woman), cap- 
 tured, 146, 153 ; guide and in- 
 terpreter to Lewis and Clark, 
 111, 130, 146, 147, 153, 179; 
 birth of son, 135 ; meets broth- 
 er, 153 ; returns to Mandans, 
 182. 
 
 Sacramento (Cal.), Fremont at, 
 242. 
 
 St. Charles (Mo.), Boone settles 
 near, 89 ; Lewis and Clark at, 
 112, 185, 186. 
 
 St. Clair, General Arthur, gov- 
 ernor of Northwest Territory, 
 73. 
 
 St. Joseph (Mo.), emigration cen- 
 ter, 245. 
 
 St. Louis, Spanish at, 88, 107, 
 212 ; surrendered to United 
 States, 90, 91, 110, 112 ; visited 
 by Lewis, 109, 110 ; fur-traders 
 at, 109, 115, 183, 220, 221, 223 ; 
 citizens of, 112; welcomes 
 Lewis and Clark, 186 ; Pike's 
 expedition from, 197 ; Fre'mont 
 in, 232 ; mail service from, 245. 
 
 271 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 St. Paul (Minn.), railway from, 
 247. 
 
 St. Pierre, Legardeur, French 
 explorer, 35, 36, 40. 
 
 Salcedo, , governor of Mex- 
 ico, 208. 
 
 Salish Indians, meet Lewis and 
 Clark, 165. 
 
 Salmon, as article of commerce, 
 165, 170. 
 
 Salt, made by Lewis and Clark, 
 163, 164. 
 
 — Lake City, railway route to, 
 248. 
 
 Salvatierra, Father , Jesuit 
 
 missionary, 13. 
 San Antonio, Mexican province, 
 
 208. 
 San Diego, missions at, 14. 
 San Fernando de Taos, road 
 
 from, 217 ; Kit Carson's home, 
 
 231. 
 San Francisco, missions at, 14 ; 
 
 Americans, 245. 
 San Jose (Cal.), railway from, 
 
 249. 
 San Luis Valley, Pike in, 205. 
 Sand Hill pass, Pike on, 205. 
 Sangre de Cristo Range, Pike 
 
 crosses, 205. 
 Santa Fe, 199, 217, 241 ; built by 
 
 Spanish, 13 ; visited by French, 
 
 64 ; trading expedition to, 184 ; 
 
 Robinson at, 206; Pike, 207, 
 
 208 ; caravan to, 226. 
 
 — trail, 225, 233, 235, 245; 
 Pike searches for, 205 ; sur- 
 veyed, 217. 
 
 Santo Domingo, French expedi- 
 tion to, 82. 
 
 Sault Ste. Marie, Henry at, 45 ; 
 Long, 216. 
 
 Schoolcraft, Henry R., explora- 
 tions of, 218. 
 
 Scotch, in fur-trade, 45, 127. 
 
 Scott, General Charles, expedition 
 of, 103. 
 
 Sea-otters, on Columbia, 160. 
 
 Seattle (Wash.), Post- Intelligen- 
 cer, 18. 
 
 Se'moulin, de, Russian am- 
 bassador, coop«rates with Jef- 
 ferson, 70. 
 
 Serro, Father Junipero, Francis- 
 can missionary, 14. 
 
 Shannon, George, accompanies 
 Lewis and Clark, 111, 121. 
 
 Shelby, Isaac, governor of Ken- 
 tucky, 77. 
 
 Shields, John, accompanies Lewis 
 and Clark, 111, 151. 
 
 Shoshoni Indians. See Snake. 
 
 Sibley, George C, marks Santa 
 Fe trail, 217. 
 
 — Dr. John, explores Red River, 
 199. 
 
 Sierras, crossed, 222; Fremont 
 among, 236-239 ; railways over, 
 248, 249. 
 
