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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 42398 ***
+
+[Illustration: SHOOTING TONGUES OF SMOKE FROM THEIR GREAT BLACK THROATS]
+
+
+
+
+    Historic Adventures
+
+    _Tales from American History_
+
+    By
+    RUPERT S. HOLLAND
+
+    _Author of "Historic Boyhoods," "Historic Girlhoods,"
+    "Historic Inventions," etc._
+
+    [Illustration]
+
+    PHILADELPHIA
+    GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY
+    PUBLISHERS
+
+
+
+
+    Copyright, 1913, by
+    GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY
+    _Published October, 1913_
+
+    _All rights reserved_
+    Printed in U.S.A.
+
+
+
+
+    _To
+    Robert D. Jenks_
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+
+       I. THE LOST CHILDREN                                     9
+
+      II. THE GREAT JOURNEY OF LEWIS AND CLARK                 21
+
+     III. THE CONSPIRACY OF AARON BURR                         59
+
+      IV. HOW THE YOUNG REPUBLIC FOUGHT THE BARBARY PIRATES    80
+
+       V. THE FATE OF LOVEJOY'S PRINTING-PRESS                113
+
+      VI. HOW MARCUS WHITMAN SAVED OREGON                     135
+
+     VII. HOW THE MORMONS CAME TO SETTLE UTAH                 165
+
+    VIII. THE GOLDEN DAYS OF 'FORTY-NINE                      181
+
+      IX. HOW THE UNITED STATES MADE FRIENDS WITH JAPAN       203
+
+       X. THE PIG THAT ALMOST CAUSED A WAR                    222
+
+      XI. JOHN BROWN AT HARPER'S FERRY                        229
+
+     XII. AN ARCTIC EXPLORER                                  254
+
+    XIII. THE STORY OF ALASKA                                 264
+
+     XIV. HOW THE "MERRIMAC" WAS SUNK IN SANTIAGO HARBOR      275
+
+
+
+
+Illustrations
+
+
+    Shooting tongues of smoke from their great black
+            throats                                _Frontispiece_
+
+                                                    _Facing page_
+    Sawquehanna seemed to remember the voice                   18
+
+    Decatur caught the Moor's arm                              90
+
+    The last six hundred miles were the hardest               152
+
+    Nauvoo had handsome houses and public buildings           166
+
+    Wherever there was a stream explorers began to dig        186
+
+    The teams, exhausted, began to fail                       200
+
+    Spanish boats pulled close to them                        282
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+THE LOST CHILDREN
+
+
+The valleys of Pennsylvania were dotted with log cabins in the days of
+the French and Indian wars. Sometimes a number of the little houses
+stood close together for protection, but often they were built far
+apart. Wherever the pioneer saw good farm land he settled. It was a new
+sensation for men to be able to go into the country and take whatever
+land attracted them. Gentle rolling fields, with wide views of distant
+country through the notches of the hills, shining rivers, splendid uncut
+forests, and rich pasturage were to be found not far from the growing
+village of Philadelphia, and were free to any who wished to take them.
+Such a land would have been a paradise, but for one shadow that hung
+over it. In the background always lurked the Indians, who might at any
+time, without rhyme or reason, steal down upon the lonely hamlet or
+cabin, and lay it waste. The pioneer looked across the broad acres of
+central Pennsylvania and found them beautiful. Only when he had built
+his home and planted his fields did he fully realize the constant peril
+that lurked in the wooded mountains.
+
+English, French, and Spanish came to the new world, and the English
+proved themselves the best colonists. They settled the central part
+of the Atlantic Coast, but among them and mixed with them were people
+of other lands. The Dutch took a liking for the Island of Manhattan
+and the Hudson River, the Swedes for Delaware, and into the colony of
+William Penn came pilgrims from what was called the Palatinate, Germans,
+a strong race drawn partly by desire for religious freedom, partly by
+the reports of the great free lands across the ocean. They brought with
+them the tongue, the customs, and the names of the German Fatherland,
+and many a valley of eastern Pennsylvania heard only the German language
+spoken.
+
+The Indian tribes known as the Six Nations roamed through the country
+watered by the Susquehanna. They hunted through all the land south of
+the Great Lakes. Sometimes they fought with the Delawares, sometimes
+with the Catawbas, and again they would smoke the calumet or pipe of
+peace with their neighbors, and give up the war-path for months at a
+time. But the settlers could never be sure of their intentions. Wily
+French agents might sow seeds of discord in the Indians' minds, and
+then the chiefs who had lately exchanged gifts with the settlers might
+suddenly steal upon some quiet village and leave the place in ruins.
+This constant peril was the price men had to pay in return for the right
+to take whatever land they liked.
+
+In a little valley of eastern Pennsylvania a German settler named John
+Hartman had built a cabin in 1754. He had come to this place with his
+wife and four children because here he might earn a good living from the
+land. He was a hard worker, and his farm was prospering. He had horses
+and cattle, and his wife spun and wove the clothing for the family. The
+four children, George, Barbara, Regina, and Christian, looked upon the
+valley as their home, forgetting the German village over the sea. Not
+far away lived neighbors, and sometimes the children went to play with
+other boys and girls, and sometimes their friends spent a holiday on
+John Hartman's farm.
+
+The family, like all farmers' families, rose early. Before they began
+the day's work the father would read to them from his big Bible, which
+he had brought from his native land as his most valuable possession. On
+a bright morning in the autumn of 1754 he gathered his family in the
+living-room of his cabin and read them a Bible lesson. The doors and
+windows stood open, and the sun flooded the little house, built of rough
+boards, and scrupulously clean. The farmer's dog, Wasser, lay curled
+up asleep just outside the front door, and a pair of horses, already
+harnessed, stood waiting to be driven to the field. Birds singing in
+the trees called to the children to hurry out-of-doors. They tried to
+listen to their father's voice as he read, and to pay attention. As they
+all knelt he prayed for their safety. Then they had breakfast, and the
+father and mother made plans for the day. Mrs. Hartman was to take the
+younger boy, Christian, to the flour-mill several miles away, and if
+they had time was to call at the cabin of a sick friend. The father and
+George went to the field to finish their sowing before the autumn rains
+should come, and the two little girls were told to look after the house
+till their mother should return. Little Christian sat upon an old horse,
+held on by his mother, and waved his hand to his father and George as he
+rode by the field on his way to the mill.
+
+The girls, like their mother, were good housekeepers. They set the table
+for dinner, and at noon Barbara blew the big tin horn to call her father
+and brother. As they were eating dinner the dog Wasser came running into
+the house growling, and acting as if he were very much frightened. Mr.
+Hartman spoke to him, and called him to his side. But the dog stood in
+the doorway, and then suddenly leaped forward and sprang upon an Indian
+who came around the wall.
+
+The peril that lurked in the woods had come. John Hartman jumped to the
+door, but two rifle bullets struck him down. George sprang up, only to
+fall beside his father. An Indian killed the dog with his tomahawk.
+Into the peaceful cabin swarmed fifteen yelling savages. Barbara ran up
+a ladder into the loft, and Regina fell on her knees, murmuring "Herr
+Jesus! Herr Jesus!" The Indians hesitated, then one of them seized her,
+and made a motion with his knife across her lips to bid her be silent.
+Another went after Barbara and brought her down from the loft, and then
+the Indians ordered the two girls to put on the table all the food there
+was in the cabin.
+
+When the food was gone the savages plundered the house, making bundles
+of what they wanted and slinging them over their shoulders. They took
+the two little girls into the field. There another girl stood tied to
+the fence. When she saw Barbara and Regina she began to cry, and called
+in German for her mother. While the three frightened girls stood close
+together the Indians set fire to the cabin. Very soon the log house that
+had cost John Hartman so much labor was burned to the ground. When their
+work of destruction was completed the Indians took the three children
+into the woods.
+
+At sunset Mrs. Hartman returned from the flour-mill with little
+Christian riding his horse, but when she came up the road it seemed as
+if her house had disappeared. Yet the pine trees, the fences, the plowed
+fields, and the orchard were still there. The little boy cried, "Where
+is our house, mother?" and the poor woman could not understand.
+
+The story of what had occurred was only too plain to her a few minutes
+later. What had happened to many other pioneers had happened to her
+family. Clutching Christian in her arms she ran to the house of her
+nearest neighbor. There she heard that the Indians had left the same
+track of blood through other parts of the valley; that farmers had
+been slain; their crops burned; and their children carried off into the
+wilderness. The terrified settlers banded together for protection. For
+weeks new stories came of the Indians' massacres. If ever there were
+heartless savages these were! They did not carry all the children to
+their wigwams; some were killed on the way; and among them was little
+Barbara Hartman. Word came from time to time of some of the stolen
+children, but there was no word of Regina or Susan Smith, the daughter
+of the neighboring farmer.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Far in the forests of western New York was the camp of a great Indian
+tribe. The wigwams stood on the banks of a beautiful mountain stream,
+broken by great rocks that sent the water leaping in cascades and
+falls. In one of the wigwams lived the mother of a famous warrior
+of the tribe, and with her were two girls whom she treated as her
+daughters. The name of the old squaw was She-lack-la, which meant "the
+Dark and Rainy Cloud," a name given her because at times she grew very
+angry and ill-treated every one around her. Fortunately there were two
+girls in her wigwam, and when the old squaw was in a bad temper they
+had each other for protection. The older girl had been given the name
+of Saw-que-han-na, or "the White Lily," and the other was known as
+Kno-los-ka, "the Short-legged Bear." Like all the Indian girls they had
+to work hard, grinding corn, cooking and keeping house for the boys
+and men who were brought up to hunt and fight. Sawquehanna was tall and
+strong, spoke the language of the tribe, and looked very much like her
+Indian girl friends.
+
+In the meantime many battles had been fought through the country of
+the pioneers, and the English colonists were beating the French and
+Indians, and driving the Frenchmen farther and farther north. In 1765
+the long war between the two nations ended. Under a treaty of peace the
+English Colonel Boquet demanded that all the white children who had
+been captured by the Indian tribes should be surrendered to the English
+officers. So one day white soldiers came into the woods of western New
+York and found the wigwams there. The children were called out, and the
+soldiers took the two girls from the old squaw Shelackla. Then they
+went on to the other tribes, and from each they took all the white
+children. They carried them to Fort Duquesne. The Fort was in western
+Pennsylvania, and as soon as it was known that the lost white children
+were there, fathers and mothers all over the country hurried to find
+their boys and girls. Many of the children had been away so long that
+they hardly remembered their parents, but most of the parents knew their
+children, and found them again within the walls of the fortress.
+
+Some of the children, however, were not claimed. Sawquehanna and her
+friend Knoloska and nearly fifty more found no one looking for them
+and wondered what would happen to them. After they had waited at Fort
+Duquesne eight days, Colonel Boquet started to march with his band
+of children to the town of Carlisle, in hopes that they might find
+friends farther east, or at least kind-hearted people who would give the
+children homes. He sent news of their march all through the country, and
+from day to day as they traveled through the mountains by way of Fort
+Ligonier, Raystown, and Louden, eager people arrived to search among the
+band of children for lost sons and daughters. When the children came to
+Carlisle the town was filled with settlers from the East.
+
+The children stood in the market-place, and the men and women pressed
+about them, trying to recognize little ones who had been carried away by
+Indians years before. Some people who lived in the Blue Mountains were
+in the throng, and they recognized the dark-haired Indian girl Knoloska
+as Susan, the daughter of Mr. Smith, the farmer who had lived near the
+Hartmans. Knoloska and Sawquehanna had not been separated for a long
+time. They had kept together ever since the white soldiers had freed
+them from the old squaw's wigwam. Sawquehanna could not bear to think of
+having her comrade leave her, and Susan clung to her adopted sister's
+arm and kissed her again and again. The white people were much kinder
+than the old squaw had been, and instead of beating the girls when they
+cried, and frightening them with threats, the officers told Sawquehanna
+that she would probably find some friends soon, and if she did not, that
+perhaps Susan's family would let her live in their home. But as nobody
+seemed to recognize her Sawquehanna felt more lonely than she had ever
+felt before.
