Pathfinders of the West

BEING

THE THRILLING STORY OF THE ADVENTURES
OF THE MEN WHO DISCOVERED
THE GREAT NORTHWEST

RADISSON, LA VÉRENDRYE, LEWIS AND CLARK

BY

A. C. LAUT

AUTHOR OF "LORDS OF THE NORTH," "HERALDS
OF EMPIRE," "STORY OF THE TRAPPER"

ILLUSTRATIONS BY
REMINGTON, GOODWIN, MARCHAND
AND OTHERS

NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS

COPYRIGHT, 1904,
By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.


Set up and electrotyped. Published November, 1904. Reprinted February, 1906.

WILDWOOD PLACE, WASSAIC, N.Y.

August 15, 1904.

DEAR MR. SULTE:

A few years ago, when I was a resident of the Far West and tried to trace the paths of early explorers, I found that all authorities—first, second, and third rate—alike referred to one source of information for their facts. The name in the tell-tale footnote was invariably your own.

While I assume all responsibility for upsetting the apple cart of established opinions by this book, will you permit me to dedicate it to you as a slight token of esteem to the greatest living French-Canadian historian, from whom we have all borrowed and to whom few of us have rendered the tribute due?

Faithfully,
AGNES C. LAUT.

MR. BENJAMIN SULTE,
PRESIDENT ROYAL SOCIETY,
OTTAWA, CANADA.

THE GREAT NORTHWEST

I love thee, O thou great, wild, rugged land
Of fenceless field and snowy mountain height,
Uprearing crests all starry-diademed
Above the silver clouds! A sea of light
Swims o'er thy prairies, shimmering to the sight
A rolling world of glossy yellow wheat
That runs before the wind in billows bright
As waves beneath the beat of unseen feet,
And ripples far as eye can see--as far and fleet!

Here's chances for every man! The hands that work
Become the hands that rule! Thy harvests yield
Only to him who toils; and hands that shirk
Must empty go! And here the hands that wield
The sceptre work! O glorious golden field!
O bounteous, plenteous land of poet's dream!
O'er thy broad plain the cloudless sun ne'er wheeled
But some dull heart was brightened by its gleam
To seize on hope and realize life's highest dream!

Thy roaring tempests sweep from out the north--
Ten thousand cohorts on the wind's wild mane--
No hand can check thy frost-steeds bursting forth
To gambol madly on the storm-swept plain!
Thy hissing snow-drifts wreathe their serpent train,
With stormy laughter shrieks the joy of might--
Or lifts, or falls, or wails upon the wane--
Thy tempests sweep their stormy trail of white
Across the deepening drifts--and man must die, or fight!

Yes, man must sink or fight, be strong or die!
That is thy law, O great, free, strenuous West!
The weak thou wilt make strong till he defy
Thy bufferings; but spacious prairie breast
Will never nourish weakling as its guest!
He must grow strong or die! Thou givest all
An equal chance--to work, to do their best--
Free land, free hand--thy son must work or fall
Grow strong or die! That message shrieks the storm-wind's call!

And so I love thee, great, free, rugged land
Of cloudless summer days, with west-wind croon,
And prairie flowers all dewy-diademed,
And twilights long, with blood-red, low-hung moon
And mountain peaks that glisten white each noon
Through purple haze that veils the western sky--
And well I know the meadow-lark's far rune
As up and down he lilts and circles high
And sings sheer joy--be strong, be free; be strong or die!