was the key-note of future projects. Even before Louisiana was ours,
he began to take steps for having it explored, partly with the view
of ascertaining its real value, but chiefly to determine whether the
Missouri and Columbia Rivers would afford a practicable overland route
for commerce with the Pacific. Should they do so, the discovery of
the century would be made. It was the very first step taken to open a
road across the continent under national auspices, and, as such, has
historic importance, going far beyond the aimless wanderings of a few
migratory fur-traders, who, thus far, were the sole geographers of this
interesting region.
Except that they took their rise somewhere in the great Rocky Mountain
chain, next to nothing was known about the higher sources of the
Missouri. Something, indeed, was learned from the French traders who
had been making canoe voyages up the Missouri for many years. These
adventurers had pushed their way into the Osage, the Kansas, and the
Platte. To them we owe the names these streams bear to-day, which are
derived, the Platte[1] alone excepted, from the tribes inhabiting
their banks. For the same reason the great Missouri[2] itself was
given this name by the French explorers because they were ignorant of
its existing Indian name.
From their known activity and restlessness of character, we should
expect to find evidences of the presence of Frenchmen everywhere in
a region they had possessed for centuries. We do find that the most
adventurous had ascended not only as high as the Yellowstone,[3]
but had even found their way into the Black Hills, so establishing an
important landmark for after-comers. Indeed, both the Yellowstone and
the Black Hills owe their names to these pioneers.
[Illustration: MOUNTAIN GOAT.]
But the knowledge thus gained was, at best, little better than what
would be disclosed by the mirage of the prairies themselves. It was
vague, mostly inaccurate, and often quite upside down.
Therefore, while an occasional trapper or trader might be met with
on the Missouri, no habitation of civilized man existed in all its
magnificent valley, if we except the French settlements begun near its
mouth. This state of things is all the more striking because it comes
within the memory of living men.
Beyond their regular villages, which could be moved at a few hours'
warning, the Indians of this valley had no fixed habitations, but roamed
the wide, treeless prairies in savage freedom, like wandering Arabs
of the desert, carrying their skin-tents on the backs of their shaggy
little ponies about with them from camp to camp.
These rovers of the prairies had the same barbaric picturesqueness, the
same wild and free manners, the same thieving propensities, as the Arab.
Like him, the Indian of the plains set the greatest value on his horse,
which, though subdued to his rider's will, was yet as untamed as he.
[Illustration: INDIANS MOVING CAMP.]
Once a year the whole village struck its tents, and started off on its
annual buffalo-hunt. On the eve of departure, a solemn dance was held
and offerings made to the god of the chase, without whose help they
believed the hunt would be in vain. Their hunting camps were pitched at
some favorite spot, where grass grew and water could be had. Here they
lived in savage luxury on the buffalo-meat which the hunters brought in
from the chase. When enough meat had been obtained for their winter's
supply, they rode back to their villages, and with singing and dancing
celebrated the success of the hunt. Thus they hunted, ate, slept, and
waged continual war with each other. This was all their life.
Of the Columbia[4] nothing certain was known. More was known, even
in America, about the Nile. It was thought, however, that its highest
streams would be found interlocked with those of the Missouri, about
the feet of the same great mountain chain. Should this prove true,
a practicable passage from one to the other through these mountains
might be discovered; yet while nothing actual was known about them the
difficulties were felt to be so uncommon, that none but men of tried
courage would be found equal to them. Clearly it was to be no holiday
journey. Just what obstacles lay in the explorer's way, what means of
living the country would afford, what sort of people would be met with,
were questions no one had so far attempted to solve.
Mr. Jefferson set about solving them. He looked about him for the man
to do the work. His first choice fell upon his own secretary, Captain
Meriwether Lewis,[5] "of courage undaunted," at whose request Captain
William Clarke[6] was invited to make one of the party. Clarke
accepted the offer with great glee. Both were young men, both had seen
service on the frontiers, both were Virginians, and both gave heart and
soul to the enterprise in hand.
Though its objects were less scientific than political, the young
explorers were commanded to carefully note down every thing of interest
about the countries and nations they were going to pass through—what
were the natural products of the one, or the numbers, disposition and
manners of the other.