+
+Meanwhile Mrs. Hartman was living in the valley with her son Christian,
+who had grown to be a strong boy of fourteen. Neighbors told her that
+the lost children were being brought across the mountains to Carlisle,
+but there seemed little chance that her own Regina might be one of them.
+She decided, however, that she must go to the town and see. Travel
+was difficult in those days, but the brave woman set out over the
+mountains and across the rivers to Carlisle, and at last reached the
+town market-place. She looked anxiously among the girls, remembering
+her little daughter as she had been on that autumn day eleven years
+before; but none of the girls had the blue eyes, light yellow hair and
+red cheeks of Regina. Mrs. Hartman shook her head, and decided that her
+daughter was not among these children.
+
+As she turned away, disconsolate, Colonel Boquet said to her, "Can't you
+find your daughter?"
+
+"No," said the disappointed mother, "my daughter is not among those
+children."
+
+"Are you sure?" asked the colonel. "Are there no marks by which you
+might know her?"
+
+"None, sir," she answered, shaking her head.
+
+Colonel Boquet considered the matter for a few minutes. "Did you ever
+sing to her?" he asked presently. "Was there no old hymn that she was
+fond of?"
+
+The mother looked up quickly. "Yes, there was!" she answered. "I have
+often sung her to sleep in my arms with an old German hymn we all loved
+so well."
+
+"Then," said the colonel, "you and I will walk along the line of girls
+and you shall sing that hymn. It may be that your daughter has changed
+so much that you wouldn't know her, but she may remember the tune."
+
+Mrs. Hartman looked very doubtful. "There is little use in it, sir," she
+said, "for certainly I should have known her if she were here; and if
+I try your plan all these soldiers will laugh at me for a foolish old
+German woman."
+
+[Illustration: SAWQUEHANNA SEEMED TO REMEMBER THE VOICE]
+
+The colonel, however, begged her at least to try his plan, and she
+finally consented. They walked back to the place where the children were
+standing, and Mrs. Hartman began to sing in a trembling voice the first
+words of the old hymn:
+
+    "Alone, and yet not all alone, am I
+       In this lone wilderness."
+
+As she went on singing every one stopped talking and turned to look at
+her. The woman's hands were clasped as if in prayer, and her eyes
+were closed. The sun shone full upon her white hair and upturned face.
+There was something very beautiful in the picture she made, and there
+was silence in the market-place as her gentle voice went on through the
+words of the hymn.
+
+The mother had begun the second verse when one of the children gave a
+cry. It was Sawquehanna, who seemed suddenly to have remembered the
+voice and words. She rushed forward, and flung her arms about the
+mother's neck, crying, "Mother, mother!" Then, with her arms tight about
+her, the tall girl joined in singing the words that had lulled her to
+sleep in their cabin home.
+
+    "Alone, and yet not all alone, am I
+       In this lone wilderness,
+    I feel my Saviour always nigh;
+       He comes the weary hours to bless.
+    I am with Him, and He with me,
+       E'en here alone I cannot be."
+
+The people in the market-place moved on about their own affairs, and the
+mother and daughter were left together. Now Mrs. Hartman recognized the
+blue eyes of Regina, and knew her daughter in spite of her height and
+dark skin. Regina began to remember the days of her childhood, and the
+years she had spent among the Indians were forgotten. She was a white
+girl again, and happier now than she had ever thought to be.
+
+Next day Knoloska, now Susan Smith, and Sawquehanna, or Regina Hartman,
+went back to their homes in the valley. Many a settler there had found
+his son or daughter in the crowd of lost children at Carlisle.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+THE GREAT JOURNEY OF LEWIS AND CLARK
+
+
+French is still spoken in Quebec and New Orleans, reminders that the
+land of the lilies had much to do with the settlement of North America.
+Many of the greatest explorers of the continent were Frenchmen. Jacques
+Cartier sailed up the St. Lawrence River in 1534, and Champlain in 1603
+founded New France, and from his small fortress at Quebec planned an
+empire that should reach to Florida. In 1666 Robert Cavalier, the Sieur
+de La Salle, came to Canada, and set out from his _seigneurie_ near the
+rapids of Montreal to find the long-sought road to China. Instead of
+doing that he discovered the Ohio River, first of white men he voyaged
+across the Great Lakes and sailed down the Mississippi to its mouth.
+Great explorer, he mapped the country from the St. Lawrence to the
+Gulf of Mexico, from the Mississippi to the Atlantic Ocean, and built
+frontier-posts in the wilderness. He traveled thousands of miles, and in
+1682 he raised the lilies of France near the mouth of the Mississippi
+and named the whole territory he had covered _Louisiana_, in honor of
+King Louis XIV of France.
+
+The first colony on the Gulf was established seventeen years later at
+Biloxi by a Canadian _seigneur_ named Iberville. Soon afterward this
+_seigneur's_ brother, Bienville, founded New Orleans and attracted
+many French pioneers there. The French proved to be better explorers
+than farmers or settlers. In the south they hunted the sources of the
+Arkansas and Red Rivers, and discovered the little-known Pawnee and
+Comanche Indians. In the north they pressed westward and came in sight
+of the Rocky Mountains. At that time it seemed as if France was to own
+at least two-thirds of the continent. The English general, Braddock,
+was defeated at Fort Duquesne in 1755, and the French commanded the
+Ohio as well as the Mississippi; but four years later the English
+general, Wolfe, won the victory of the Plains of Abraham near Quebec;
+and France's chance was over. Men in Paris who knew little concerning
+the new world did not scruple to give away their country's title to
+vast lands. The French ceded Canada and all of La Salle's old province
+of Louisiana east of the Mississippi, except New Orleans, to England.
+Soon afterward France, to outwit England, gave Spain New Orleans and her
+claim to the half of the Mississippi Valley west of the river to which
+the name Louisiana now came to be restricted.
+
+The French, however, were great adventurers by nature, and Napoleon,
+changing the map of Europe, could not keep his fingers from North
+America. He planned to win back the New France that had been given
+away. Spain was weak, and Napoleon traded a small province in Italy for
+the great tract of Louisiana. He meant to colonize and fortify this
+splendid empire, but before it could be done enemies gathered against
+his eagles at home, and to save his European throne he had to forsake
+his western colony.
+
+When Thomas Jefferson became President in 1801, he found the people of
+the South and West disturbed at France's repossessing herself of so much
+territory. He sent Robert R. Livingston and James Monroe to Paris to try
+to buy New Orleans and the country known as the Floridas for $2,000,000.
+Instead Napoleon offered to sell not only New Orleans, but the whole
+of Louisiana Territory extending as far west as the Rocky Mountains
+for $15,000,000. Napoleon insisted on the sale, and the envoys agreed.
+Jefferson and the people in the eastern United States were dismayed at
+the price paid for what they considered almost worthless land, but the
+West was delighted, owning the mouth of the great Mississippi and with
+the country beyond it free to them to explore. In time this purchase of
+Louisiana, or the territory stretching to the Rocky Mountains, forming
+the larger part of what are now thirteen of the states of the Union,
+was to be considered one of the greatest pieces of good fortune in the
+country's history.
+
+Scarcely anything was known of Louisiana, except the stories told by
+a few hunters. Jefferson decided that the region must be explored,
+and asked his young secretary, Meriwether Lewis, who had shown great
+interest in the new country, to make a path through the wilderness.
+Lewis chose his friend William Clark to accompany him, and picked
+thirty-two experienced men for their party. May 14, 1804, the expedition
+set out in a barge with sails and two smaller boats from a point on the
+Missouri River near St. Louis.
+
+The nearer part of this country had already been well explored by
+hunters and trappers, and especially by that race of adventurous
+Frenchmen who were rovers by nature. These men could not endure
+the confining life of towns, and were continually pushing into the
+wilderness, driving their light canoes over the waters of the great
+rivers, and often sharing the tents of friendly Indians they met. Many
+had become almost more Indian than white man,--had married Indian
+wives and lived the wandering life of the native. Such a man Captain
+Lewis found at the start of his journey, and took with him to act as
+interpreter among the Sioux and tribes who spoke a similar language.
+
+The party traveled rapidly at the outset of their journey, meeting small
+bands of Indians, and passing one or two widely-separated frontier
+settlements. They had to pass many difficult rapids in the river, but as
+they were for the most part expert boatmen they met with no mishaps. The
+last white town on the Missouri was a little hamlet called La Charrette,
+consisting of seven houses, with as many families located there to hunt
+and trade for skins and furs. As they went up the river they frequently
+met canoes loaded with furs coming down. Day by day they took careful
+observations, and made maps of the country through which they were
+traveling, and when they met Indians tried to learn the history and
+customs of the tribe. Captain Lewis wrote down many of their curious
+traditions. The Osage tribe had given their name to a river that flowed
+into the Missouri a little more than a hundred miles from its mouth.
+There were three tribes of this nation: the Great Osages, numbering
+about five hundred warriors; the Little Osages, who lived some six miles
+distant from the others, and numbered half as many men; and the Arkansas
+band, six hundred strong, who had left the others some time before, and
+settled on the Vermillion River. The Osages lived in villages and were
+good farmers, usually peaceful, although naturally strong and tireless.
+Captain Lewis found a curious tradition as to the origin of their tribe.
+The story was that the founder of the nation was a snail, who lived
+quietly on the banks of the Osage until a high flood swept him down to
+the Missouri, and left him exposed on the shore. The heat of the sun
+at length ripened him into a man, but with the change in his nature he
+did not forget his native haunts on the Osage, but immediately bent
+his way in that direction. He was, however, soon overtaken by hunger
+and fatigue, when happily the Great Spirit appeared, and giving him a
+bow and arrow showed him how to kill and cook deer, and cover himself
+with the skins. He then pushed on to his home, but as he neared it he
+was met by a beaver, who inquired haughtily who he was, and by what
+authority he came to disturb his possession. The Osage answered that the
+river was his own, for he had once lived on its borders. As they stood
+disputing, the daughter of the beaver came, and having by her entreaties
+made peace between her father and the young stranger, it was proposed
+that the Osage should marry the young beaver, and share the banks of
+the river with her family. The Osage readily consented, and from this
+happy marriage there came the village and the nation of the Wasbasha,
+or Osages, who kept a reverence for their ancestors, never hunting the
+beaver, because in killing that animal they would kill a brother of the
+Osage. The explorers found, however, that since the value of beaver
+skins had risen in trade with the white men, these Indians were not so
+particular in their reverence for their relatives.
+
+The mouth of the Platte River was reached on July 21st, and the next day
+Lewis held a council with the Ottoes and Missouri Indians, and named the
+site Council Bluffs. At each of these meetings between Lewis and the
+Indians the white man would explain that this territory was now part
+of the United States, would urge the tribes to trade with their new
+neighbors, and then present them with gifts of medals, necklaces, rings,
+tobacco, ornaments of all sorts, and often powder and arms.
+
+The Indians were friendly and each day taught the white men something
+new. Both Captain Lewis and Lieutenant Clark had seen much of the red
+men on the frontier, but now they were in a land where they found them
+in their own homes. They grew accustomed to the round tepees decorated
+with bright-colored skins, the necklaces made of claws of grizzly bears,
+the head-dresses of eagle feathers, the tambourines, or small drums that
+furnished most of their music, the whip-rattles made of the hoofs of
+goats and deer, the white-dressed buffalo robes painted with pictures
+that told the history of the tribe, the moccasins and tobacco pouches
+embroidered with many colored beads. Each tribe differed in some way
+from its neighbors. For the first time the explorers found among the
+Rickarees eight-sided earth-covered lodges, and basket-shaped boats made
+of interwoven boughs covered with buffalo skins.
