[Sidenote: =A vast unexplored country=]
[Sidenote: =Gray visits the Pacific=]
=118. Discovery of the Columbia River.= The purchase of the Louisiana
territory by Jefferson opened up a great new field for settlers. It
was necessary to know something about the new territory. It was a
vast unexplored country stretching from the Mississippi River to the
Rockies. The Pacific shore had already been visited by explorers.
Boston merchants had sent Captain Robert Gray to the Pacific coast to
buy furs of the Indians. He did not try to find an overland route,
but sailed around South America and up the coast to Vancouver Island,
where he obtained a rich cargo of furs. He then made his way across
the Pacific to China, and came back to Boston by way of the Cape of
Good Hope--the first American to carry the Stars and Stripes around the
world.
[Sidenote: =Discovers the mouth of the Columbia=]
On a second voyage to the same region, in the good ship _Columbia_,
Gray discovered the mouth of a great river (1792). Up this river he
went for nearly thirty miles, probably the first white man to sail upon
its waters. Captain Gray named the river the Columbia after his vessel.
The Indians had called it the Oregon.
=119. The Lewis and Clark Expedition.= The next important step in
finding a route to the Oregon country was the great expedition
undertaken while Thomas Jefferson was yet president.
[Sidenote: =Expedition leaves St. Louis=]
Lewis and Clark were two young men chosen by Jefferson to explore the
region known as the Louisiana Purchase and to make their way across the
Rocky Mountains to the Oregon country and to the Pacific. They chose
forty-two men to go with them--some as soldiers, others as servants,
and still others as hunters. From the little French village of St.
Louis they began their adventurous journey in boats in the spring of
1804.
[Illustration: CAPTAIN MERIWETHER LEWIS
_From the original painting by Charles Wilson Peale in Independence
Hall, Philadelphia_]
Up the Missouri River they slowly made their way against the current of
the muddy, rushing stream. At one time it was so swift that they could
not force boats against it, and at another time the brushwood that came
down the river broke their oars.
[Sidenote: =Smoked the "pipe of peace"=]
Near where the city of Council Bluffs now stands, Lewis and Clark held
a great meeting with the Indians. They told the Indians that the people
of the United States and not the people of France were now the owners
of this great land. Together they smoked the "pipe of peace," and the
Indians promised to be friendly.
On they went till the region near the Black Hills was reached. It was
the fall of the year and the trees were bright with color, and the
wild ducks and geese in large numbers were seen going southward.
[Sidenote: =Spent the winter with the Indians=]
The company spent the winter on an island sixteen hundred miles from
St. Louis. The men built rude homes and fortified them. The Indians
were friendly and the explorers spent many evenings around the wigwam
fires listening to stories of the country the Indians had to tell them.
[Sidenote: =The Rocky Mountains=]
In the spring they bade the Indians good-by, passed the mouth of the
Yellowstone, and traveled on till the Rocky Mountains with their long
rows of snow-covered peaks came into view.
On the thirteenth day of June they beheld wonderful pictures of the
"Falls of the Missouri." The water tore through a vast gorge a dozen
miles or more in length.
=120. The Way over the Mountains.= On they went until their boats could
go no farther. They had reached rough and rugged hills and mountains.
They climbed the heights as best they could. From now on the suffering
was very great indeed.
[Illustration: CAPTAIN WILLIAM CLARK
_From the original painting by Charles Wilson Peale in Independence
Hall, Philadelphia_]
[Sidenote: =The source of the Missouri=]
One day Captain Lewis went ahead with three men to find Indian guides
for the party. They climbed higher and higher until finally they came
to a place where the Missouri River takes its rise. They went on and at
last came to the western slope of the mountains, down which flowed a
stream toward the Pacific Ocean.
Finally Captain Lewis came upon a company of Indian women who could not
get away. They all bowed their heads as if expecting to be killed. They
led the white men to a band of Indians, who received them with all the
signs of kindness they could show.