It was to be a long voyage to begin with—two thousand miles at the
least. The best the Government could do was to provide a keel-boat,
fifty-five feet long, drawing three feet, carrying one large square sail
and twenty-two oars. A half deck at bow and stern formed forecastle
and cabin, the middle being left open for the rowers. This vessel, we
see, was but a modification of the galley of ancient times, and quite
like those used by the Spaniards in exploring our coasts two centuries
before.
Thus equipped the party started down the Ohio on their long journey to
the Pacific.
The Spaniards had not yet given up St. Louis to us when the expedition
reached there, in the autumn of 1803. It therefore went into winter
quarters on the American bank of the Mississippi, opposite the mouth of
the Missouri.
[Illustration: A MANDAN.]
It was the middle of May before the voyage up the Missouri could begin.
With sail and oars, the deeply laden keel-boat was forced slowly along
against a swift yellow tide, which ever and anon hurled floating trees
athwart its course, or brought it to a standstill on some hidden
sand-bar. Compared with it, the navigation of the Ohio was but a
pleasure-trip. The Platte, however, was reached late in July. Not far
above, the explorers landed to hold a council with the Otoes, for which
reason they gave the place the name of Council Bluff.
In the last days of October, 1804, they halted for the winter at the
Mandan villages, sixteen hundred miles from the Mississippi. So far
the journey had been only fatiguing. Its real difficulties were just
beginning.
The winter was spent in making ready for the coming season's work, in
hunting and exploring, and in talks with the Indians, from whom it was
now learned that after many days' journey toward the setting sun, the
white men would come to a gorge wondrous deep and wild, where the whole
river plunged foaming down with thunderous roar. They even spoke with
veneration of the solitary eagle which had built her nest in a dead
cottonwood tree, among the mists of the cataract itself.
With the early spring (1805) the party again set out in good health and
spirits. Before doing so Captain Lewis sent back all but the bravest
and strongest men, as he was now about to enter a region roamed over
by predatory savages, whose friendship would be best secured by being
always ready to fight them, for though brave, they would seldom attack
a well-armed party of whites unless the advantage was on their own side.
As they went on, each day found the navigation of the river growing more
and more difficult. Sometimes they were forced to drag their canoes
slowly along with the aid of towlines, or again to push them over
shallow places or through dangerous rapids with poles. Their hunters
kept them supplied with venison, bear and buffalo meat, which they were
now mostly to live on for months to come.
The Yellowstone was reached and passed. On the 26th of May the party
came in sight of the Rocky Mountains,—a long line of snowy summits
nestling among clouds. By the end of the month they were skirting the
Black Hills, or _Côte Noire_ of the French traders. The river grew
swifter now, and its bed thickly sown with rocks. Since leaving the
Mandan villages no permanent habitations had been seen, though the
travellers often came upon traces of some transient encampment where
the ground would be strewed with the remnants of savage feasts. While
the men were wearily dragging the boats on at a snail's pace through the
river shallows, Captains Lewis and Clarke would be scouting the country
in advance, rifle in hand. Whenever a bluff was climbed to gain a
wider view, thousands upon thousands of buffaloes would be seen quietly
feeding on the prairies, far as the eye could reach. Then at the evening
halt, round the camp-fires, the events of the day would be noted down,
its difficulties talked over, and the chances for the morrow discussed,
over the joints of venison or bear-meat the hunters had brought in. At
dark sentinels were posted. Relaxation gave way to discipline. Fresh
logs were thrown on the blazing fires. The men stretched themselves on
the ground in their blankets, and soon forgot the fatigues of the day.
At dawn the camp was again astir.
[Illustration: MANDAN SKIN-BOATS.]
FOOTNOTES
[1] PLATTE is French for low or flat. Long says it derives
its name from the fact of being broad and shallow.
[2] THE MISSOURI. So says Charlevoix. Marquette calls it
Pekitanoui, on his map. It was not unfrequently called the
Great River of the Osages.
[3] YELLOWSTONE is English for Roche Jaune, the old French
name. BLACK HILLS were Côte Noire.
[4] THE COLUMBIA. Vancouver had ascended it (1792), one
hundred miles from the sea.
[5] CAPTAIN MERIWETHER LEWIS, afterwards governor of
Louisiana, committed suicide in a fit of depression.