 Sioux Indians, 176, 183, 197; fond 
 of liquor, 122, 125; French posts 
 among, 26, 30; massacre 
 French, 31 ; English among, 
 48 ; Dourion, 115, 117 ; visit 
 Lewis and Clark, 117, 118; 
 Clark's account of, 118; hostile, 
 122, 123, 131, 135. See also, 
 Tetons. 
 
 — City (la.), Floyd dies near, 
 117. 
 
 272 
 
Index 
 
 Sitka, Spanish explorers near, 
 16. 
 
 Six Nations (Iroquois), visited by 
 Ledyard, 69. 
 
 Smith, John, seeks South Sea, 
 2. 
 
 Snake (Shoshoni) Indians, 
 sought, 146, 148 ; met, 151, 152 ; 
 aid Lewis and Clark, 153, 154 ; 
 feared by Columbia River na- 
 tives, 159. 
 
 South Pass, 218, 249; sought, 
 210; discovered, 212, 213; 
 Bonneville crosses, 222 ; Fre- 
 mont, 231-233 ; missionaries, 
 225 ; popular, 230. 
 
 — Sea, sought by Spanish, 3, 
 5 ; by French, 2, 5, 23. See 
 also, Pacific Ocean. 
 
 — West Company, organized, 
 194. 
 
 Southern Overland Mail Com- 
 pany, organized, 245. 
 
 — Pacific Railway, surveyed, 
 248. 
 
 Southwest Point, military post, 
 106. 
 
 Spain, interests in South Sea, 11 ; 
 conquers Mexico, 2; explores 
 Southwest interior, 2, 4, 10, 16 ; 
 claims Lower California, 4, 11 ; 
 explores Northwest Coast, 3, 
 4, 10-12, 16-18; establishes 
 missions, 12-16; in Missouri 
 Valley, 64 ; possesses Louisi- 
 ana, 68, 81, 94 ; cedes Louisiana 
 to Napoleon, 81, 82, 88; denies 
 navigation of Mississippi, 83 ; 
 holds purchase of Louisiana 
 void, 89. 
 
 Spalding, H. H. , missionary to 
 Oregon, 225. 
 
 Spaniards, Clark's mission to, 
 104; incite Indians against 
 Americans, 201 ; arrest Pike, 
 206-208 ; McLeod, 226. 
 
 Spanish Peaks, seen by Pike, 203. 
 
 Sparks, Captain , explorer, 
 
 200, 206. 
 
 Sparks, Jared, American Biog- 
 raphy, 72, 
 
 Spokane (Wash.), British post 
 at, 192,196. 
 
 Squirrels, on Missouri, 118. 
 
 Stanbury, Captain H., explorer, 
 
 tanp 
 2& 
 
 Steamboats, on Western waters, 
 
 211. 
 Steptoe, Colonel Edward J., ex- 
 plorer, 249. 
 Stevens, Isaac Ingalls, railway 
 
 surveyor, 247, 248. 
 Stockton, Commodore Robert F. , 
 
 in California, 240, 241. 
 Stoddard, Captain Amos, receives 
 
 surrender of Upper Louisiana, 
 
 90, 91, 112. 
 Strait, Bering's, discovered, 66. 
 — , Hudson, supposed route to 
 
 Northwest Passage, 41. 
 Straits of Anian, 63 ; discovered 
 
 by Drake, 47-49. See also, 
 
 Northwest Passage. 
 Stuart, John, fur-trader, 192- 
 
 194. 
 Sublette, William L., fur-trader, 
 
 221. 
 Sutter, Captain John Augustus, 
 
 in California, 236, 238. 
 Swans (wild), on Missouri, 119. 
 
 273 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Tallbtband-Peeigord, 
 Charles Maurice de, French 
 minister, connection with 
 Louisiana Purchase, 82, 83. 
 
 Tennessee, settlements multiply- 
 ing, 210. 
 
 Teton Indians, annoy Lewis and 
 Clark, 122, 123, 183. 
 
 Texas Indians, missions among, 
 13. 
 
 — , crossed by Spanish ex- 
 plorers, 7 ; acquired by United 
 States, 87. 
 