+
+Game was plentiful as they went farther up the Missouri River. At
+first no buffaloes were found, but bands of elk were seen, and large
+herds of goats crossing from their summer grazing grounds in the hilly
+region west of the Missouri to their winter quarters. Besides these
+were antelopes, beavers, bears, badgers, deer, and porcupines, and the
+river banks supplied them with plover, grouse, geese, turkeys, ducks,
+and pelicans. There were plenty of wild fruits to be had, and they lived
+well during the whole of the summer. They traveled rapidly until the
+approach of cold weather decided them to establish winter quarters on
+October 27th.
+
+They pitched their camp, which they called Fort Mandan, on the eastern
+shore of the Missouri, near the present city of Bismarck. They built
+some wooden huts, which formed two sides of a triangle, and a row of
+pickets on the third side, to provide them with a stockade in case of
+attack. They found a trader of the Hudson's Bay Company near by, and
+during the winter a dozen other traders visited them. Although they
+appeared to be friendly, Captain Lewis was convinced that the traders
+had no desire to see this United States expedition push into the
+country, and would in fact do all they could to prevent its advance.
+The Indians in the neighborhood belonged to the tribes of the Mandans,
+Rickarees, and Minnetarees. The first two of these tribes went to war
+early in the winter, but peace was made through the efforts of Captain
+Lewis. After that all the Indians visited the encampment, bringing
+stores of corn and presents of different sorts, in exchange for which
+they obtained beads, rings, and cloth from the white men. Here Captain
+Lewis learned a curious legend of the Mandan tribe. They believed that
+all their nation originally lived in one large village underground
+near a subterranean lake, and that a grape-vine stretched its roots
+down to their home and gave them a view of daylight. Some of the more
+adventurous of the tribe climbed up the vine, and were delighted with
+the sight of the earth, which they found covered with buffaloes and
+rich with all kinds of fruits. They gathered some grapes and returned
+with them to their countrymen, and told them of the charms of the land
+they had seen. The others were very much pleased with the story and with
+the grapes, and men, women and children started to climb up the vine.
+But when only half of them had reached the top a heavy woman broke the
+vine by her weight, and so closed the road to the rest of the nation.
+Each member of this tribe was accustomed to select a particular object
+for his devotion, and call it his "medicine." To this they would offer
+sacrifices of every kind. One of the Indians said to Captain Lewis, "I
+was lately the owner of seventeen horses; but I have offered them all
+up to my 'medicine,' and am now poor." He had actually loosed all his
+seventeen horses on the plains, thinking that in that way he was doing
+honor to his god.
+
+Almost every day hunting parties left the camp and brought back
+buffaloes. The weather grew very cold in December, and several times
+the thermometer fell to forty degrees below zero. As spring advanced,
+however, the weather became very mild, and as early as April 7, 1805,
+they were able to leave their camp at Fort Manden and start on again.
+The upper Missouri they found was too shallow for the large barge they
+had used the previous summer, so this was now sent back down the river
+in charge of a party of ten men who carried letters and specimens,
+while the others embarked in six canoes and two large open boats that
+they had built during the winter. So far the country through which they
+had passed had been explored by a few Hudson's Bay trappers, but as they
+now turned westward they came into a region entirely unknown, which they
+soon found was almost uninhabited.
+
+The party had by this time three interpreters, one a Canadian half-breed
+named Drewyer, who had inherited from his mother the Indian's skill in
+woodcraft, and who also knew the language of the white explorers. The
+other two were a man named Chaboneau and his wife, a young squaw called
+Sacajawea, the "Bird-woman," who had originally belonged to the Snake
+tribe, but who had been captured in her childhood by Blackfeet Indians.
+This Indian girl had married Chaboneau, a French wanderer, who like
+many others of his kind had sunk into an almost savage state. As the
+squaw had not forgotten the language of her native people the two white
+leaders thought she would prove a valuable help to them in the wild
+country westward, and persuaded her and her husband to go on with them.
+
+As the weather was fine the party traveled rapidly, and by April 26th
+reached the mouth of the Yellowstone. They were now very far north,
+near the northwest corner of what is the state of North Dakota. Game
+was still plentiful but the banks of the river were covered with a
+coating of alkali salts, which made the water of the streams bitter and
+unpleasant for drinking. Occasionally they came upon a deserted Indian
+camp, but in this northern territory they found few roving tribes. When
+there was a favorable wind they sailed along the Missouri, but most of
+the time they had to use their oars. Early in May they drew up their
+birch canoes for the night at the mouth of a stream where they found a
+large number of porcupines feeding on young willow trees. Captain Lewis
+christened the stream Porcupine River. Here there were quantities of
+game, and elk and buffalo in abundance, so that it was an easy matter to
+provide food for all the party.
+
+Now they were continually coming upon new rivers, many of them broad,
+with swift-flowing currents, and all of them appealing to the love of
+exploration. The Missouri was their highroad, however, and so they
+simply stopped to name the different streams they came to. One they
+passed had a peculiar white color, and Captain Lewis called it the Milk
+River. The country along this stream was bare for some distance, with
+gradually rising hills beyond.
+
+The game here was very plentiful and the buffaloes were so tame that the
+men were obliged to drive them away with sticks and stones. The only
+dangerous animal was the grizzly bear, a beast that never seemed to know
+when he had had enough of a fight. One evening the men in the canoes
+saw a large grizzly lying some three hundred paces from the shore. Six
+of them landed and hid behind a small hillock within forty paces of the
+bear; four of the hunters fired, and each lodged a ball in the bear's
+body. The animal sprang up and roared furiously at them. As he came near
+them the two hunters who had not yet fired gave him two more wounds,
+one of which broke a shoulder, but before they had time to reload their
+guns, the bear was so near them that they had to run for the river.
+He almost overtook them; two jumped into the canoes; the other four
+separated, and hiding in the willows fired as fast as they could reload
+their guns. Again and again they shot him, but each time the shots
+only seemed to attract his attention toward the hunters, until finally
+he chased two of them so closely that they threw away their guns, and
+jumped down a steep bank into the river. The bear sprang after them, and
+was almost on top of the rear man when one of the others on shore shot
+him in the head, and finally killed him. They dragged him to shore, and
+found that eight balls had gone through him in different directions. The
+hunters took the bear's skin back to camp, and there they learned that
+another adventure had occurred. One of the other canoes, which contained
+all the provisions, instruments, and numerous other important articles,
+had been under sail when it was struck on the side by a sudden squall
+of wind. The man at the helm, who was one of the worst navigators of
+the party, made the mistake of luffing the boat into the wind. The
+wind was so high that it forced the brace of the square-sail out of the
+hand of the man who was holding it, and instantly upset the canoe. The
+boat would have turned upside down but for the resistance of the canvas
+awning. The other boats hastened to the rescue, righted the canoe, and
+by baling her out kept her from sinking. They rowed the canoe to shore
+and the cargo was saved. Had it been lost the expedition would have been
+deprived of most of the things that were necessary for its success, at
+a distance of between two and three thousand miles from any place where
+they could get supplies.
+
+On May 20th they reached the yellowish waters of the Musselshell River.
+A short distance beyond this Captain Lewis caught his first view of
+the Rocky Mountains, one of the goals toward which they were tending.
+Along the Musselshell the country was covered with wild roses and small
+honeysuckle, but soon after they came into a region that was very
+bare and dry, where both game and timber were scarce, the mosquitoes
+annoying, the noonday sun uncomfortably hot, and the nights very cold.
+The Missouri River, along which they were still traveling, was now
+heading to the southwest. They were near the border of the present state
+of Idaho when they passed several old Indian camps, most of which seemed
+to have been deserted for five or six weeks. From this fact they judged
+that they were following a band of about one hundred lodges, who were
+traveling up the same river. They knew that the Minnetarees of the
+Missouri often traveled as far west as the Yellowstone, and presumed
+that the Indians ahead of them belonged to that tribe. There were other
+evidences of the Indians. At the foot of a cliff they found the bodies
+of a great many slaughtered buffaloes, which had been hunted after the
+fashion of the Blackfeet. Their way of hunting was to select one of the
+most active braves, and disguise him by tying a buffalo skin around his
+body, fastening the skin of the head, with ears and horns, over the head
+of the brave. Thus disguised the Indian would take a position between a
+herd of buffalo and the precipice overlooking a river. The other hunters
+would steal back of the herd, and at a given signal chase them. The
+buffaloes would run in the direction of the disguised brave, who would
+lead them on at full speed toward the river. As he reached the edge he
+would quickly hide himself in some crevice or ravine of the cliff, which
+he had chosen beforehand, and the herd would be left on the brink. The
+buffaloes in front could not stop being driven on by those behind, who
+in their turn would be closely pursued by the hunters. The whole herd,
+therefore, would usually rush over the cliff, and the hunters could take
+their pick of hides and meat in the river below. This method of hunting
+was very extravagant, but at that time the Indians had no thought of
+preserving the buffaloes. One of the rivers Lewis passed in this region
+he named the Slaughter River, on account of this way of hunting.
+
+When the Missouri turned southward the explorers came to many steep
+rapids, around which the canoes had to be carried, which made traveling
+slow. Often the banks were so steep and the mud so thick that the men
+were obliged to take off their moccasins, and much of the time they were
+up to their arms in the cold water of the river. But there was a great
+deal to charm the eye in the opening spring, even in that bare country.
+Lewis found places near the river filled with choke-cherries, yellow
+currants, wild roses, and prickly pears in full bloom. In the distance
+the mountains, rising in long greenish-blue chains, the tops covered
+with snow, invited the travelers to find what lay on the other side of
+their ridges.
+
+On June 3d they reached a place where the river divided into two wide
+streams, and it became very important to decide which of the two was
+the one that the Indians called the Ahmateahza, or Missouri, which they
+had said approached very near to the Columbia River. Lewis knew that
+the success of his expedition depended largely upon choosing the right
+stream, because if, after they had ascended the Rocky Mountains beyond,
+they should find that the river they had taken did not bring them near
+the Columbia, they would have to return, and thereby would lose a large
+part of the summer, which was the only season when they could travel.
+For this reason he decided to send out two exploring parties. He himself
+made a two days' march up the north branch, and deciding that this was
+not the Missouri, he named it Maria's River. As they came back they had
+to walk along high cliffs, and at one steep point Captain Lewis slipped,
+and, if he had not been able to catch himself with his mountain stick,
+would have been thrown into the river. He had just reached a point of
+safety when he heard a man behind him call out, "Good God, captain, what
+shall I do?" Turning instantly he found that his companion had lost his
+footing on the narrow pass, and had slipped down to the very edge of the
+precipice, where he lay with his right arm and leg over the cliff, while
+with the other arm and leg he was trying to keep from slipping over.
+Lewis saw the danger, but calmly told the other to take his knife from
+his belt with his right hand, and dig a hole in the side of the bluff in
+which to stick his foot. With great presence of mind the man did this,
+and getting a foothold, raised himself on his knees. Lewis then told him
+to take off his moccasins, and crawl forward on his hands and knees, his
+knife in one hand and his rifle in the other. In this manner the man
+regained a secure place on the cliff.
+
+Captain Lewis considered that this method of traveling was too
+dangerous, and he ordered the rest of the party to wade the river at the
+foot of the bluff, where the water was only breast-high. This adventure
+taught them the danger of crossing the slippery heights above the
+stream, but as the plains were broken by ravines almost as difficult
+to pass, they kept on down the river, sometimes wading in the mud
+of the low grounds, sometimes in the water, but when that became too
+deep, cutting footholds in the river bank with their knives. On that
+particular day they traveled through rain, mud, and water for eighteen
+miles, and at night camped in a deserted Indian lodge built of sticks.
