Bonneville Dropped from the Army—Indian Shooters—The Mythical Rio Buenaventura—Bonneville Twice to the Columbia—Wyeth Again—The Oregon Trail—The Big Thunder Canoe—A Wilderness Whiskey Still—Missionaries to Oregon—The North-West Boundary Settlement—Decline of the Beaver—Through the Canyon of Lodore on the Ice—FrÉmont, the Scientific Pathfinder—The Spanish Sentinel Turned to the Wall—Fortune's Blindfold.

After forwarding his meagre collection of furs, Bonneville prepared to try his luck in the Wilderness once more. Although his orders were to avail himself of every opportunity of informing the War Department of his position and progress, he gave this matter no attention whatever, and without an extension of leave plunged into another year's trapping and trading as lightly as if army orders and obligations had no existence. His furlough he had obtained ostensibly for exploration, but, of course, it is clear, his real object was the fur trade; exploration was not even a secondary consideration. Had he met with Ashley's success he might have ignored the War Department entirely. As it was, he ignored it for the time being, and making no report, he was dropped from the rolls.

Meanwhile, some of his plans were being executed and there was prospect of a good harvest. He sent one large party under his first assistant Walker, to California, though the Captain afterwards claimed the great object of this expedition was the exploration of Salt Lake, upon which he said his heart had been set. Walker has consequently been severely censured for disobeying his instructions, but Chittenden declares the Salt Lake project was an afterthought, and he seems to be right. "If this ambitious explorer [Bonneville] were really so absorbed in his desire to learn all about the great Salt Lake, how happened it that he remained three years in the country and passed repeatedly within fifty or a hundred miles of the lake but never went to see it?" he inquires. Salt Lake was then well known, it was easy to reach, and there was absolutely no reason why Bonneville himself should not have gone there and explored it if he really had its examination at heart. The conclusion is inevitable that at the time he did not consider it a matter of great importance; yet he may have intended Walker to explore it on the way to California.

At any rate, Walker, with his forty men, started July 24, 1833, and, after suffering somewhat from thirst in the region west of the lake, abandoned it for pastures new, and falling upon the head of Mary's, or Ogden's, River, now the Humboldt, of which he must of course have had some previous information, he followed its more inviting valley, and there pursued a career toward California which emulated the Forty Thieves in the stirring story of Ali Baba. They were in the country of the "Shoshokoes," some of whom took the liberty of appropriating certain traps. One trapper who so suffered, declared he would kill the first native he saw, innocent or guilty. He soon came upon two who were fishing and instantly shot one and threw the body into the river. This crime naturally caused the party to feel that they might expect retaliation, and hence when a few days later they saw a large body of the natives around them, they believed a battle was at hand. Thirty-two of Walker's men thereupon surrounded about eighty of the supposed enemy and shot them mercilessly down, leaving thirty-nine dead on the field. "The remainder," says Leonard, who was one of the shooters, "were overwhelmed with dismay, running into the high grass in every direction, howling in the most lamentable manner." Farther on, Nidiver, another of the trappers, noticing two natives running accidentally towards him and away from Walker, supposed they had committed some crime, and shot both with one ball.

Such was the mad progress of this triumphal band. Similar work was being accomplished in other directions. It was about this time that the afterwards famous mountain man Joe Meek came to the Wilderness. One day he shot a "Digger" who was prowling about a stream where Meek had some traps. Wyeth, who was with the party, asked why he had shot the man.

"To keep him from stealing traps," replied Meek.

"Had he stolen any?" inquired Wyeth.

"No," said Meek, "but he looked as if he war going to."

There were some men who seemed to take pleasure in shooting natives without any reason. Captain Bidwell[97] called these "Indian shooters." "One of the Indian shooters," he writes, "seeing an Indian on the opposite bank of the river swam over, carrying a butcher knife in his mouth.... The Indian ran. The man with the knife crippled him with a stone and then killed him.... Another Indian followed later. One of the Indian killers hid and shot him." Another time a man missed his bridle. He swore an Indian had stolen it. "He fired at an Indian who stood by a tree one hundred yards or so distant. The Indian fell back into the brush and the other Indians in sight fled in terror." The bridle was found later under some blankets in camp.

