| CHAPTER I | PAGE |
| Extent of the Wilderness—The First White Man—The Backbone of the Continent—A Vanished Sea and a Petrified Ocean—The Biggest Trees—The Spike of Gold | 1 |
| CHAPTER II |
| The Intelligent Beaver, Chief of the Rodents—A Four-footed Engineer—A Builder of Houses, Artificial Canals, Dams, Ponds, and Lakes—Beaver Meadows—A Masterful Woodchopper—A Tail for the Epicure—Muskbogs—The Fatal Trap | 13 |
| CHAPTER III |
| A Monarch of the Plains—The Hunchback Cows of Cibola—A Boon to the Frontiersman—Wide Range of the Bison—Marrow Bones for the Epicure—Washington Irving a Buffalo Hunter—The Rushing Run of the Bison Herd—The Sacred White Buffalo Cow Skin—A Calf with a Bull Head—Wolves and White Bears | 32 |
| CHAPTER IV |
| The People of the Wilderness—Men without Rights—Killing by Alcohol—Change in the Character of the Native—Growth of the War Spirit—Classification by Language—Dwellers in Tents and Builders of Houses—Farmers and Hunters—Irrigation Works—The Coming of the Horse | 54 |
| CHAPTER V |
| Three Conditions of Wilderness Life—Farming in the Driest Country—The Cache—The Clan, the Unit of the Tribe—Hospitality—Totems and Totem Marks—Dress—An Aboriginal Geographer—The Winter Life—The War-path, the Scalp-lock, and the Scalp-dance—Mourning the Lost Braves—Drifting | 75 |
| CHAPTER VI |
| Lost in the Wilderness—Cabeza de Vaca, Great Medicine Man—The Wilderness Traversed—Spanish Slave Hunters—The Northern Mystery—The Monk and the Negro—The Great Coronado Expedition—The Settlement of New Mexico and the Pueblo Rebellion—California Missions—Escalante to Salt Lake Valley | 103 |
| CHAPTER VII |
| Soto and the Mississippi—The Gate to the Wilderness—The Voyageur—Champlain to Mackinaw—Pandemonium of Wars—Down the Mississippi to Soto's Grave—Louisiana—La Salle and his Death—Coureurs de Bois—First Sight of the Northern Rockies—Where Rolls the Oregon—The American Revolution | 126 |
| CHAPTER VIII |
| The United States Borders the Wilderness—American Ships to the Pacific Coast—The North-West Company—Mackenzie Spans the Continent—Meares and Vancouver Baffled by Breakers—Captain Robert Gray, Victor—The Columbia at Last—The Louisiana Purchase a Pig in a Poke, and a Boundless Wilderness—Claims All Round to the Centre—The Perfidious Napoleon—The Spanish Sentinel Steps Back | 144 |
| CHAPTER IX |
| Jefferson's Hobby—Two Noblemen—An Indefinite Transaction—Expedition to the Wilderness—Fort Mandan—The Roche Jaune and the First View of the Great Range—The Long-lost Sister—Depths of the Unknown—Starvation on the Trail—Music of the Breakers—Fort Clatsop—The Return—Medicine Men Again—Two Natives Shot—Premature Death of the Captain | 156 |
| CHAPTER X |
| The Metropolis of the Far Wilderness—James Pursley Arrives—Pike up the Mississippi and across the Plains—A Spanish War Party—A Breastwork to Mark the Site of Pueblo—Polar Weather and No Clothing—Pike Sees the Grand Peak—San Luis Valley—The Americans Captured by Diplomacy—Pursley Finds Gold—Malgares, the Gentleman—The Pike Party Sent Home | 175 |
| CHAPTER XI |
| A Race for Life—Colter Wins—The Missouri Fur Company—The American Fur Company—The Pacific Fur Company—A Great Project Foredoomed—Disaster at the Columbia Bar—The Destruction of the Tonquin—Hunt Starts for the Columbia Overland—The Voyageurs Baulked—The Caldron Linn—Dog Steak at a Premium—Misery and Danger—Success at Last | 193 |
| CHAPTER XII |
| Eastward from Astoria—The War of 1812 on a Business Basis in Oregon—Astoria Becomes Fort George—The Pacific Fur Company Expires—Louisiana Delimited at Last—The Expedition of Major Long—A Steamboat on the Missouri—The First Man on Pike's Peak—The Elusive Red River Refuses to be Explored—Closing on the Inner Wilderness—The Spanish Sentinel Turns Mexican | 215 |
| CHAPTER XIII |
| The Wilderness Breaker—Lisa Closes his Account—General Ashley Takes a Hand—The Religious Jedediah—Green River Valley—What a White Bear could Do—Ashley Navigates Red Canyon of Green River—Discovery of Salt Lake—Ashley Retires Rich—The Rocky Mountain Fur Company—Sylvester and James O. Pattie—Pattie's Journey in the Valley of the Colorado—The Great Circuit of Jedediah Smith | 229 |
| CHAPTER XIV |
| A Brood of Wilderness Breakers—Kit Carson the Dauntless—Campbell, 1827, Santa FÉ to San Diego—Becknell and the Santa FÉ Trail—Wheel Tracks in the Wilderness—The Knight in Buckskin Dies—Pegleg Smith the Horse Trader—The Apache Turns Forever against the American—New Mexico the Dreamland—Wolfskill Breaks a Trail to the Pacific—Bonneville, Captain Courteous; and Wyeth, Leader Hopeful—Bonneville Forgets a Duty | 253 |
| CHAPTER XV |
| 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— Decoration
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