+Here they cooked part of the six deer they had killed in the day's
+traveling, and slept on willow boughs they piled inside the lodge.
+
+Many of the party thought that the north fork was the Missouri River,
+but Lewis and Clark were both convinced that the south fork was the real
+Missouri. They therefore hid their heaviest boat and all the supplies
+they could spare, and prepared to push on with as little burden as
+possible. A few days later Lewis was proved to be right in his judgment
+of the south fork, for on June 13th he came to the Great Falls of the
+Missouri. The grandeur of the falls made a tremendous impression on
+them all. The river, three hundred yards wide, was shut in by steep
+cliffs, and for ninety yards from the left cliff the water fell in a
+smooth sheet over a precipice of eighty feet. The rest of the river shot
+forward with greater force, and, being broken by projecting rocks, sent
+clouds of foam into the air. As the water struck the basin below the
+falls it beat furiously against the ledge of rocks that extended across
+the river, and Lewis found that for three miles below the stream was one
+line of rapids and cascades, overhung by bluffs. Five miles above the
+first falls the whole river was blocked by one straight shelf of rock,
+over which the water ran in an even sheet, a majestic sight.
+
+This part of the Missouri, however, offered great difficulties to their
+travel. The men had now journeyed constantly for several months, and
+were in a region of steep falls and rapids. It was clear that they could
+not carry the boats on their shoulders for long distances. Fortunately
+they found a small creek at the foot of the falls, and by this they were
+able to reach the highlands. From there Lieutenant Clark and a few men
+surveyed the trail they were to follow, while others hunted and prepared
+stores of dried meat, and the carpenter built a carriage to transport
+the boats. They found a large cottonwood tree, about twenty-two inches
+in diameter, which provided them with the carriage wheels. They decided
+to leave one of their boats behind, and use its mast for two axle-trees.
+
+Meantime Clark studied the river and found that a series of rapids
+made a perilous descent, and that a portage of thirteen miles would be
+necessary. The country was difficult for traveling, being covered with
+patches of prickly pears, the needles of which cut through the moccasins
+of the men who dragged the boat's carriage. To add to the difficulty,
+when they were about five miles from their goal the axle-trees broke,
+and then the tongues of green cottonwood gave way. They had to stop
+and search for a substitute, and finally found willow trees, which
+provided them with enough wood to patch up the boat-carriage. Half a
+mile from their new camping place the carriage broke again, and this
+time they found it easier to carry boat and baggage than to build a
+new conveyance. Captain Lewis described the state of his party at this
+portage. "The men," he wrote, "are loaded as heavily as their strength
+will permit; the crossing is really painful; some are limping with the
+soreness of their feet, others are scarcely able to stand for more than
+a few minutes from the heat and fatigue; they are all obliged to halt
+and rest frequently, and at almost every stopping place they fall, and
+many of them are asleep in an instant."
+
+As they had to go back to the other side of the rapids for the stores
+they had left, they were obliged to repair the carriage and cross the
+portage again and again. After ten days' work all their stores were
+above the falls.
+
+While they were busy making this portage they had several narrow escapes
+from attacks by grizzly bears. The bears were so bold that they would
+walk into the camp at night, attracted by buffalo meat, and the sleeping
+men were in danger from their claws. A tremendous storm added to their
+discomfort, and the hailstones were driven so furiously by the high wind
+that they wounded some of the men. Before the storm Lieutenant Clark,
+with his colored servant York, the half-breed Chaboneau, and his Indian
+wife and young child, had taken the road above the falls on their way
+to camp when they noticed a very dark cloud coming up rapidly in the
+west. Clark hunted about for shelter, and at length found a ravine
+protected by shelving rocks under which they could take refuge. Here
+they were safe from the rain, and they laid down their guns, compass,
+and the other articles they had with them. Rain and hail beat upon their
+shelter, and the rain began to fall in such solid sheets that it washed
+down rocks and mud from higher up the ravine. Then a landslide started,
+but just before the heaviest part of it struck them Lieutenant Clark
+seized his gun in one hand, and pushed the Indian woman, her child in
+her arms, up the bank. Her husband also caught at her and pulled her
+along, but he was so much frightened at the noise and danger that but
+for Clark's steadiness he, with his wife and child, would probably have
+been lost. As it was, Clark could hardly climb as fast as the water
+rose. Had they waited a minute longer they would have been swept into
+the Missouri just above the Great Falls. They reached the top in safety,
+and there found York, who had left them just before the storm to hunt
+some buffalo. They pushed on to camp where the rest of the party had
+already taken shelter, and had abandoned all work for that day.
+
+While the men were building a new boat of skins, Captain Lewis spent
+much time studying the animals, trees, and plants of the region, making
+records of them to take home. Ever since their arrival at the falls
+they had heard a strange noise coming from the mountains a little to the
+north of west. "It is heard at different periods of the day and night,"
+Lewis wrote, "sometimes when the air is perfectly still and without a
+cloud, and consists of one stroke only, or of five or six discharges
+in quick succession. It is loud, and resembles precisely the sound
+of a six-pound piece of ordnance at the distance of three miles. The
+Minnetarees frequently mentioned this noise like thunder, which they
+said the mountains made; but we paid no attention to it, believing it to
+have been some superstition, or perhaps a falsehood. The watermen also
+of the party say that the Pawnees and Ricaras give the same account of a
+noise heard in the Black Mountains to the westward of them. The solution
+of the mystery given by the philosophy of the watermen is, that it is
+occasioned by the bursting of the rich mines of silver confined within
+the bosom of the mountain."
+
+Early in July the new boat was finished. It was very strong, and yet
+could be carried easily by five men. But when it was first launched
+they found that the tar-like material with which they had covered the
+skins that made the body of the boat would not withstand water, and so
+the craft leaked. After trying to repair the boat for several days they
+finally decided to abandon it. Putting all their luggage into the canoes
+they resumed their journey up the river.
+
+As the canoes were heavily loaded the men who were not needed to paddle
+them walked along the shore. The country here was very picturesque. At
+times they climbed hills that gave them wide views of open country never
+explored by white men; again they waded through fields of wild rye,
+reminding them of the farm lands of the East; sometimes their path wound
+through forests of redwood trees, and always they could see the high
+mountains, still snow-capped. The glistening light on the mountain tops
+told the explorers why they were called the Shining Mountains.
+
+Game was now less plentiful, and as they had to save the dried meat
+for the crossing of the mountains, it became a problem to provide
+food for the party of thirty-two people, who usually consumed a daily
+supply equal to an elk and deer, four deer or one buffalo. The wild
+berries, however, were now ripe, and as there were quantities of these
+they helped to furnish the larder. There were red, purple, yellow, and
+black currants, gooseberries, and service-berries. The sunflower grew
+everywhere. Lewis wrote in his diary: "The Indians of the Missouri, more
+especially those who do not cultivate maize, make great use of the seed
+of this plant for bread or in thickening their soup. They first parch
+and then pound it between two stones until it is reduced to a fine meal.
+Sometimes they add a portion of water, and drink it thus diluted; at
+other times they add a sufficient proportion of marrow grease to reduce
+it to the consistency of common dough and eat it in that manner. This
+last composition we preferred to all the rest, and thought it at that
+time a very palatable dish."
+
+The Missouri now flowed to the south, and on July 18th the party reached
+a wide stream, which they named Dearborn River in honor of the Secretary
+of War. Lewis meant to send back a small party in canoes from this
+point, but as he had not yet met the Snake Indians, and was uncertain
+as to their friendliness, he decided he had better not weaken his
+expedition here. He, however, sent Clark with three men on a scouting
+trip. Clark found an old Indian road, which he followed, but the prickly
+pears cut the feet of his men so badly that he could not go far. Along
+his track he strewed signals, pieces of cloth and paper, to show the
+Indians, if they should cross that trail, that the party was composed
+of white men. Before he returned the main party had discovered a great
+column of smoke up the valley, and suspected that this was an Indian
+signal to show that their approach had been discovered. Afterward they
+learned that this was the fact. The Indians had heard one of Clark's men
+fire a gun, and, taking alarm, had fled into the mountains, giving the
+smoke signal to warn the rest of the tribe.
+
+The high mountains now began to draw close to the expedition, and they
+camped one night at a place called the Gates of the Rocky Mountains.
+Here tremendous rocks rose directly from the river's edge almost twelve
+hundred feet in the air; at the base they were made of black granite,
+but the upper part Lewis decided was probably flint of a yellowish brown
+and cream color. On July 25th the advance guard reached the three forks
+of the Missouri. Chaboneau was ill, and they had to wait until Lewis
+and the others caught up. They named the forks of the river Gallatin,
+Madison, and Jefferson, in honor of the statesmen of those names. It was
+at this place that the Indian squaw Sacajawea had been in camp with her
+tribe five years before when the Minnetarees attacked them, killed some,
+and made a prisoner of her and some others. Lewis hoped that she would
+be able to help them if they should fall in with bands of her own tribe.
+
+As the main stream ended here, the party now followed the Jefferson
+River. They soon decided that it would be necessary to secure horses
+if they were to cross the mountains, and Lewis with three men set out
+to try to find the Shoshone Indians, from whom they might buy mounts.
+After several hours' march they saw a man on horseback coming across the
+plain toward them; examining him through the glass Lewis decided that
+he belonged to a different tribe of Indians from any that they had yet
+met, probably the Shoshones. He was armed with a bow and a quiver of
+arrows, and rode a good horse without a saddle, a small string attached
+to the lower jaw answering as a bridle. Lewis was anxious to convince
+him that the white men meant to be friendly, and went toward him at his
+usual pace. When they were still some distance apart the Indian suddenly
+stopped. Lewis immediately stopped also, and taking his blanket from
+his knapsack, and holding it with both hands at the four corners threw
+it above his head and then unfolded it as he brought it to the ground,
+as if in the act of spreading it. This signal, which was intended to
+represent the spreading of a robe as a seat for guests, was the common
+sign of friendship among the Indian tribes of the Missouri and the Rocky
+Mountains. Lewis repeated the sign three times, and then taking some
+beads, a looking-glass, and a few other trinkets from his knapsack, and
+leaving his gun, walked on toward the Indian. But when he was within
+two hundred yards of him the Indian turned his horse and began to ride
+away. Captain Lewis then called to him, using words of the Shoshones.
+The captain's companions now walked forward, also, and their advance
+evidently frightened the Indian, for he suddenly whipped his horse and
+disappeared in a clump of willow bushes. When they returned to the
+camp Lewis packed some more Indian gifts in his knapsack, and fastened
+a small United States flag to a pole to be carried by one of the men,
+which was intended as a friendly signal should the Indians see them
+advancing.
+
+The next day brought them to the head-waters of the Jefferson River,
+rising from low mountains. They had now reached the sources of the
+great Missouri River, a place never before seen by white men. From this
+distant spot flowed the waters that traversed a third of the continent,
+finally flowing into the Mississippi near St. Louis.
+
+Leaving the river, they followed an Indian road through the hills, and
+reached the top of a ridge from which they could see more mountains,
+partly covered with snow. The ridge on which they stood marked the
+dividing line between the waters of the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans.