Walker passed the sink of the Humboldt and then struck into the Sierra Nevada. It took twenty-three days to cross and they suffered for food, seventeen horses being used up for this purpose and seventeen others being absolutely lost. There was no game and they finally were reduced to almost nothing and were glad to get a basket of acorns which a frightened native dropped. Arriving at last on the western edge they met with rocks so steep that it was with difficulty they were able to descend. Here they killed three deer and a bear and began to find a less inhospitable region, although at one place they were obliged to lower the horses by ropes over a long slope of loose rocks. On October 30, 1833, they reached the foot of the range and appear to have passed through the now famous Yosemite Valley, perhaps the first white men to enter it.

They were soon in Monterey where they found the people so agreeable that they had the jolliest kind of a winter. The season passed, however, and the time to go back came. Reluctantly they started in February, 1834, went up the San Joaquin valley with native guides, and crossed the Sierra at a more southern point than the outward passage; by Sonora Pass, Chittenden believes, and he is doubtless correct. Then they worked north-east till they came to their outward trail. On the way they had further amusement killing natives, whom they hunted down as a species of rare game. Several Mexicans in this sport exhibited their skill at horsemanship and lassoing by charging at full speed and throwing the rope over the necks of the terrified runners. The noose tightening, the victims were dragged and strangled to death. Some of the men joined a party under a trapper named Fraeb, who hunted in the mountains of what is now Colorado, and they ranged from the Gila to North and Middle Parks. Walker went to the rendezvous on Bear River to settle his affairs with Bonneville.

Walker had made a trip similar to Jedediah Smith's, but with a smaller circuit, and it was now certain that the river Buenaventura, which heretofore had been vaguely supposed to flow from Salt Lake or from near it, to the Pacific, was a myth. Bonneville, in a letter written long afterwards, claims this as one of the great results geographically of his expedition, yet he condemns Walker for not having explored Salt Lake, a much easier task and one which, to a certain extent, had already been accomplished though not placed on record.

Captain Bonneville himself, when he had arranged his permanent camp the previous autumn on the Portneuf, a branch of the Snake in south-eastern Idaho, set out December 25, 1833, with only three companions to visit the Columbia River region. Crossing the barren valley of Snake River about on the route which by this time may be called the usual one, for besides Hunt and Stuart, and recently Wyeth, the Hudson Bay Company men often passed that way—the Oregon Trail in fact,—through a thick layer of snow, he arrived at last, without any unpleasant encounter with the bands of Amerinds he met, in the valley of the Grande Ronde, on the eastern foot of the splendid Blue Mountains. This fair basin was free from snow, and was obviously the place from which to make an extensive and thorough reconnaissance before attempting to cross the Blue range, whose mighty summits lay between him and the Columbia. But instead of doing this Bonneville wandered on and presently was back on Snake River amid a wild array of rocks and canyons, where, after desperate ventures, he was forced to fall back. He tried to surmount the range and failed. Farther back they tried again and butted their way across with the usual starvation and fatigue incident to advancing without proper investigation. At last they floundered down to a tributary of the Snake where a solitary Nez Perce was encountered who speedily led them to the camp of his friendly tribe. Here their troubles for the moment were over, and Bonneville gained the chief's high favour by curing his daughter of an illness by means of a dose of gunpowder dissolved in water. On March 4th they reached the Columbia at Fort Walla Walla, a post of the Hudson Bay Company, which, in the Columbia River region, had entire control of the trade, as Bonneville, as well as Wyeth, soon discovered. Pambrune, the agent, was cordial and treated them well as long as they were in a measure his guests, but when they wanted provisions with which to return he declined to sell any, on the ground that it was not fair to his company to encourage competing traders.

He advised them to return in company with one of his men about to cross the Blue range by the regular trail on a visit to the upper tribes of the Nez Perces, but Bonneville declined and once more butted his way haphazard across the great ridges, arriving at last on the Snake after much unnecessary privation. At one point a horse approached too near an icy precipice, and sliding down more than two thousand feet was literally dashed to pieces, as they found on going to the spot to secure the carcass for food. By May 12, 1834, he was again at the Portneuf, where he found his camp removed to the Blackfoot River not far away.

Not satisfied with this trip to the Columbia, Bonneville again started for that river on July 3, 1834, with twenty-three men. He had not been on the way a week, before he received word that the indefatigable Wyeth was at his heels, also bound for the lower Columbia. About the same time a Hudson Bay Company party appeared, so the prospects for company were too good to suit the objects of the Captain. The Oregon Trail was rapidly becoming popular in spite of its hardships, and perhaps Wyeth's enthusiasm did as much as any other single factor to advertise this great road to the Oregon country.