[Sidenote: =Indians are friendly=]
Now they all turned back to find Clark and his party. When they reached
Clark the Indians smoked the "pipe of peace" and Lewis and Clark told
the Indians why the United States had sent them out.
[Illustration: STATUE OF SACAJAWEA
_This Indian woman, as interpreter and guide, was a great aid to the
exploring party_]
They were the first white men these Indians had ever seen. They looked
the men over carefully and took a deep interest in their clothing,
their food, and in their guns.
[Sidenote: =Explorers suffer from hunger and cold=]
The mountains were now rough and barren and the streams ran through
deep gorges. The explorers took an old Indian guide and crossed the
Bitter Root Mountains into a valley of the same name. They followed an
Indian trail over the mountains again and into the Clearwater. They
suffered for want of food and on account of the cold. When they reached
a tribe of the Nez Percé (Pierced Nose) Indians they ate so much they
were all ill.
[Sidenote: =Reach the Columbia River=]
=121. On Waters Flowing into the Pacific.= In five log boats, which
they had dug out of trees, they glided down the Clearwater to where it
meets the Snake River. They camped near the spot where now stands the
present town of Lewiston, Idaho. Then they embarked on the Snake River
and floated down to where it joins the mighty Columbia.
They were among the Indians again, who had plenty of dried fish, for
here is the home of the salmon, a fish found in astonishing numbers.
The men had never seen so many fish before.
[Sidenote: =Explorers reach the Pacific=]
The number of Indians increased as they went toward the Pacific.
Finally the party of explorers passed through the Cascade Mountains and
were once more on the smooth current of the Columbia. They soon beheld
the blue waters of the Pacific.
During their five months' stay on the Pacific, Captain Clark made a map
of the region they had gone through. They repaired their guns and made
clothes of the skins of elk and of other game.
[Sidenote: =Lewis and Clark travel different routes=]
The Indians told them of a shorter route to the Falls of the Missouri,
and Captain Lewis and nine men went by this route while Captain Clark
with others retraced the old route. They saw nothing of each other
for two months, when they all met again in August on the banks of the
Missouri.
[Sidenote: =All return to St. Louis=]
They reached St. Louis September 23, 1806. The people of the United
States were glad to hear of the safe return of the exploring party, for
they had long thought the men were dead.
[Sidenote: =Rewarded by Congress=]
Both President Jefferson and Congress put great value upon the useful
information that the expedition gathered. Congress rewarded every one
connected with the expedition. Each man was granted double pay for the
time he spent and was given three hundred acres of land. To Captain
Lewis was given fifteen hundred acres and to Captain Clark a thousand
acres. Lewis was appointed first governor of Louisiana Territory and
Clark was made the governor of Missouri Territory.
=122. Fur Traders and Missionaries Lead the Way.= Soon after this
expedition the fur traders pushed their way across the Rocky Mountains
from St. Louis to the Pacific. They found the "gateway of the Rockies,"
called the South Pass, which opened the way to the Oregon country
(1824).
[Illustration: LEWIS AND CLARK ON THEIR WAY DOWN SNAKE RIVER]
[Sidenote: =The coming of the missionaries=]
After the fur traders came the missionary, Nathaniel Wyeth, a New
Englander who led a party to the Columbia and established a post
(1832). Five missionaries followed him and began to work among the
Indians. Very soon Parker and Whitman went out to the Nez Percé
Indians, who came over the mountains to meet them near the headwaters
of the Green River. Parker returned with the Indians and visited Walla
Walla, Vancouver, and the Spokane and Colville regions. Whitman
returned East, was married, and found a missionary, Spaulding, and his
wife, and the party went out to the Oregon country to work among the
Indians.
[Sidenote: =The treaty of 1846=]
=123. The Boundary Established.= During this time fur traders from
Canada and Great Britain were occupying the Oregon country as far as
the Columbia River. The United States and Great Britain made a treaty
by which they agreed to occupy the country together. This treaty lasted
till settlers from the United States made it necessary to have a new
treaty. In 1846 a new treaty was made and the present northern boundary
was established.