+Going down the farther side they came to a creek, which was part of
+the Columbia River; near this was a spring. They gathered enough dry
+willow brush for fuel, and halted for the night. Here they ate their
+last piece of pork, and had only a little flour and parched meal left
+in the way of provisions. Early next day Lewis went forward on foot,
+hoping to find some Indians. After several hours he saw three; but they
+fled away. Later he came upon three Indian women; one of them ran, but
+the other two, an elderly woman and a little girl, approached, evidently
+thinking that the strangers were too near for them to escape, and sat
+down on the ground. Lewis put down his rifle and walking to them, took
+the woman by the hand, and helped her up. He then rolled up his shirt
+sleeve to show that he was a white man, since his hands and face were
+almost as dark as an Indian's. His companions joined him, and they gave
+the Indians some pewter mirrors, beads, and other presents. He painted
+the women's cheeks with some vermilion paint, which was the Shoshone
+custom, meaning peace. He then made them understand by signs that he
+wished to go to their camp to see their chiefs. The squaw led the white
+men along a road for some two miles, when they met a band of sixty
+mounted warriors riding toward them. Again Lewis dropped his rifle, and
+courageously marched out to deal with these unknown red men. The chief
+and two others galloped up in advance and spoke to the women, who showed
+them the presents they had just received. Then the three Indians leaped
+from their horses, and coming up to Lewis, put their arms about him in
+friendly greeting, at the same time rubbing their cheeks against his and
+smearing considerable paint on his face. The other white men advanced
+and were greeted in the same way. Lewis gave presents to the warriors,
+and, lighting a pipe, offered it to them for the "smoke of peace."
+Before they smoked it, however, the Indians took off their moccasins,
+a custom which meant that they would go barefooted forever, before
+they broke their treaty of friendship with their friends. The chief
+then turned and led the white men and his warriors to their camp. Here
+the white men were invited into a leathern lodge, and seated on green
+boughs and antelope skins. A small fire was lit in the centre. Again
+taking off their moccasins, the chief lighted a pipe made of some highly
+polished green stone; after some words in his own tongue he handed the
+pipe to Captain Lewis, who then handed it to the other white men.
+Each took a few whiffs, and then passed it back to the warriors. After
+this ceremony was finished, Lewis explained that they were in great
+need of food. The chief presented them with cakes made of sun-dried
+service-berries and choke-cherries. Later another warrior gave them
+a piece of boiled antelope, and some fresh roasted salmon, the first
+salmon Lewis had seen, which convinced him that he was now on the waters
+of the Columbia River. He learned that the Indians had received word of
+the advance of his party, whom they at first took to be a hostile tribe,
+and had therefore set out, prepared for an attack. As a further sign of
+good-will, the white men were invited to witness an Indian dance, which
+lasted nearly all night. It was late when the white men, tired by their
+long day's journey, were allowed to take their rest.
+
+On the next day Captain Lewis tried to persuade the Shoshones to
+accompany him across the divide in order to assist in bringing his
+baggage over. It took considerable argument to get the Indians to do
+this, and he had to promise them more gifts and arouse their curiosity
+by telling them that there were a black man and a native Indian woman
+in his camp, before he could induce them to consent. Finally the chief,
+Cameahwait, and several of his warriors agreed to go with Lewis. When
+they reached the place where the rest of the party were camped the chief
+was surprised and delighted to find that the Indian woman, Sacajawea,
+was his own sister, whom he had not seen since she had been captured
+by the enemies of his tribe. Clark's negro servant, York, caused much
+amazement to the Indians, who had never seen a man of his color before.
+Lewis then had a long talk with the Shoshones, telling them of the great
+power of the government he represented, and of the advantages they would
+receive by trading with the white men. Presently he won their good-will,
+and they agreed to give him four horses in exchange for firearms and
+other articles. Sacajawea was of the greatest help in the talk between
+the white men and the Shoshones, and it was she who finally induced her
+brother to do all he could to assist the explorers.
+
+Lewis now sent Clark ahead to explore the route along the Columbia
+River, and to build canoes if possible. The Indians had told him that
+their road would lie over steep, rocky mountains, where there would be
+little or no game, and then for ten days across a sandy desert. Clark
+pushed on, and found all the Indians' reports correct. He met a few
+small parties of Indians, but they had no provisions to spare, and his
+men were soon exhausted from hunger and the weariness of marching over
+mountains. His expedition proved that it would be impossible for the
+main party to follow this river, to which he gave the name of Lewis, and
+he returned to the camp of the Shoshones, which Lewis and the others had
+made their headquarters.
+
+In this camp the white men made preparations for the rest of their
+journey. They finally obtained twenty-nine young horses and saddles
+for them. They also studied the history and habits of this tribe, who
+had once been among the most powerful, but had been lately defeated in
+battle by their neighbors. The Shoshones were also called the Snake
+Indians, and lived along the rivers of the northwest, fishing for salmon
+and hunting buffaloes. Their chief wealth lay in their small, wiry
+horses, which were very sure-footed and fleet, and to which they paid a
+great deal of attention.
+
+On August 27th the expedition started afresh, with twenty-nine
+packhorses, heading across the mountains to other Indian encampments on
+another branch of the Columbia. Travel was slow, as in many places they
+had to cut a road for the ponies, and often the path was so rough that
+the heavily-burdened horses would slip and fall. Snow fell at one time,
+and added to the difficulty of the journey, but by September 6th they
+had passed the mountain range, and had come into a wide valley, at the
+head of a stream they called Clark's Fork of the Columbia. Here they
+met about four hundred Ootlashoot Indians, to whom they gave presents
+in exchange for fresh horses. Continuing again, they reached Traveler's
+Rest Creek, and here they stopped to hunt, as the Indians had told them
+that the country ahead held no game. After refurnishing their larder
+they pushed on westward, and ran into another snow-storm, which made
+riding more difficult than ever. Their provisions were soon exhausted,
+game was lacking, and the situation was discouraging. The march had
+proved very tiring, and there was no immediate prospect of reaching
+better country. Lewis, therefore, sent Clark with six hunters ahead,
+but this light scouting party was able to find very little game, and
+was nearly exhausted, when on September 20th Clark came upon a village
+of the Chopunish or Nez Percés Indians, in a beautiful valley. These
+Indians had fish, roots, and berries, which they gave the white men, who
+at once sent some back to Lewis and the others. These provisions reached
+the main party at a time when they had been without food for more than a
+day. Strengthened by the supplies, and encouraged by news of the Indian
+village, they hastened forward, and reached the Nez Percés' encampment.
+
+Their stock of firearms and small articles enabled them to buy
+provisions from these Indians; and they moved on to the forks of the
+Snake River, where they camped for several days, to enable the party
+to regain its strength. They built five canoes in the Indian fashion,
+and launched them on the river, which they hoped would lead them to the
+ocean. Lewis hid his saddles and extra ammunition, and, having branded
+the horses, turned them over to three Indians, who agreed to take care
+of them until the party should return.
+
+The Snake River, flowing through beautiful country, was filled with
+rapids, and they had many hardships in passing them. At one place a
+canoe struck a rock, and immediately filled with water and sank. Several
+of the men could not swim, and were rescued with difficulty. At the
+same time they had to guard their supplies carefully at night from
+wandering Indians, who, although they were friendly, could not resist
+the temptation to steal small articles of all sorts. The rapids passed,
+the river brought them into the main stream of the Lewis River, and
+this in turn led them to the junction of the Lewis and Columbia Rivers,
+which they reached on October 17th. Here they parted from the last of
+the Nez Percés Indians. The Columbia had as many rapids as the smaller
+river, and in addition they came to the Great Falls, where they had to
+lower the canoes by ropes made of elkskin. At one or two places they
+had to make portages, but as this involved a great deal of extra labor,
+they tried to keep to the stream wherever they could. At one place a
+tremendous rock jutted into the river, leaving a channel only forty-five
+yards wide through which the Columbia passed, its waters tossed into
+great whirlpools and wild currents. Lewis decided that it would be
+impossible to carry the boats over this high rock, and determined
+to rely on skillful steering of them through the narrow passage. He
+succeeded in doing this, although Indians whom he had met shortly before
+had told him that it was impossible. At several places they landed most
+of the men and all the valuable articles, and the two chief explorers
+took the canoes through the rapids themselves, not daring to trust the
+navigation to less experienced hands.
+
+In this far-western country they were continually meeting wandering
+Indians, and they learned from them that the Pacific Ocean was not far
+distant. On October 28th Lewis found an Indian wearing a round hat and
+sailor's jacket, which had been brought up the river in trade, and
+soon after he found other red men wearing white men's clothes. On the
+thirty-first they came to more falls. Here they followed the example
+of their Indian friends, and carried the canoes and baggage across the
+slippery rocks to the foot of the rapids. The large canoes were brought
+down by slipping them along on poles, which were stretched from one rock
+to another. They had to stop constantly to make repairs to the boats,
+which had weathered all sorts of currents, and had been buffeted against
+innumerable rocks and tree-trunks. Then they discovered tide-water in
+the river, and pushed on eagerly to a place called Diamond Island. Here,
+Lewis wrote, "we met fifteen Indians ascending the river in two canoes;
+but the only information we could procure from them was that they had
+seen three vessels, which we presumed to be European, at the mouth of
+the Columbia."
+
+They came to more and more Indian villages, generally belonging to the
+Skilloot tribe, who were very friendly, but who were too sharp at a
+bargain to please Captain Lewis. On November 7, 1805, they reached a
+point from which they could see the ocean. Lewis says: "The fog cleared
+off, and we enjoyed the delightful prospect of the ocean--that ocean,
+the object of all our labors, the reward of all our anxieties. This
+cheering view exhilarated the spirits of all the party, who were still
+more delighted on hearing the distant roar of the breakers, and went on
+with great cheerfulness."
+
+It was late in the year, and the captain wished to push on so that he
+might winter on the coast, but a heavy storm forced them to land and
+seek refuge under a high cliff. The waves on the river were very high,
+and the wind was blowing a gale directly from the sea; great waves broke
+over the place where they camped, and they had to use the utmost care
+to save their canoes from being smashed by drifting logs. Here they
+had to stay for six days, in which time their clothes and food were
+drenched, and their supply of dried fish exhausted; but the men bore
+these trials lightly now that they were so near the Pacific Ocean. When
+the gale ended they explored the country for a good place to establish
+their winter quarters. The captain finally decided to locate on a point
+of high land above the river Neutel, well beyond the highest tide, and
+protected by a grove of lofty pines. Here they made their permanent
+camp, which was called Fort Clatsop. They built seven wooden huts in
+which to spend the winter. They lived chiefly on elk, to which they
+added fish and berries in the early spring. A whale stranded on the
+beach provided them with blubber, and they found salt on the shore. The
+winter passed without any unusual experiences, and gave the captain an
+opportunity to make a full record of the country through which he had
+passed, and of the Indian tribes he had met.
+
+The original plan was to remain at Fort Clatsop until April, when Lewis
+expected to renew his stock of merchandise from the trading vessels,
+which visited the mouth of the Columbia every spring; but as the winter
+passed the constant rain brought sickness among the men, and game grew
+more and more scarce, so that it was decided to make an earlier return.
+Before they did this Lewis wrote out an account of his expedition, and
+arranged to have this delivered to the trading vessels when they should
+arrive, and in this way the news of his discoveries would not be lost
+in case anything should happen to his own party. The Indians agreed to
+deliver the packets, and one of the messages, carried by an American
+trader, finally reached Boston by way of China in February, 1807, some
+six months after Lewis himself had returned to the East. On March 24,
+1806, they started back on their long route of four thousand one hundred
+and forty-four miles to St. Louis.
+
+Searching for fish, they found the Multonah or Willamette River, and
+Lewis wrote that the valley of this stream would furnish the only
+desirable place of settlement west of the Rocky Mountains. Here he
+found rich prairies, plenty of fish and game, unusual plants of various
+sorts, and abundant timber. Soon they reached the village of the Walla
+Walla Indians, who received them so hospitably that the captain said of
+all the Indians they had met since leaving the United States this tribe
+was the most honest and sincere. With twenty-three horses, and Walla
+Walla Indians as guides, they followed a new road up the valley of the
+Lewis or Snake River, which saved them eighty miles of their westward
+route. It was still too early to cross the mountains, and they camped
+near the place where they had trusted their thirty-eight horses to their
+Indian friends the autumn before. The Indians returned the horses in
+exchange for merchandise, and Lewis provided them with food. In all
+these meetings the squaw wife of the French trader was invaluable.