Wyeth was again on his way to put into execution his vast scheme to combine fur trading with salmon fishing, for the benefit of his "Columbia River Fishing and Trading Company." He had with him sixty men, veterans of the mountains many of them, and two naturalists, Thomas Nuttall, the same who had gone up the Missouri with Hunt, and J. K. Townshend, an ornithologist. There were also several missionaries under Jason and Daniel Lee. Wyeth had made a contract the previous year to bring out a quantity of goods for the Rocky Mountain Company, but the managers repudiated their obligation. When he arrived on the Portneuf he built a trading-post to utilise these goods, and called it Fort Hall. A flag, made of unbleached sheeting, red flannel, and some blue patches, was raised above the fort, and twelve men well armed were installed there. Wyeth reached the Columbia in good order, and there made another post on Wapatoo Island, but though his ideas were practical and deserved success, he met with disasters and the Hudson Bay people had such complete control of the whole Oregon country that, while his personal relations with them were cordial, he finally gave up, sold out, and returned to Fort Hall, which he also sold to the Hudson Bay Company. Thence by way of Taos and the Arkansas, he went back to Boston, arriving home in the autumn of 1836. He had conducted all his affairs with admirable skill, intelligence, and perseverance, but in business the Hudson Bay Company was a rock, and he was crushed against it.

Bonneville went on down the Snake and over the Blue range to Fort Walla Walla, being much impeded in the mountains by a vast conflagration which made the air dark with smoke and added a new danger to the difficulties of the great mountains in his path. But his efforts to start trade on the Columbia were foredoomed to failure by the power of the Hudson Bay Company. This company had revived old Astoria in 1830, they had Fort Vancouver, Fort Walla Walla, and others, covering every branch of the trade, and the natives were loyal. Bonneville found it impossible to buy anywhere the simplest articles or food of any kind. The Hudson Bay Company was tolerably fair and just with the Amerind and he appreciated this kind of treatment. At Fort Walla Walla Bonneville's effort to buy food met with the same repulse from the manager as on the former occasion. He therefore could but retrace his steps to Bear River Valley where he passed the winter of 1834-35.

In the summer of 1835 he met his parties on Wind River and, adjusting the accounts, started for the settlements, where he arrived on August 22d, his great enterprise over with very meagre results to show. As a trading venture it was a dire failure. As a geographical exploration it had little that was new to present. The maps Bonneville made were partly copied from Gallatin and others. Yet when all that is against him is admitted, he remains a dominating figure of the time, a high light in the picture of breaking the Wilderness. His name, which he applied to Salt Lake, has by geologists been given, as mentioned, to the ancient sea which once lashed the Rocky Mountains with its waves, so that in geology, in geography, in history, and in literature, it is permanently fixed.

"As a soldier by education and profession," says Chittenden, "Captain Bonneville committed an unpardonable breach of discipline in overstaying his leave of absence. It was more than a simple lapse of duty, it was an act of ingratitude to his superiors, considering their great indulgence in granting him so long a leave." By special order of President Jackson he was finally reinstated. He served in the Seminole and in the Mexican wars and was made Brevet Brigadier-General. He bought a farm at Fort Smith, Arkansas, and there, after 1865, ended his days, dying June 12, 1878, at the ripe age of eighty-two.

The year after Bonneville went out to the mountains (1833), a distinguished foreigner, Maximilian, Prince of Wied, made the journey up the Missouri[98] with Kenneth McKenzie, on the steamboat Yellowstone to Fort Pierre and thence to Fort Union on the new Assiniboine. The Yellowstone was a boat with the distinction of having been the first steamboat to go above Council Bluffs. In 1831 she was taken to Fort Tecumseh, a little above where Pierre, South Dakota, now stands (named from Fort Pierre, which was named for Pierre Chouteau, Jr.), and in 1832 went as far as the mouth of the Yellowstone. On board at this time was Catlin, the artist whose paintings of Amerinds and whose extensive travels through the Wilderness have made him forever famous.[99] The natives called the boat the "Big Thunder Canoe," and the "Big Medicine Canoe with Eyes." It was an object of wonder with them for a time, but they soon accepted in a matter-of-fact way the new things the whites brought to them. The steamboat on the Missouri was a great boon to the traders and fur companies as it enabled goods to be taken into the North-west with far greater ease and consequently at less price. There was much rivalry among the companies as heretofore. New ones were formed and the competition was great. All sorts of methods were adopted, many of them questionable, often dishonourable, to secure advantage. As whiskey was prohibited by the Government, and a rigid examination was made of every ascending boat, there were many schemes for smuggling it; for every trader used it, if he could, in his dealings with the natives. It was the most profitable medium of exchange, and by means of it a tribe could be literally skinned for a song. The traders were there to take every advantage of the natives, and, except the Hudson Bay Company, they hesitated at nothing that would bring them money. They would have been perfectly willing to exterminate the whole Amerind population in twenty-four hours if they could have done it with great profit. In other words, their sole care was to fleece the native for a company's benefit. The beaver by 1835 were beginning to be alarmingly scarce and attention was turned more and more to buffalo robes and other furs, but there was yet much money to be made in this field.

