In this volume I have endeavoured to present a review in chronological order of the important events which contributed to breaking the Wilderness that so long lay untamed west of the Mississippi, mentioning with as much detail as possible in a single popular volume the principal persons and happenings in proper sequence, but paying special attention to the trapper and trader element, which, more than any other, dispelled the mysteries of the vast region.

I believe this to be the first book so fully to treat the subject as a consecutive narrative. By means of it, not only may the story of the struggle to master the Wilderness be examined, but the place of the trapper and trader in the work of its reduction, and that of Coronado, Mackenzie, Lewis and Clark, FrÉmont, Powell, and similar explorers, may be determined with reference to each other as well as with reference to the general order.

Many people seem to know little about Western history; about Coronado, Cabeza de Vaca, or even about Mackenzie; and others are by no means clear as to where in the historical scale these characters belong. While the name of Daniel Boone is familiar to every child, names of men equally eminent in the same pursuits, like Jedediah Smith, Bridger, Fitzpatrick, etc., are scarcely known at all. Nor have many persons a just appreciation of the numerous attempts that were made to explore the Western Wilderness, or of the extremely early period in the history of North America when these attempts began. Many are surprised, therefore, to learn that the first European entrance into the western part of the United States occurred over three and a quarter centuries ago. At least partly, this vagueness is due to the one-sidedness up to the present of the usual works dealing with American history, most of which are only histories of the eastern part of the country, with mere offhand references to the important events of the region beyond the Mississippi. Numerous details are presented of early Virginia and of New England, but the happenings in New Mexico and in California, and the great West generally, are dismissed with a few superficial notes.

Within the last year or two much has been written about Lewis and Clark, and consequently their grand exploit is well known, but its relation in the popular mind as to accomplishment and position with reference to other explorations is often quite uncertain. It therefore appeared to me that a single volume which should tell the Wilderness story in unbroken sequence, with special emphasis on the trapper and trader, would be of value. I have consequently shown the first attacks by sea and land, and the gradual closing in on all sides, through the matchless trail-breaking of the trappers and traders, down to the year when Powell practically finished this particular white man's task by his bold and romantic conquest of the Colorado,—the year when the first railway trains crossing the continent began a new era. In order that the subject might be still clearer and more comprehensive, I have gone farther and have told the story of the chief denizens of the pristine Wilderness: the beaver, the buffalo, and their close associates, those indomitable, iron-nerved people, the Amerinds; the North-Americans of yesterday.

Sometimes it is difficult to describe with precision the route of an explorer without searching his original story, and, in my studies, this has not always been practicable. For example, I do not know where the journals of Hunt and Bonneville now are, if extant. Irving's interpretation seems fairly accurate, but as he was entirely unfamiliar with the region west of the Rocky Mountains, his description is not always clear. In other cases, especially in that of Verendrye, I have relied on the transcripts of others. The trail of Coronado I have long studied with special care, and I have reached the conclusions embodied in the map on page 115,—conclusions entirely at variance with all accepted authorities, but which I feel confident, nevertheless, are in the main correct.

One early explorer in the Minnesota and Hudson Bay regions I have not mentioned. This is Radisson, who, it is claimed, saw the upper Mississippi before Marquette. The omission was an oversight. Miss A. C. Laut has given a convincing account of his travels in her Pathfinders of the West, to which I take pleasure in referring the reader for information on this point.[1]

A completed book is the mirror of the writer's shortcomings. I hope the reflections which may fall to my lot in this one will not be too painful, for I have had in contemplation others to fill in a general scheme. One starts with a desire for perfection, but without the resources of a Carnegie he is apt to fall so far short of the mark that he fears to look in the glass at all.

With the Wilderness, however, I can claim some degree of familiarity, for I may be said to have been "in at the death," as I was one of Powell's companions down the Colorado on his second voyage, 1871-72, and have been over portions of almost every one of the principal historical trails. I have travelled there on foot, on horseback, by boat, by waggon, and by railway,—even by Pullman "Palace" car. I have lived under its open sky through summers and through winters; its snows, its rains, its burning heat, have baptised me one of its children. In some cases my footsteps have been among the first of our race to break the surface; and if I have not visited every nook and corner of it during the last thirty four years it is the fault of my purse, not of my spirit.

My remarks on supplying whiskey to the natives may by some be deemed too severe, but in my own opinion there is no expression of condemnation adequate to denounce the debauchment of the American tribes by this foul means. It was a crime against civilisation, against humanity; a cruel, dastardly outrage against these people who by its means largely have been reduced to the lowest degree and are sneered at by those who have profited by their debasement. In the final chapter I have thought it desirable to add a footnote to the effect that I am neither a teetotaler nor a prohibitionist for the reason that my condemnatory remarks might otherwise be attributed to the prejudice of zeal, rather than to indignation at the low devices resorted to by white men to work the Amerinds for their own profit. A great deal that is base and mean is now excused on the ground that this is a commercial age, but I can only remark that if there is to be no standard for measuring modern conduct but financial profit, the white man's footsteps are surely on the wrong trail.

The reader in following these pages must remember that comfort is generally relative, and that what appears hard from the chimney corner may have been comparative luxury. I have never slept more comfortably anywhere than under a foot of snow.

I have had much kind assistance and am grateful for it. I am particularly obliged to Mr. William J. Schieffelin for the generous and unlimited use of valuable books from his library; to Mr. E. H. Harriman for transportation favours; also for the same to Mr. S. K. Hooper; to Mr. F. M. Bishop for the loan of a volume on Jacob Hamblin not otherwise obtainable; to Mr. O. D. Wheeler and the Montana Historical Society for cuts; to Captain E. L. Berthoud, Edgar A. Rider, and Jack Sumner for manuscript notes; to Mr. L. H. Johnson for manuscript notes and photographs; to Mr. B. L. Young for a special drawing of the rock pecking of a buffalo in southern Utah; to Mr. R. H. Chapman, Mr. J. B. Lippincott, Mr. J. K. Hillers, Mr. E. E. Howell, Mr. Delancy Gill, for photographs; and to the United States Bureau of Ethnology for the use of illustration material. I would also here thank my publishers for their constant consideration, for presents of books pertaining to my subject, and for the loan of others; and Mr. H. C. Rizer, chief clerk of the United States Geological Survey, for assistance and courtesies extending over a long series of years. Finally I wish to express my renewed thanks for many favours to the veteran geographer and explorer, A. H. Thompson, of the United States Geological Survey, to whom I have the honour of dedicating this book.

Frederick S. Dellenbaugh.

New York, December 7, 1904.