+Usually Lewis spoke in English, which was translated by one of his men
+into French for the benefit of the trapper Chaboneau, who repeated it
+in the tongue of the Minnetarees to his wife; she would then repeat
+the words in the Shoshone tongue, and most of the Indians could then
+understand them, or some could repeat them to the others in their own
+dialect.
+
+Early in June they tried to cross the mountains, but the snow was
+ten feet deep on a level, and they had to abandon the attempt until
+late in the month. They finally crossed, and found their trail of
+the previous September. At this point the party divided in order to
+explore different parts of the country. Lewis took a direct road to the
+Great Falls of the Missouri, where he wished to explore Maria's River.
+Clark went on to the head of the Jefferson River, where he was to find
+the canoes that they had hidden, and cross by the shortest route to
+the Yellowstone; and the two parties were to meet at the mouth of the
+Yellowstone River. Lack of game prevented Lewis getting far into the
+country along Maria's River. On this journey he fell in with a band
+of Minnetarees, and some of them tried to steal his guns and horses.
+The only real fight of the journey followed, in which two Indians were
+killed. He then continued eastward, and on August 7th reached the mouth
+of the Yellowstone, where he found a note telling him that Clark had
+camped a few miles below.
+
+In the meantime Clark had explored a large part of the valleys of the
+Jefferson, Gallatin, and Madison Rivers, and had found a boiling-hot
+spring at the head of the Wisdom River, one of the first signs of the
+wonders of the Yellowstone. His journey was made safely and comfortably,
+although at one place he had to stop to build fresh canoes, and during
+this delay a band of Indians stole twenty-four of his packhorses.
+
+The united party descended the Missouri, and found that other explorers
+were already following in their track. They met two men from Illinois
+who had pushed as far west as the Yellowstone on a hunting trip, and
+back of them they heard of hunters and trappers who were pushing into
+this unexplored region. Travel homeward was rapid, and on September 23,
+1806, the expedition arrived at St. Louis, from which they had started
+two years and four months before. At the place where they parted with
+the last of the Minnetarees they said goodbye to Chaboneau, his Indian
+wife, and child. The squaw had been of the greatest service to them; but
+for her it is possible that the expedition might never have been able to
+get through the Shoshone country. Lewis offered to take the three to the
+United States, but the French trader said that he preferred to remain
+among the Indians. He was paid five hundred dollars, which included the
+price of a horse and lodge that had been purchased from him.
+
+The wonderful journey had been a complete success. The explorers had
+passed through strange tribes of Indians, dangers from hunger and
+hardship in the high mountains, the desert, and the plains, and had
+brought back a remarkable record of the scenes and people they had met.
+From their reports the people of the United States first learned the
+true value of that great Louisiana Territory, which had been bought for
+such a small price in money, but which was to furnish homesteads for
+thousands of pioneers. The work begun by the brave French explorers of
+earlier centuries was brought to a triumphant close by these two native
+American discoverers.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+THE CONSPIRACY OF AARON BURR
+
+
+There is a small island in the Ohio River, two miles below the town
+of Parkersburg, that is still haunted with the memory of a strange
+conspiracy. In 1805 the island, then some three hundred acres in size,
+belonged to an Irish gentleman, Harman Blennerhassett, who had built
+a beautiful home there and planted fields of hemp. For a time he and
+his family lived there in great content, Blennerhassett himself being
+devoted to science and to music, but presently he felt the need of
+increasing his small fortune and looked about for a suitable enterprise.
+Then there was introduced to him a gentleman from New York, a very
+well-known man by the name of Aaron Burr. He also was seeking to make
+his fortune, and he took Blennerhassett into his confidence. Together
+they plotted a conspiracy. They started to put their plans into action,
+and many people called them patriots, and many called them traitors.
+History does not know all the secrets of that small island, but it tells
+a curious story of the conspiracy.
+
+Aaron Burr was a very talented and fascinating man, but he was a born
+adventurer. At this time he was about fifty years old. He had fought
+in the Revolution, and practiced law in New York City, where he
+divided honors with Alexander Hamilton, the most brilliant attorney
+of the period. He had been elected a senator, and then had become
+a candidate for President of the United States. In the election of
+1800 the Electoral College cast seventy-three votes apiece for Thomas
+Jefferson and Aaron Burr, and these two candidates led all the others.
+As there was a tie, the choice of President was thrown into the House
+of Representatives, and there followed a long and bitter fight. Finally
+Jefferson was chosen President, and Burr Vice-President. In the long
+campaign Burr made many enemies, chief among whom were the powerful
+New York families of Clinton and Livingston. These men charged him
+with being a political trickster, and won most of his followers away
+from him. When Burr became a candidate for Governor of New York he was
+beaten, and his defeat was made more bitter by the stinging attacks of
+his old rival, Alexander Hamilton.
+
+In that day it was still the custom for gentlemen to settle questions
+of honor on the dueling field. Burr, stung by Hamilton's criticisms,
+challenged him, and the two met on the heights of Weehawken, overlooking
+the Hudson River. Here Burr wounded Hamilton so severely that the latter
+died a few days later. Hounded by Hamilton's friends, the luckless Burr
+now found himself cast out by both the Federalists and Republicans, and
+with no political future. Yet he knew that he had unusual talents for
+leadership. Still filled with ambition and in great need of money, he
+saw that there was little opportunity for him at home, and began to turn
+his eyes outside of the Republic.
+
+The western world was then a wonderful field for daring adventurers.
+Thirteen small colonies lying close to the Atlantic Ocean had less than
+twenty years before thrown off the yoke of a great European nation. Men
+had already pushed west to the Mississippi, and settled the fertile
+fields beyond the Alleghanies. Across the great "Mother of Rivers" lay a
+vast tract that men knew little about. To the south lay Spanish colonies
+and islands. The Gulf of Mexico was the home of freebooters and pirates.
+In Europe a man of the people named Napoleon Bonaparte was carving out
+an empire for himself, and stirring the blood of all ambitious men.
+Soldiers of fortune everywhere were wondering whether they might not
+follow in Napoleon's footsteps.
+
+It is hard to say in which direction Burr was tempted first. He wanted
+to hide his real plans not only from his own countrymen, but from the
+English, French, and Spanish agents as well. He first pretended to
+Anthony Merry, the British minister at Washington, that he intended to
+join a conspiracy to start a revolution in the Spanish colonies, in the
+hope of turning them into a new republic. Mr. Merry told his government
+that it would be to the advantage of England if Mr. Burr's plans
+succeeded. But even then Burr was working on a different scheme. He
+thought that the people of Louisiana, a large territory at the mouth of
+the Mississippi River, which had only lately become a part of the United
+States, might be induced to separate into a new nation of their own. He
+needed money for his plans, and so he kept pointing out to the British
+minister the many advantages to England if either the Spanish colonies
+or Louisiana should win freedom. A third plan was also dawning in Burr's
+mind, the possibility of entering Mexico and carving out a kingdom
+there for himself. So he began by dealing with the agents of different
+countries, trying to get money from each for his own secret schemes.
+
+In the spring of 1805 Burr set out for the West. He took coach for
+the journey over the mountains to Pittsburgh, where he had arranged
+by letter to meet General James Wilkinson, the governor of the new
+territory of Louisiana. Wilkinson was delayed, however, and so Burr
+embarked in an ark that he had ordered built to sail down the Ohio
+River. After several days on the water he reached Blennerhassett Island
+early in May. The owner of the island was away from home, but his wife
+invited Burr to their house, and he learned from her that her husband
+was looking for a way to mend his fortunes.
+
+Next day Burr continued his journey in the ark. He reached Cincinnati,
+then a very small town of fifteen hundred people, where he talked over
+his plans with several friends. From Cincinnati he went to Louisville,
+and from there rode to Frankfort. At Nashville he was the guest of
+Andrew Jackson, who was major-general of the Tennessee militia. Word
+spread about that Aaron Burr was plotting to free Florida and the West
+Indies from Spanish rule, and the liberty-loving settlers welcomed him
+with open arms.
+
+Leaving Andrew Jackson, Burr floated in an open boat to the mouth of
+the Cumberland River, where his ark, which had come down the Ohio, was
+waiting for him. The ark made its first stop at a frontier post called
+Fort Massac, and there Burr met General Wilkinson of Louisiana. These
+two men were real soldiers of fortune. They had fought side by side at
+the walls of Quebec, and Wilkinson, like many another, had fallen under
+the spell of Burr's charm. They probably discussed the whole situation:
+how a small army might seize Florida, how a small navy could drive the
+Spaniards from Cuba, how a daring band of frontiersmen could march from
+Vera Cruz to the city of Mexico. Wilkinson seemed delighted with Burr's
+schemes, and when he left he provided his friend with a large barge
+manned by ten soldiers and a sergeant.
+
+In this imposing vessel Burr sailed on down the Mississippi to New
+Orleans, and on June 25, 1805, landed at that quaint old city. It was
+already a place of much importance; seagoing ships and thousands of
+river flatboats docked at its levees, for it was the chief port for
+sending goods to Mexico and the other Spanish colonies. Burr brought
+letters to many prominent people, and a public dinner was given in his
+honor. The visitor had been Vice-President of the United States, and was
+said to be the leader of a band of mysterious patriots. Enthusiasm ran
+high in New Orleans when their guest said, as he had already announced
+in Tennessee, that he intended to devote his life to overthrowing all
+Spanish rule in America.
+
+Day after day the soldier of fortune was busy with his plans. When he
+started north on horseback he carried with him the fame of a great
+patriot. Wherever he stopped, at cabins, at villages, or cities, the
+frontiersmen wanted to shake his hand. He rode four hundred and fifty
+miles through the wilderness from Natchez to Nashville, where he again
+visited Andrew Jackson, who promised him Tennessee soldiers for a war on
+Spain. At St. Louis he learned that General Zebulon Pike was exploring
+the best route over the plains to Santa Fé, and many letters told him
+that the time was ripe to settle old grudges with the borderers of
+Mexico. Everything seemed favorable to his adventure. Burr had only
+to decide where he would strike first. He was back in the East by the
+middle of November, 1805, having filled the whole country with rumors
+of wild plots and insurrections. He was a figure of mystery. People
+whispered that Aaron Burr was to be the Washington of a new republic in
+the West, or the king of a country to be carved out of Mexico.
+
+By the summer of 1806 Burr knew that he could not get money from England
+to further his plans. He would have to depend on his own countrymen in
+any attack on Mexico or Spain. His journey had showed him that many
+of them were eager to follow his lead. Troubles were daily increasing
+along the borders of Florida and Mexico. It looked easy to take an army
+into Florida, but there would be more profit in the rich country to the
+southwest. His friend, General Wilkinson, had just been sent to drive
+the Mexicans across the Sabine River, the western boundary of Louisiana,
+and Burr thought this was a good chance to go west again, and perhaps
+call the settlers to arms. Men he trusted started west early in the
+summer of 1806, and Burr, with his daughter, and a Colonel De Pestre,
+who had fought in the French Revolution, and a few friends and servants,
+set out in August for their meeting-place on Blennerhassett Island.