McKenzie set up a whiskey still at Fort Union, to get ahead of the inspectors. Ramsay Crooks, who had long been prominent in the American Fur Company, opposed the scheme, fearing trouble with the Government, and he was right, but it was put in operation. Wyeth and CerrÉ, passing Fort Union, learned of it and reported to the Government, and William Clark, of Lewis and Clark, who was still superintendent for the Western tribes, was instructed to stop it. The matter was finally allowed to pass without punishment, but it came near bringing the American Fur Company to disaster. The persistence with which the respectable fur companies forced whiskey into the Wilderness and debauched the tribes there, in spite of every effort of the Government to prevent it, is a permanent disgrace to these companies and to their managers, every one of whom, from chief down, knew that the wealth they were accumulating by it was largely a swindle, and meant the impoverishment and wrecking of the people of the Wilderness. It was bad enough to charge the poor natives outrageous prices for cheap articles, but deliberately to intoxicate them for profit can never be considered anything but dishonour for every man, high and low, who permitted it to go on without hindrance or protest, or who abetted it, and received the money from such base sources.

Famous travellers now went for a turn in the Wilderness, though most of them contented themselves with the part east of the Rocky Mountains. Among these was Washington Irving, in 1832, with several congenial spirits, one of whom was Charles Latrobe, an Englishman, who wrote an interesting book. This adventure of Irving was of value afterwards when he came to write Astoria and Bonneville, albeit it was brief. He saw the buffalo, however, and, as described, experienced the excitement of the chase. Francis Parkman, at a later time, followed Irving's example, and then gathered notes for his Oregon Trail.

Various American and English sportsmen also sought this fascinating field, but this volume is too small to record the doings of the great numbers who now began to swarm into the Wilderness. Many of them have written valuable books which may be found in all good libraries.[100]

The missionaries began to turn more attention to the Oregon country, and in 1836 Samuel Parker was sent by the Presbyterians to that region. He took with him a medical man, Doctor Marcus Whitman, and these two were practically the breakers of the Oregon Trail for the gentler side of civilisation. They went out as far as the Black Hills under the guidance of the veteran trapper Fontenelle, a man as widely known as Fitzpatrick, Sublette, or any of the other prominent mountain men of the time. Fitzpatrick himself escorted them on to Green River. Whitman was able to give medical attention to many of those in the Wilderness, and he seems to have been the first American doctor, or indeed the first doctor of any nationality, who ventured there. In Green River Valley he took from the back of Bridger an iron arrow-head, which had been there three years. It was the custom of the mountaineers to do their own surgery. Sometimes it was successful, as in the case of Pegleg Smith, sometimes the patient did not survive the camp operation more than a day or two. Sometimes they let "well enough alone," as in Bridger's case, who allowed the arrow-head to remain. No anÆsthetic was thought of at that time, and Whitman performed the operation under the admiring gaze of a crowd of natives and whites, while Bridger never winced. Another arrow-head was taken from under the shoulder of a hunter, where it had been for two and a half years.

Whitman became so much interested in the missionary side of the prospective Oregon work that he returned from Green River to secure more help, leaving Parker to continue. Parker says of the trappers: "Their demoralising influence with the Indians has been lamentable, and they have imposed upon them in all the ways that sinful propensity can dictate. It is said they have sold them packs of cards at high prices, calling them the Bible."