[6] CAPTAIN WILLIAM CLARKE kept a journal of the expedition.
Brother of General George Rogers Clarke. Lewis also kept a
diary.
THEY CROSS THE CONTINENT.
On the 13th of June, while scouting in advance of his party, Captain
Lewis saw, in the distance, a thin cloudlike mist rising up out of the
plain. To him it was like the guiding column which led the Israelites
in the desert. Not doubting that it was the Great Fall, which the
Mandans had told him about, and of which he was in search, Captain Lewis
hastened toward it. He soon heard it roar distinctly, and in a few hours
more stood on the brink of the cataract itself. The Indians had told him
truly. Not even the eagle's nest was wanting to make their description
complete.
He was the first white man who had ever stood there, and he calls it a
sublime sight.
Thirteen miles of cascades and rapids! At headlong speed the Missouri
rushes down a rocky gorge, through which it has torn its way, now
leaping over a precipice, now lost to sight in the depths of the
cañon,[1] a thousand feet below the plain, or again, as with recovered
breath, breaking away from these dark gulfs into the light of clay and
bounding on again. No wonder the discoverer stood forgetful of all else
but this wondrous work of nature!
Much valuable time was lost in getting the boats and baggage round these
falls. To pass them was impossible. It was necessary to build carriages
on which the boats were dragged by hand a distance of eighteen miles,
before they could be launched again.
But after all this had been done the boats were found unsuited to the
navigation of the river above them, and so new ones had to be hewed
out of the trees growing on the banks, which could better withstand
the buffeting of the rocks. In these the party again embarked, and
on the 19th of July found themselves just entering a deep gorge of
the mountains, five miles long, through which the river wound its way
between walls of rock that rose a thousand feet above their heads. They
named this awful cañon the Gate of the Rocky Mountains.
Boat navigation was now nearly at an end. Every day the scouts were
sent out in search of roving Indians from whom they might get horses
and guides to cross the mountains. But no Indians could be found. A
well-beaten trail had been followed high up into the hills, but lost
again among defiles so narrow and stony, that when the scouts came back
they said no horseman could go through them. So these great mountains,
which so long had been to them a guide and landmark, now seemed sternly
forbidding their farther progress.
Yet at all risks horses and guides must be had. Telling his men he
would not come back till he had found them, Captain Lewis set out on his
forlorn search, knowing that on him depended the success or failure of
the expedition. The men remained encamped where he left them.[2]
While engaged in this search, Captain Lewis, on the 12th of August,
reached the highest source of the Missouri. At three thousand miles
from its mouth it dwindled to a mountain brook. Passing thence over
the dividing ridge, he came upon the waters of what proved to be
the Columbia. So within a few hours he drank of the waters of both.
Following the stream down the mountain, with fresh hope, it led him to
a village of the Shoshones or Snake Indians.[3]
[Illustration: GATE OF THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS.]
No shipwrecked wanderer on an unknown sea ever looked with more
eagerness on a rescuing sail than Lewis did upon this uncouth and
squalid habitation in the wilderness. The Indians would not believe
he had crossed the mountains on foot and without guides. At length,
however, some of them agreed to go back with him, and these having found
his story true, horses and guides were furnished for the white men's
use.
Thus equipped, the party began the passage of the mountains, following
the obscure windings of a trail known only to the Indians themselves.
They found it a hard march. Sometimes it led them through a wild cañon
strewed with stones for miles together. Sometimes the caravan would
be painfully climbing some slippery height, or skirting the edge of a
precipice where a single false step would have flung horse and rider
headlong to the bottom of the ravine.
But these active little horses, which the Indians rode without saddle
or bridle, unshod and ill-fed as they were, did their work to the
admiration of the white men. Though they frequently slipped and fell
with their burdens, they would quickly scramble to their feet again with
the agility of mountain goats.
Almost a month was thus spent in getting through the mountains. Snow
fell, and water froze among those rocky heights. On some days five miles
would be the most they could advance. On others they could scarcely go
forward at all. The plenty they had enjoyed in the plains gave way to
scarcity or worse. Seldom could the hunters bring in any thing but a
pheasant, a squirrel, or a hawk, to men famishing with hunger and worn
down by a hard day's tramp. The daily food mostly consisted of berries
and dried fish, of which every man got a mouthful, but none a full meal.