+When he arrived there he was warmly welcomed by the owner. Burr showed
+Blennerhassett how he could make his fortune in Mexico, because if the
+conspiracy were successful they could take a large part of that country
+for themselves. Fired by Burr's story the men on the island immediately
+began preparations. They sent to the town of Marietta for one hundred
+barrels of pork, and contracted to have fifteen boats delivered at the
+island the following December. A kiln was built near Blennerhassett's
+house for drying corn, which was then ground into meal, and packed for
+shipping. All sorts of provisions were purchased, and the Blennerhassett
+family prepared to send their household goods down the river. Word of
+the plans spread, and men in various towns near the Ohio made ready to
+join the expedition. When the leader should send out his messengers
+recruits would come pouring in.
+
+In the meantime Burr himself had left the little island and covered a
+wide stretch of country. He wanted to be sure of Andrew Jackson's aid,
+and he found that fiery warrior as ready as ever to fight Spaniard or
+Mexican in the cause of liberty. The general still thought that his
+friend Burr's only object was to free all of North America. Eager in
+that cause, Jackson sent word to the Tennessee militia, urging them
+to be ready for instant duty against the Spaniards, who, he said, had
+already captured several citizens of the United States, had cut down
+our flag, had driven our explorers away from the Red River, and had
+taken an insulting position on the east bank of the River Sabine, in the
+territory of Orleans. He wrote to President Jefferson offering to lead
+his Tennessee militia against the troops of Spain. A large part of the
+country expected war at once. Burr, for his own purposes, did all he
+could to inflame this warlike feeling.
+
+In October the chief conspirator met his daughter, Theodosia Alston, her
+husband, and Blennerhassett at Lexington, Kentucky. He now arranged
+to buy a tract, known as the Bastrop lands, which included nearly a
+million acres in northern Louisiana on the Washita River. This purchase
+he meant to use as a blind, intending to settle there only in case his
+other plans failed. If the United States Government should suspect
+the conspirators of plotting against Mexico, they could pretend to be
+merely settlers, armed to defend themselves in case the Spaniards should
+overrun their borders. The tract would be valuable in any case, because
+of the rich bottom-lands and vast forests, and made a splendid base for
+a raid into the Spanish provinces.
+
+Recruits were added daily to Burr's forces. He told them as much or as
+little of his schemes as he thought advisable. To some he said that he
+was a secret agent of the government, to others that he only meant to
+start a new pioneer settlement. If there should be war with Spain the
+men who followed him would share in the spoils, if victorious. If there
+was no war they would be ready to protect the border against invaders.
+
+There were some people, however, who could not get over their distrust
+of Burr because of what he had done. The mysterious preparations at
+Blennerhassett Island caused some uneasiness in the neighborhood, and
+on October 6th a mass meeting of the people of Wood County, Virginia,
+was held, and the military preparations on the island were denounced.
+Blennerhassett was away at the time, but his wife, hearing of the
+meeting, grew uneasy, and sent her gardener, Peter Taylor, to tell her
+husband this news. Taylor found the conspirators at Lexington, and gave
+them Mrs. Blennerhassett's message. The gardener was evidently taken
+into his master's confidence, because he said later that the plan was
+"to take Mexico, one of the finest and richest places in the whole
+world." He added, "Colonel Burr would be the King of Mexico, and Mrs.
+Alston, daughter of Colonel Burr, was to be Queen of Mexico, whenever
+Colonel Burr died.... Colonel Burr had made fortunes for many in his
+time, but none for himself; but now he was going to make something
+for himself. He said that he had a great many friends in the Spanish
+territory; no less than two thousand Roman Catholic priests were
+engaged, and all their friends would join, if once he could get to them;
+that the Spaniards, like the French, had got dissatisfied with their
+government, and wanted to swap it."
+
+President Jefferson could no longer overlook the adventures of Burr and
+his friends. He knew that very little was needed to kindle the flame
+of war on the Mexican border. But he had his hands full with foreign
+affairs; England was making trouble for American sailors, and Napoleon
+was setting the whole world by the ears. So the busy President wrote
+to his agents in the West and urged them to keep a secret watch over
+Colonel Burr and Blennerhassett Island.
+
+War with Spain almost came that summer. There were many disputed
+boundary lines between the United States and the Spanish colonies. The
+Spanish troops in Florida, Texas, and Mexico were prepared for an attack
+from the United States, and Spanish agents were urging Indian tribes to
+rise against the white men. Men protested in Western cities and towns.
+The people of Orleans Territory were afraid that Spain was going to try
+to win back their country by force of arms. On the 4th of July, 1806,
+the people of New Orleans held a great patriotic celebration, and in the
+evening a play called, "Washington; or the Liberty of the New World,"
+was acted to a huge audience. Even the Creoles, who were more Spanish
+than Anglo-Saxon, were eager to fight against the old tyranny of Spain.
+
+In the midst of this war excitement word came that a man born in
+Venezuela, named Francesco Miranda, had sailed from New York to free his
+native country from Spanish rule. Miranda was looked upon as a hero and
+patriot by many people in the United States, and this encouraged Burr
+and his friends.
+
+There were in 1806 about one thousand soldiers in Texas, which was then
+a province of Mexico. These troops were ordered to cross the Sabine
+River, which formed a part of the disputed boundary, and as soon as
+they did cross the governor of Louisiana called for volunteers, and
+the people of Mississippi Territory prepared to march to the aid of
+New Orleans. The meeting place of the volunteers was Natchitoches,
+and there hundreds of countrymen came flocking, armed, and eager to
+defend Louisiana. Everything seemed ready for Aaron Burr to launch his
+great adventure. But at this point Burr's former friend, General James
+Wilkinson, the governor of Louisiana, changed his mind as to the wisdom
+of Burr's schemes. He would not give the order to the volunteers to
+march to the Mexican border, but waited, hoping that President Jefferson
+would prevent the war by diplomacy, or that the Spanish troops would
+decide to retreat.
+
+On September 27th a great crowd in Nashville hailed Colonel Burr as the
+deliverer of the Southwest, and Andrew Jackson proclaimed, "Millions for
+defense; not one cent for tribute;" and at the same time the Mexican
+General Herrera ordered his troops to retreat from the River Sabine.
+Danger of war was over, and the moment the flag of Spain left the
+Louisiana shore, Burr's dream of an empire for himself and his friends
+vanished.
+
+General Wilkinson knew that the government in Washington was suspicious
+of Aaron Burr's plans, and he thought that his name was included among
+those of Burr's friends. Some newspapers had even linked their names
+together, and the general, knowing perhaps the treachery of his own
+thoughts, now decided to prove his patriotism by accusing Aaron Burr and
+the others of treason. All the time that he was making a treaty with the
+Mexican general on the Texan frontier he was also working up a strong
+case against Burr. He saw to it that the agents put all suspicion on
+the shoulders of the others, and made him appear as the one man who had
+tried his best to protect his country. He intended to show that not only
+was he not a traitor, but that he was able to unmask traitors, by having
+pretended to join with them earlier.
+
+In his sudden eagerness to prevent war with the Mexicans, General
+Wilkinson made terms of peace with them, which proved a great
+disadvantage to the United States at a later date, but which pleased
+the peace party of the day. He met the Mexican general at the very time
+when Burr and his allies were ready to launch their fleet of boats on
+the Mississippi River. Then Wilkinson made haste to raise the cry of
+"Treason in the West," which was to echo through the United States for
+months, and ruin the reputation of many men.
+
+President Jefferson trusted Wilkinson, and when he heard the latter's
+charges against Burr he sent a special messenger to see what was
+happening at Blennerhassett Island. Before the messenger reached the
+Alleghany Mountains, however, another man had accused Burr in the court
+at Frankfort, Kentucky, of having broken the laws of the country in
+starting an expedition against Mexico. Burr said that he could easily
+answer these charges, and sent a message to Blennerhassett, telling
+him not to be disturbed. He went to the court at Frankfort, and when
+the man who had accused him could not bring his witnesses the matter
+was promptly dropped. Burr was more a hero than ever to the people of
+Frankfort. They agreed with a leading newspaper that said, "Colonel
+Burr has throughout this business conducted himself with the calmness,
+moderation, and firmness which have characterized him through life. He
+evinced an earnest desire for a full and speedy investigation--free from
+irritation or emotion; he excited the strongest sensation of respect and
+friendship in the breast of every impartial person present."
+
+Burr then went back to Lexington, and continued raising money to buy
+a fleet of boats. Andrew Jackson had already received three thousand
+dollars in Kentucky for this purpose. Blennerhassett went on enrolling
+volunteers. It looked as if Burr's conduct at Frankfort had put an end
+to the rumors of treason.
+
+General Wilkinson, however, was still anxious to make a name for himself
+as a great patriot, and he kept sending alarming messages to Washington.
+He accused his former friend of all sorts of treason. It was also
+perfectly clear that a large number of boats were being gathered on the
+Ohio under orders of Burr and his friends, and so President Jefferson
+sent word to the officers at Marietta to post one hundred and fifty or
+two hundred soldiers on the river to prevent Burr's fleet sailing. With
+the news of this order people in the West began to suspect their former
+hero, and even some of his old allies grew doubtful of his patriotism.
+
+Wilkinson increased the alarm by orders he gave in New Orleans as
+governor of Louisiana Territory. He began to make military arrests,
+locking up all those he distrusted, and all those who were admirers
+of Aaron Burr. He had gunboats stationed in the river, and they were
+ordered to fire on Burr's fleet if it ever got that far, and he refused
+to allow any boats to ascend the Mississippi without his express
+permission. All this preparation caused great excitement in New Orleans,
+which spread through the neighboring country. It seemed as if General
+Wilkinson were trying to force the people to believe there was some
+great conspiracy on foot.
+
+The colonel and his allies tried to explain that their fleet of boats
+was simply to carry settlers, arms and provisions into the Bastrop
+tract of land that they had bought; but by now nobody would believe
+them. On December 9, 1806, the boats that Blennerhassett had been
+gathering on the Muskingum River were seized by order of the governor
+of Ohio. Patrols were placed along the Ohio River, and the militia
+called out to capture Blennerhassett and the men with him. The next day
+the Virginia militia declared that they meant to find out the secret
+of Blennerhassett Island. The owner and his friend, Comfort Tyler, had
+word of this, and at once prepared for flight. At midnight they left the
+island and started down the Ohio by boat. The Virginia troops arrived
+to find the place deserted, and, leaving sentinels there, started
+in pursuit of Blennerhassett. The next day the sentries captured a
+flatboat with fourteen boys on board, who were coming from Pittsburgh
+to join Burr. People along the Ohio began to expect attacks from Burr's
+recruits. Cincinnati was especially alarmed. One of the newspapers there
+stated that three of Burr's armed boats were anchored near the city,
+which they meant to attack. That night some practical joker exploded
+a bomb, and the people thought that Burr's army was firing on them.
+The citizens armed, and the militia was called out, but when they came
+to inspect the boats on the river next day they found that those they
+thought belonged to Burr were vessels of a Louisville merchant loaded
+with dry-goods. No story was now too wild to be believed when it was
+attached to the name of Burr or Blennerhassett.
+
+Burr now only intended to sail down to his own lands. On December 20th
+he sent word to Blennerhassett that he would be at the mouth of the
+Cumberland River on the twenty-third. Two days later he put a number of
+horses on one of his boats, and with a few men to help him, floated down
+the Cumberland River to its mouth, where Blennerhassett and the rest
+of their party were waiting for him. They joined their seven boats to
+his two vessels, and had a fleet of nine ships with about sixty men on
+board. On December 28th they sailed down the Ohio, and the next night
+anchored a little below Fort Massac.
+
+Country people along the river saw the flotilla pass, and sent word
+of it to the nearest military post. The captain there stopped all
+ships, but found nothing suspicious on any of them. "Colonel Burr, late
+Vice-President," the officer reported, "passed this way with about ten
+boats of different descriptions, navigated with about six men each,
+having nothing on board that would even suffer a conjecture more than
+that he was a man bound to market. He has descended the river toward
+Orleans."