Of the rendezvous he remarks:

Parker reached Oregon safely, while Whitman was making the eastward journey. On reaching New England, Whitman, who was only thirty-two, married. With his wife and another newly married couple, the Reverend H. H. Spalding and wife, he set out once more for Oregon, with the settlement of which his name was now to become forever associated, even to the extent of being called the "Saviour of Oregon."[101] It must be remembered that the British Hudson Bay Company still maintained almost complete control of the Oregon country, notwithstanding the provision made by the two Governments that the region was to be free to both nations. It was free nominally, but, as has been seen in the case of Bonneville and in that of Wyeth, as well as other Americans, the freedom was a mere form. American trappers could pass through the country without direct molestation, but it was an impossibility for them to accomplish anything there. As the fifth decade of the century opened, the question of boundary so long left in the air became pressing. The time set for adjustment had arrived. It was particularly in relation to this that it is said Whitman made a winter journey to Washington by way of Santa FÉ in 1842-43. During his absence the natives grew more insolent. Mrs. Whitman was obliged to flee to the Methodist mission for protection. The natives were also suspicious of the missionaries: the latter often held themselves superior to the trappers who would have been their best friends; and the Hudson Bay Company continued its opposition to American settlement. A troublous condition all round was the result. A horrible massacre by the Cayuses finally took place at the Whitman mission, November 28, 1847, eleven years after the Doctor began his enthusiastic work for Oregon. Doctor and Mrs. Whitman with many others were most cruelly murdered, some of the chief criminals being those whom they had often befriended.

Doctor McLoughlin, the Hudson Bay Company governor, while refusing aid to Americans, came to have much sympathy for, and was later accused by the managers of the great corporation of having promoted, American settlement. He was even charged an enormous sum as damages the Company had suffered in consequence of the course of action of which he was accused. He resigned, settled himself in Oregon, and eventually became an American citizen. The British desired an adjustment of the boundary by following the course of the Columbia River, but this was not accepted by the United States, and it was not till 1848 that the line was placed permanently where it now is; a continuation of the line on the forty-ninth parallel, which had been adopted east of the mountains long before.

One of the trappers intimately connected with the development of Oregon was Joe Meek, who had ranged the Wilderness for many years. He was possessed of a full share of the qualities which abounded in men like Jedediah Smith, Sublette, Bridger, and others of that type, and was seldom taken unawares. One anecdote will exhibit his temper and at the same time present a picture of the dangerous circumstances which sometimes surrounded such men and over which they triumphed. Meek was captured by a party of Crows in the Yellowstone country. His captors numbered 187 men, nine boys, and three women. Meek calmly counted them while they were discussing his case. At last the chief, called "The Bold," said to him: "I have known the whites for a long time and I know them to be great liars, deserving death, but if you will tell the truth you shall live. Tell me where are the whites you belong to; and what is your captain's name." Meek replied that his captain was Bridger, and to an inquiry as to the number of men Bridger had, he answered forty, which was a lie, as Bridger had six times that number. The Bold laughed and said: "We will make them poor, and you shall live, but they shall die." For four days they travelled to attack Bridger, and Meek was forced to do the menial work of the camp under the ridicule of the squaws.

Bridger's horse guard now approached to drive in the horses. The Crow chief ordered Meek to tell him to come up, but instead Meek shouted for him to keep away and to tell Bridger to try to treat with them. In a little while Bridger came on a large white horse to within three hundred yards and asked for a council. Little Gun, the second chief, finally was ordered to go and smoke with Bridger, while the whole band prepared for war. When Little Gun and Bridger were within about a hundred yards of each other they halted and stripped, according to Crow rules, proceeding the remaining distance in a nude state, to kiss and embrace. Meanwhile five of Bridger's men crept along in a dry ravine and were able to cut off Little Gun from his friends. Now there was a great commotion among the Crows. At this moment about a hundred of Bridger's men came up and he called to Meek to propose an exchange of himself for Little Gun. To this the chief sullenly consented, remarking that he could not afford to give a chief for one white dog's scalp. Meek thereupon was allowed to go toward his friends as Little Gun approached his, and in a few moments the exchange was accomplished. That same evening, the head chief with forty of his men visited Bridger's camp and made a treaty of peace to endure three months, in order that they might join together to fight the Blackfeet. They gave Meek his mule, gun, and beaver packs, and told him his name should henceforth be Shiam Shaspusia, as he could outlie the Crows.