When a horse gave out he was killed and eaten with avidity. The men grew
sick and dispirited under incessant labor for which want of nourishing
food rendered them every day more and more incapable. In short, every
suffering which cold, hunger, and fatigue could bring, was borne by
these explorers.
Ragged, half-starved, and foot-sore, but upheld by the courage of their
leaders, the explorers came out on the other side of the mountains less
like conquerors than fugitives.
Their guides led them on, past many streams, till they came to one on
which they were told they might safely embark. It was the Kooskooskee.
This was about four hundred miles from the place where they had left
their boats on the other side of the mountains. They had struck one of
the southern affluents of the Columbia.
Here the party built canoes in which they began to descend the river,
leaving their horses with the Nez Percés Indians[4] to keep against
their return. In three days this stream led into a larger one to which
they gave the name of Lewis River. In seven, they reached the junction
of a larger branch coming from the north, which they named the Clarke.
They were now fairly afloat upon the great river itself. Down this they
paddled till they came to the point where the Columbia in a series of
mad leaps breaks through the lofty Cascade chain.[5] These too were
safely passed.
It was now late in October. All along the explorers had found camps
pitched on the borders of the rivers, for the Indians of this region
lived wholly on salmon, like the tribes Mackenzie had fallen in with
on Frazer River. Wherever the river was broken by rapids a noted
fishing-place would be found, so the travellers were now in a land of
plenty; but the farther they fell down, the more squalid the Indians
became, and of meaner looks and stature. Had these people shown
themselves unfriendly, Lewis and Clarke might never have reached the
ocean, for the valley was everywhere very populous.
[Illustration: CATCHING SALMON, COLUMBIA RIVER.]
Since leaving the cascades, evidences of approach to the sea multiplied.
Up to that point no fire-arms had been seen among the Indians. Many
now had guns, and showed themselves more and more presuming toward the
white men. They traversed the river in great war canoes, having images
set up at the stem and stern, like the vikings of old. But our men did
not fear them. They were already more than half Indians themselves in
dress, looks and habits of life. They had learned to eat dog-meat, and
to make their beds wherever the night found them.
Soon the tides were observed. On the 7th of November the roar of the
breakers was heard in the distance. They had reached their goal at last.
A most inhospitable welcome awaited the explorers. They had struck the
coast in the rainy season. The floods drove them from their first camp
on the north side, to the south side of the river, where they set to
work building themselves winter quarters. The little clump of cabins was
named Fort Clatsop, from the tribe on whose land it stood, with the flag
the explorers had brought waving over it. Here the winter was passed.
In March, 1806, the explorers began their journey home. At the Falls of
the Columbia they bought horses which took them to the place where their
own had been left. From here they travelled on an east line through the
mountains till the head of Clarke's River was struck. The party was then
divided. One band under Lewis crossed the mountains to the head-waters
of the Maria River, while the other, under the lead of Clarke, passed
them lower down, so reaching the sources of the Yellowstone, down which
they floated to the place of rendezvous.
FOOTNOTES
[1] CAÑON. Spanish for ravine or gorge; pronounced,
_kan-yon_. The word has been naturalized in the West.
[2] ENCAMPED ON THE MISSOURI, at the head of the Jefferson
River.
[3] SHOSHONES, or SNAKES, occupied the country west of the
mountains and south of the Salmon River. They had a custom of
taking off their moccasins when meeting a stranger and wishing
to show amity.
[4] NEZ PERCÉS, or Pierced Noses, lived about the waters of
the Kooskooskee and Lewis, next north of the Shoshones.
[5] CASCADE MOUNTAINS take their name from the cascades
formed by the Columbia in its passage through them.
PIKE EXPLORES THE ARKANSAS VALLEY.
_PIKE'S PEAK A LANDMARK_.
In the course of an expedition made to the Upper Mississippi, in the
years 1805 and 1806, Lieutenant Zebulon M. Pike[1] had shown such
aptitude for the work of an explorer, that he was immediately chosen
to lead another to the sources of the Arkansas. Pike was directed to
go through the country of the Osages, with whom the Kansas nation was
then at war, and, after effecting a peace between them, "to ascertain
the direction, extent, and navigation of the Arkansas and Red Rivers."