 Thompson, David, explorer, 189- 
 192, 195, 196. 
 
 — , John P. , accompanies Lewis 
 and Clark, 111, 175. 
 
 Thorn-trees, harass travelers, 
 148. 
 
 Three Rivers (Canada), Veren- 
 drye from, 27. 
 
 Thwaites, Reuben G., Jesuit Re- 
 lations, 62. 
 
 Tiger-cats, on Upper Missouri, 
 142. 
 
 Tobacco, on Lewis and Clark ex- 
 pedition, 165, 183. 
 
 Townsend, John Kirk, natural- 
 ist, 224, 225. 
 
 Treaties, of Greenville (1795), 
 104; Guadalupe Hidalgo (1848), 
 244; Jay (1794), 188, 194; 
 Paris (1763), 44, 81 ; Paris 
 (1783), 188; St. Ildefonso 
 (1762), 81, 82, 89; Webster- 
 Ashburton (1846), 189, 230. 
 
 Turkeys (wild), on Missouri, 118, 
 119. 
 
 Turner, Dr. Frederick J., " Cor- 
 respondence of Clark and 
 
 Genet," 78; " Significance of 
 Louisiana Purchase," 78, 87, 88. 
 Twisted Hair, Chopunnish chief, 
 157, 171, 172. 
 
 Union Pacific Railway, route 
 surveyed, 213, 248. 
 
 United States, northwest bound- 
 ary of, 188, 189, 250 ; southwest 
 boundary, 198, 199, 250 ; secures 
 Oregon, 230; California, 240; 
 Florida, 87 ; Louisiana, 90. 
 
 Upper Louisiana, transferred to 
 United States, 91, 109, 110, 
 112. 
 
 Utah, Mormons in, 244. 
 
 Vaca, Cabeza de, Spanish ex- 
 plorer, 6-8. 
 
 Vancouver, George, English ex- 
 plorer, 18, 20, 162. 
 
 — Island, 18. 
 
 Vaudreuil, Pierre Rigaud, mar- 
 quis de, governor of New 
 France, 24, 25. 
 
 V^rendrye, Pierre Gaultier de 
 Varenne de la, French ex- 
 plorer, 40, 190 ; early life, 27 ; 
 authorized to explore, 28, 29 ; 
 first expedition, 29-31 ; chain 
 of posts, 31, 32; searches for 
 Pacific, 32, 33; death, 34. 
 
 Verendrye, Pierre, chevalier de 
 la, sees Rockies, 33, 34 ; ascends 
 Saskatchewan, 35 ; dispos- 
 sessed, 35. 
 
 Vincennes (Ind.), 186; captured 
 by Clark, 68. 
 
 Vizcaino, Sebastian, Spanish ex- 
 plorer, 11, 12. 
 
 274 
 
Index 
 
 Voorhis, Julia Clark, owns Clark 
 manuscripts, 169, 187. 
 
 Walker, I. R., explorer, 222. 
 
 Walla Walla (Wash.), road to, 
 249. 
 
 War of 1812-15, effect on fur- 
 trade, 196. 
 
 Warner, Captain W. H. , explorer, 
 242. 
 
 Warren, Lieutenant G. K., ex- 
 plorer, 249. 
 
 Washington, George, subscribes 
 for Western exploration, 75; 
 opposes Genet's intrigue, 78. 
 
 — (D. C), Indians at, 183, 198; 
 Long, 212 ; Fremont, 230, 231,. 
 234, 235, 241. 
 
 — Territory, explorations in, 19, 
 226, 247, 249 
 
 — University State Historical 
 Society, monument to Cuadra, 
 18. 
 
 Wayne, General Anthony, Clark 
 
 serves with, 103, 104. 
 Weippe Weeipe plain, Lewis 
 
 and Clark on, 155, 156, 173, 
 
 174. 
 Werner, William, accompanies 
 
 Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 West Indies, discovered by 
 
 Columbus, 1, 2; American 
 
 trade with, 20. 
 " Western Engineer," Long's 
 
 steamer, 211, 212. 
 