The growing scarcity of beaver toward the end of the thirties threw many trappers out of work. The fur companies disbanded, and the men were left in the mountains not knowing what to do. They therefore scattered in small bands in search of profit and adventure. Meek was in Brown's Hole in the winter, about this time, at Fort Davy Crockett. It will be remembered that Ashley had come through Flaming Gorge, etc., and Red Canyon from Green River Valley, and went out to Salt Lake from Brown's Hole. Meek joined a party to go down on the ice through the next canyon, now called Lodore. The entrance to this gorge is very abrupt and magnificent, the rocks rising suddenly and sheer to a height of over two thousand feet, forming a monster gateway which can be seen for miles out in the valley. Into this gateway, Meek and his companions entered, doubtless the first whites ever to go far within the solemn chasm. He says they travelled nearly a hundred miles down this "awful canyon without finding but one place where they could have come out, and left it at last at the mouth of the Uintee." That is, they went through Lodore, about twenty-one miles, Echo Park, one mile, Whirlpool Canyon, about fifteen miles, Island Park, nine miles, and Split Mountain Canyon, eight miles, or in all a distance through canyons of about fifty-four miles. The remainder of their journey was in the open Wonsits Valley. The place where they thought they could have come out was Island Park, which is a small valley enclosed on the west only by slopes of the Uintas. There are also other places but more difficult. About ten years later a party attempted the descent in boats through this particular series of canyons and was wrecked in Lodore. The descent in Lodore is 420 feet, and, in the distance that the Meek party went on the ice, about 750 feet. A band of Catholic missionaries, according to Farnham,[103] attempted the descent of the Colorado, presumably from the point where the trail to Los Angeles crossed Grand or Green River. They were never heard of again. The name "Julien—1836" is cut in three places on the canyon walls, one in what is called Labyrinth Canyon, one near the foot of Cataract Canyon, and another near the head of the same canyon. So far as the records known to me go, the canyons below Lodore remained absolute wilderness till 1869, unless this Julien passed through Cataract, as is suggested by the occurrence of his name.

A trapper made famous by Ruxton's romantic account[104] of his doings was La BontÉ. The Arapahos having killed four trappers and run off with La BontÉ's animals, he and his partner, Killbuck, were after them. They discovered the camp where the scalps of the trappers were stuck on a spear in the centre of the circle. While spying out the situation, one of the mules perceived them and gave forth a whinny. La BontÉ and Killbuck immediately fired killing two Arapahos, whereupon the three survivors rushed upon them with loud yells. The trappers, "drawing their pistols, charged at once, and although the bows twanged and the three arrows struck their mark, on they rushed, discharging their pistols at close quarters. La BontÉ threw his empty one at the head of an Indian who was pulling his second arrow to its head at a yard's distance, drew his knife at the same moment and made at him. But the Indian broke and ran, followed by his surviving companion; and as soon as Killbuck could ram home another ball he sent a shot flying after them as they scrambled up the mountain side, leaving, in their fright and hurry, their bows and shields on the ground."

La BontÉ now pulled an arrow out of his arm, while Killbuck took his whetstone from the little sheath on his belt and put an edge on his knife. Then, examining the first body to see if any life remained, and finding the man dead, he proceeded to the business of scalping.

Killbuck up to this moment had been walking about with an arrow through his thigh. The point being near the surface on the other side, he pushed it entirely through, and cut the head off below the barb, after which he could pull the shaft out. A tourniquet of buckskin soon stopped the bleeding, and he "brought in his old mule, lavishing many a caress and most comical terms of endearment upon the faithful companion of his wanderings." After a hasty meal on the venison which the Amerinds had been cooking, they hurried away from the locality to a camp of Utes. The latter were enemies of the Arapahos, and when La BontÉ told them the Arapahos were coming the whole village was speedily in commotion: the squaws began to lament and tear their hair; the warriors, to paint and arm themselves. A band of a hundred soon left for the field, and La BontÉ and Killbuck would have gone too, but the chiefs forbade this, as their wounds were stiff and painful and they were well worn out. So buffalo robes were placed in a warm roomy lodge and they were left to rest and recuperate.