In pursuance of these orders Pike left St. Louis in July, 1806, for
the Osage villages, in row-boats which made about fifteen miles a day,
his men living on the bears, deer, and turkeys killed along the banks.
Turning into the Osage River, the Indian villages were reached about the
middle of August, and Pike here began mounting his party for the long
land journey before him.
Having accomplished this, the party set out for the Pawnee villages on
the Platte. Near the Grand Osage Village, Peter Chouteau,[2] a French
trader, had a trading-house, which was the last sign of civilization
the explorers would see until the Spanish settlements of New Mexico were
reached.
Tents were struck Sept. 1. The exploring party rode away in high
spirits, accompanied by a numerous train of warriors who, in this way,
did honor to those whom they considered their guests.
[Illustration: MAP ILLUSTRATING LIEUTENANT PIKE'S EXPLORATIONS.]
After following the Osage for some distance Pike struck across the
country to the Neosho, a tributary of the Arkansas. As he rode on across
the dividing ridge the prairies of Kansas broke on his sight like a
scene of enchantment. He seemed discovering a corner of paradise itself.
From the Neosho, Pike passed over to the Smoky Hill Fork of the Kansas,
and thence to the Republican, meaning to proffer friendship to the
Pawnees, whose evil reputation, however, boded no good to his mission.
[Illustration: INDIAN BURIAL-PLACE.]
When he came to their villages the Pawnees had just been visited by an
embassy sent from New Mexico to sow distrust, if not enmity, toward the
Americans. The Spaniards had come with three hundred men, by the side
of whom Pike's twenty-three looked small indeed, and to the Pawnees
indicated the number of warriors each nation had at its command. They
were therefore at no pains to hide their disdain.
Pike found them in this temper. Knowing it would never do to show fear,
he hoisted his flag in the chief town to let them see that sour looks
and uncivil words could not turn him from his purpose of making them
show respect for the government of the United States, even if they felt
a preference for the Spaniards.
His mission in this quarter having failed, Pike turned back to the
Arkansas, which was reached on the 18th of October. At this point
Lieutenant Wilkinson was sent down the river, while Pike himself began
the work of tracing it to its source. When he had done this, Pike
meant to cross over to the head of Red River and then descend it to
Natchitoches, so completing the work laid out for him, which, we have
seen, was partly diplomatic and partly geographical in its nature; for
the government wished to have the natives not only keep peace toward us,
but among themselves. So we at least set out in our new purchase with
a sound Indian policy.
Thus Pike's explorations would take in all the great central region
lying between the waters of the Red and Platte Rivers and the Rocky
Mountains, which to-day is perhaps the most fertile and populous of all
the Great West.
But Pike's plans were doomed to meet failure, and he himself to
sufferings which a man of weaker mould would have sunk under. As it
was, they served to bring out those splendid qualities which raised him
to the rank of general at the age of thirty-three, and made his name
renowned in our military annals.
On the 15th of November he came in sight of the lofty Spanish Peaks.
Soon the diminishing river he was following buried itself among the
hills, where it was lost to view. Thinking thus to get a better idea
of the country round him, Pike set out on a prospecting tour, in the
course of which he climbed the elevated peak now so fitly bearing his
own name, and saw the matchless view outspread from its summit.
Winter had now set in. Day by day difficulties multiplied. The streams
were frozen up or buried in snow-drifts, so that it was next to
impossible to follow them into the ravines which gave them birth. Where
to look for the sources of Red River, Pike knew not. Decoyed among
the hills, till all bearings were lost, his search for it was in vain.
Beaten back, but not dismayed, he then spent days in trying to recover
the trail made by the Spaniards in going from Santa Fé to the Platte.
It was obliterated by frost and snow. Baffled everywhere, his party
wandered to and fro like lost men, often without food or shelter, but
directed and encouraged to new efforts by their unconquerable leader.
[Illustration: PIKE'S PEAK.]
At last, when nearly spent, the party reached the banks of a stream
which Pike believed to be the one he was in search of. One can hardly
realize to-day this desperate struggle for life as taking place among
the pleasure-grounds of Colorado.