 — Ocean, sought by Hudson, 3. 
 See also, Pacific and South 
 Sea. 
 
 Whipple, Captain A. W., sur- 
 veyor, 248, 250. 
 
 Whisky Rebellion, Lewis in, 96. 
 Whitehouse, Joseph, accompanies 
 
 Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 Whitman, Marcus, in Oregon, 
 
 225, 228. 
 Wichita Range, Dodge at, 225. 
 Wilkes, Charles, in Oregon, 226. 
 Wilkinson, General James, com- 
 missioner to Louisiana, 90; 
 
 despatches Pike, 197, 198. 
 — , Lieutenant James B. , accom- 
 panies Pike, 200, 202. 
 Willard, Alexander, accompanies 
 
 Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 William I, German emperor, 
 
 decides boundary controversy, 
 
 189. 
 Williamson, Lieutenant R. W., 
 
 surveys railway, 249. 
 Wind River Range, seen by 
 
 Verendrye, 34; Fremont in, 
 
 232. 
 Windsor, Richard, accompanies 
 
 Lewis and Clark, 111. 
 Winnipeg, French at, 32, 49, 53. 
 Wisconsin, Indians of, 26; 
 
 Nicolet in, 22. 
 — Historical Society library, 68. 
 Wiser, Peter, accompanies Lewis 
 
 and Clark, 111. 
 Wistar, Dr. Caspar, letter from 
 
 Jefferson, 98, 99. 
 Wolfe, General James, captures 
 
 Quebec, 46. 
 Wolves, on Missouri, 118, 119 ; on 
 
 Yellowstone, 181. 
 Wood, Maria, river named for, 
 
 143, 144. 
 Worrall, Lieutenant Stephen, 
 
 escorts officers, 91. 
 
 19 
 
 275 
 
Rocky Mountain Exploration 
 
 Wyeth, Nathaniel J., expedition 
 to Oregon, 223-235. 
 
 X Y Company, rivals North 
 West Company, 64 ; absorbed, 
 191. 
 
 Yakon Indians, seen by Lewis 
 
 and Clark, 165. 
 Yankton Indians, fur-trade with, 
 
 183, 198. 
 Yellowstone National Park, 34; 
 
 discovered, 182, 221 ; govern- 
 ment expedition to, 249. 
 
 York, Duke of, in Hudson's 
 Bay Company, 37. 
 
 — , negro servant of Clark, 107, 
 111, 124, 134, 159, 175, 179. 
 
 Yosemite Valley, discovered, 222. 
 
 Young, Brigham, Mormon leader, 
 244. 
 
 Zuni Indians, visited by Span- 
 ish, 13. 
 
 (1) 
 
 THE END 
 
 276 
 
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 rative of what he himself saw and learned during his recent visit 
 to South Africa. . . . The only criticism of it will be that 
 which Sam Weller passed on his own love letter, that the reader 
 'will wish there was more of it* — which is the great art of 
 letter- writing and of book- writing. ' ' — New York World. 
 
 "The first systematic and categorical exposition of the 
 merits of the whole case and its origins written by a disinterested 
 observer. . . . An informing book, and a well-written one. ,, — 
 New York Mail and Express. 
 
 " Gives precisely the information necessary to those who 
 desire to follow intelligently the progress of events at the present 
 time.' ' — New York Commercial Advertiser, 
 
 The Boers in War. 
 
 The True Story of the Burghers in the Field. 
 Elaborately illustrated with Photographs by the 
 Author and Others. Uniform with " Oom Paul's 
 People." i2mo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 "A book of even wider interest than 'Oom Paul's People.' 
 A most novel and curious account of a military form that has 
 never been duplicated in modern times ; exceptionally interesting. 
 Mr. Hillegas has given us beyond question the best account yet 
 published. ' ' — Brooklyn Eagle. 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 016 099 690 
 
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