On the Mexican frontier trouble had for some time been brewing concerning the status of Texas in the Mexican political arrangement. The Texans, who were now mainly Americans, having followed the lead of Austin, desired to have Texas a sovereign Mexican state, but a military government was proposed by the Mexicans and a revolt occurred in 1835, which resulted in a proclamation of entire independence, March 2, 1836. The Texans triumphed the same year under Houston at the battle of San Jacinto. The western boundary was laid without any just reason along the Rio Grande from its mouth to the source and thence due north to the forty-second parallel; but the Mexicans refused to consider any line beyond the Nueces River, when the independence of Texas was finally allowed. Therefore the boundary on the Rio Grande never having been agreed to by the owner of the soil, Mexico, it has no rightful place on any map. It never had any existence, and as it is usually given without qualification on historical maps, it is entirely misleading.

In the troublous times which now for a period fell upon the Wilderness, a new figure comes to the front and dominates the epoch with a force that resulted in attaching his name to it forever and at the same time in rousing a great amount of opposition and condemnation. This was John C. FrÉmont, called the Pathfinder, though, as the reader perceives from the preceding pages, the main paths had long before been found. Nevertheless, FrÉmont was the first of his kind—the first to follow paths for the sake of the paths themselves—the first to record them properly—the first who looked at the Wilderness beyond the peaks of the Rockies with sole reference to the geographical problems that might lie there—the first to pay attention to the botany and geology. He has been ridiculed for likening himself when looking down on Salt Lake, to Balboa but the injustice of this is apparent when we find that he did not compare himself to the Spanish explorer, but merely said he was "doubtful if the followers of Balboa felt more enthusiasm" when they saw the Pacific for the first time. FrÉmont, as a lieutenant, and about twenty-five, began his work with Nicollet on the Mississippi and the Missouri in 1838-40. In Washington he met Senator Benton; and also his daughter, Jessie, whom he married in 1841. In 1842 he was selected to explore the region of South Pass and on this journey he climbed the peak named for him,—the highest of the Wind River Mountains. In 1843 he was out again, remaining fourteen months, with a large party of frontiersmen. He made a third journey in 1845-47, resigning from the army on his return. His fourth, last, and disastrous trip was in 1848. In his several expeditions he went to Oregon by the Bear River, Fort Hall, and Snake River route; to Klamath and Pyramid lakes; to San Joaquin Valley; to southern California; back over the Jedediah Smith (outward) trail from Salt Lake; crossed the Rocky Mountains and Green River from Utah Lake, and so back and forth in a number of directions.

In 1845 Texas was admitted into the Union as a State. President Polk, on what ground is not apparent, agreed with the Texans that the western limit of their domain was certainly the Rio Grande. He might as well then and there have agreed that it was the Pacific. General Taylor was ordered to occupy the region west of the Nueces and he pushed on to the Rio Grande. There was nothing left for the Mexicans to do but fight, and this they accordingly did. Scott was ordered with his army to Mexico, Kearney to New Mexico and California. Santa FÉ was easily captured in 1846, and the navy speedily took the California coast towns. FrÉmont being in California engaged actively in the insurrection there, and was much censured for what he did. The Mexicans were vanquished. In 1848 a treaty was entered into between them and the United States, by which in consideration of $15,000,000, and the United States assuming all claims, New Mexico and California were ceded to the Americans—that is, all below the forty-second parallel to the Gila and the Rio Grande. The latter river now was admitted to be the western boundary of Texas; a boundary afterwards adjusted with the Federal Government. The Mexicans were left with nothing north of the Gila; the British with nothing south of the forty-ninth parallel, west of the Mississippi. The immense area which once had formed the basis of so many broad and indefinite claims was now held by a nation which had no being when the European countries began their wrangling over this splendid domain. From Atlantic to Pacific, from the Lake of the Woods to the Rio Grande, one power was in control, and that power the very youngest in all the world. The American nation had secured for itself the most fertile, most diversified, and altogether the finest and richest area on the entire globe. The Spanish sentinel had been turned with his face to the wall; the British sentinel was equally overwhelmed; the natives were cheerfully poisoned with cheap whiskey; and it was now only a question of settlement and communication between the widely separated parts of the Republic.

The beaver was gone. Buffalo robes formed the bulk of the fur trade. Even the buffalo were diminishing in numbers. It seemed as if little incentive remained to lead people to brave the discomforts and dangers of the western Wilderness. It appeared as if the young Republic for centuries to come would have a wilderness on its hands.

But under the very feet of the trapper struggling to earn his small wage by exterminating the beaver, rich metals were hidden; and Fortune was almost ready to remove the blindfold, and lure the next set of Wilderness breakers into the field.