+
+On the last day of 1806 the fleet reached the broad waters of the
+Mississippi River. Four days later they dropped anchor at Chickasaw
+Bluffs, now the city of Memphis. Again officers boarded the boats, and
+after examining the cargoes allowed them to go on their voyage. On
+January 10th they reached Mississippi Territory, and here they found the
+excitement intense.
+
+The fleet was now in territory that was under the charge of General
+Wilkinson, and he immediately sent three hundred and seventy-five
+soldiers from Natchez to prevent Burr's further progress. On January
+16th two officers rowed out to the boats, and were received pleasantly
+by Colonel Burr, who laughed at General Wilkinson's suspicions, and,
+pointing to his peaceful flotilla, asked if it looked as if it were
+meant for war? When he was told that the soldiers had orders to stop
+him, he answered that he was willing to appear in court at any time.
+This satisfied the two officers, who asked him to ride next day to the
+town of Washington, which was the capital of Mississippi Territory, and
+appear before the court there. Burr agreed, and early next morning rode
+to Washington with the two officers who had called on him. There he was
+charged with having conspired against the United States government. His
+friends on the river remained on their boats, waiting for his return.
+The expedition never went any farther.
+
+Burr promised to stay in the Territory until the charges against him
+were cleared up. His charm of manner won him many friends, and people
+would not believe him a traitor. When the grand jury met they decided
+that Aaron Burr was not guilty of treason. The judge, however, would
+not set him free, and Burr realized that General Wilkinson was using
+all his power against him. He thought that his only chance of safety
+lay in defying the court, and taking the advice of some friends fled to
+a hiding-place near the home of Colonel Osmun, an old acquaintance. He
+meant to leave that part of the country, but the severe weather blocked
+his plans. Heavy rains had swollen all the streams, and he had to change
+his route. He set out with one companion, but had to ask a farmer the
+road to the house of Colonel Hinson. The farmer suspected that one of
+the horsemen was Aaron Burr, and knew that a large reward had been
+offered for his capture. He carried his news to the sheriff, and then
+to the officers at Fort Stoddert. A lieutenant from the fort with
+four soldiers joined the farmer, and, mounting fast horses, they rode
+after the two men. Early the next morning they came up with them. The
+lieutenant demanded in the name of the government of the United States
+whether one of the horsemen was Colonel Burr. Aaron Burr admitted his
+name, and was put under arrest. He was taken to the fort, and held there
+as a fugitive from justice.
+
+The cry of "Treason in the West" had been heard all over the country.
+The great expedition against Mexico had dwindled to a small voyage to
+settle certain timber-lands. The formidable fleet was only nine ordinary
+river boats. The army of rebels had shrunk to less than sixty peaceful
+citizens; and the store of arms and ammunition had been reduced to a few
+rifles and powder-horns. Moreover Aaron Burr had neither attempted to
+fight nor to resist arrest. He had merely fled when he thought he stood
+little chance of a fair trial. Yet the cry of treason had so alarmed the
+country that the government found it necessary to try the man who had so
+nearly defeated Jefferson for the Presidency.
+
+Orders were sent to bring Aaron Burr east. After a journey that lasted
+twenty-one days the prisoner was lodged in the Eagle Tavern in Richmond,
+Virginia. Here Chief-Justice Marshall examined the charges against Burr,
+and held him in bail to appear at the next term of court. The bail was
+secured, and on the afternoon of April 1st Burr was once more set at
+liberty. From then until the day of the trial interest in the case grew.
+Everywhere people discussed the question whether Aaron Burr had been a
+traitor to his country. By the time for the hearing of the case feeling
+against him ran high. When court met on May 22, 1807, Richmond was
+crowded with many of the most prominent men of the time, drawn by the
+charges against a man who had so lately been Vice-President.
+
+It was not until the following August that Colonel Burr was actually
+put on trial. The question was simply whether he had planned to make
+war against the United States. There were many witnesses, led by the
+faithless General Wilkinson, who were ready to declare that the purpose
+of the meetings at Blennerhassett Island was to organize an army to
+divide the western country from the rest of the republic. Each side was
+represented by famous lawyers; and the battle was hard fought. In the
+end, however, the jury found that Aaron Burr was not guilty of treason.
+No matter what Burr and Blennerhassett and their friends had planned to
+do in Mexico, the jury could not believe they had been so mad as to plot
+a war against the United States.
+
+Burr, although now free, was really a man without a country. He went to
+England and France, and in both countries engaged in plans for freeing
+the colonies of Spain. But both in England and in France the people
+looked upon him with suspicion, remembering his strange history. At the
+end of four years he returned to the United States. Here he found that
+some of his early plans were coming to fulfilment. Revolts were breaking
+out in Florida, in Mexico, and in some of the West Indies. He was
+allowed no part in any of these uprisings. Florida became a part of the
+United States, and in time Burr saw the men of Texas begin a struggle
+for freedom from Mexico. When he read the news of this, he exclaimed,
+"There! You see! I was right! I was only thirty years too soon. What was
+treason in me thirty years ago is patriotism now!" Later he was asked
+whether he had really planned to divide the Union when he started on his
+voyage from Blennerhassett Island. He answered, "No; I would as soon
+have thought of taking possession of the moon, and informing my friends
+that I intended to divide it among them."
+
+Such is the story of Aaron Burr, a real soldier of fortune, who wanted
+to carve out a new country for himself, and came to be "a man without a
+country."
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+HOW THE YOUNG REPUBLIC FOUGHT THE BARBARY PIRATES
+
+
+I
+
+Long after pirates had been swept from the Western Ocean they flourished
+in the Mediterranean Sea. They hailed from the northern coast of Africa,
+where between the Mediterranean and the desert of Sahara stretched what
+were known as the Barbary States. These states were Morocco, Algeria,
+Tunis, Tripoli, and the tiny state of Barca, which was usually included
+in Tripoli. Algeria, or, as it was commonly called from the name of its
+capital, Algiers, was the home of most of the Mediterranean pirates.
+
+There was hardly a port in the whole of that inland sea that had not
+seen a fleet of the pirates' boats sweep down upon some innocent
+merchant vessel, board her, overpower the crew, and carry them off
+to be sold in the African slave-markets. Their ships were usually
+square-rigged sailing vessels, which were commonly called galleons. The
+pirates did not trust to cannon, and the peculiar shape of the ships
+gave them a good chance for hand-to-hand fighting. The dark-skinned crew
+would climb out on the long lateen yards that hung over their enemies'
+deck, and drop from the yards and from the rigging, their sabers held
+between their teeth, their loaded pistols stuck in their belts, so that
+they might have free use of their hands for climbing and clinging to
+ropes and gunwales.
+
+Strange as it seems, the great countries of Europe made no real effort
+to destroy these pirates of the Barbary coast, but instead actually
+paid them bribes in order to protect their crews. The larger countries
+thought that, as they could afford to pay the tribute that the pirates
+demanded, and their smaller rivals could not, the pirates might actually
+serve them by annoying other countries. So England and France, and the
+other big nations of Europe, put up with all sorts of insults at the
+hands of these Moorish buccaneers, and many times their consuls were
+ill-treated and their sailors made to work in slave-gangs because they
+had not paid as much tribute as the Moors demanded.
+
+Many an American skipper fell into the hands of these corsairs. The brig
+_Polly_ of Newburyport, Massachusetts, was heading for the Spanish port
+of Cadiz in October, 1793, when she was overhauled by a brig flying the
+English flag. As the brig came near her captain hailed the _Polly_ in
+English, asking where she was bound. Meanwhile the brig ran close in
+beside the _Polly_, and the Americans saw a large number of men, Moors
+by the look of their beards and dress, spring up from under the rail.
+This crew launched a big boat, and nearly one hundred men, armed with
+swords, pistols, spears, and knives, were rowed up to the _Polly_. The
+Moors sprang on board. The Yankees were greatly outnumbered, and were
+driven into the cabin, while the pirates broke open all the trunks
+and chests, and stripped the brig of everything that could be moved.
+The prisoners were then rowed to the Moorish ship, which sailed for
+Algiers. There they were landed and marched to the palace of the Dey,
+or ruler of Algiers, while the people clapped their hands, shouted, and
+gave thanks for the capture of so many "Christian dogs." They were put
+in prison, where they found other Americans, and nearly six hundred
+Christians of other countries, all of whom were treated as slaves. On
+the next day each captive was loaded with chains, fastened around his
+waist and joined to a ring about his ankle. They were then set to work
+in rigging and fitting out ships, in blasting rocks in the mountains, or
+carrying stones for the palace the Dey was building. Their lot was but
+little better than that of the slaves of olden times who worked for the
+Pharaohs. As more American sailors were captured and made slaves their
+friends at home grew more and more eager to put an end to these pirates,
+and when the Revolution was over the young Republic of the United States
+began to heed the appeals for help that came from the slave-markets
+along the Barbary coast.
+
+The Republic found, however, that so long as England and France were
+paying tribute to the pirates it would be easier for her to do the
+same thing than to fight them. The American Navy was very small, and
+the Mediterranean was far distant. England seemed actually to be
+encouraging the pirates, thinking that their attacks on American ships
+would injure the country that had lately won its independence. So the
+United States made the best terms it could with the rulers of Algiers,
+Morocco, Tunis, and Tripoli, and paid heavy ransoms for the release of
+the captives. There was little self-respect or honor among the Moorish
+chiefs, however. One Dey succeeded another, each more greedy than the
+last, and each demanded more tribute money or threatened to seize all
+the Americans he could lay hands upon. The consuls had to be constantly
+making presents in order to keep the Moors in a good humor, and whenever
+the Dey felt the need of more money he would demand it of the United
+States consul, and threaten to throw him in prison if he refused.
+
+This state of affairs was very unpleasant for free men, but for a number
+of years it had to be put up with. When Captain Bainbridge dropped
+anchor off Algiers in command of the United States frigate _George
+Washington_, the Dey demanded that he should carry a Moorish envoy to
+Constantinople with presents for the Sultan of Turkey. Bainbridge did
+not like to be treated as a messenger boy; but the Dey said, "You pay
+me tribute, by which you become my slaves. I have, therefore, a right
+to order you as I may think proper." Bainbridge had no choice but to
+obey the command, or leave American merchant vessels at the mercy of the
+Moors, and so he carried the Dey's presents to the Sultan.
+
+As all the Barbary States throve on war, in that way gaining support
+from the enemies of the country they attacked, one or the other was
+constantly making war. In May, 1801, the Pasha of Tripoli declared
+war against the United States, cut down the American flagstaff at
+his capital, and sent out his pirate ships. In reply the United
+States ordered a squadron of four vessels under command of Commodore
+Richard Dale to sail to the Mediterranean. This squadron did good
+service, capturing a number of the galleys of Tripoli, and exchanging
+Moorish prisoners for American slaves. But the pirates were like a
+swarm of hornets; they stung wherever they got a chance, and as soon
+as the war-ships were out of sight they would steal out from their
+hiding-places to terrorize the coast. The United States had to keep
+sending squadrons to act as policemen. When the fleet kept together the
+Moors had proper respect for them, but once the ships separated they
+became the target for the hornets.
+
+The frigate _Philadelphia_, of thirty-six guns, was detailed in October,
+1803, to blockade the port of Tripoli. The morning after she reached
+there she saw a ship inshore preparing to sail westward. The frigate
+gave chase, and as the other vessel carried the colors of Tripoli, the
+frigate opened fire. As she chased the Moor the _Philadelphia_ ran on
+a shelving rock that was part of a long reef. Her crew worked hard to
+get her off, but she stuck fast. As the Moors on shore saw the plight of
+the _Philadelphia_ they manned their boats, and soon she was surrounded
+by a swarm of pirate galleys. The galleys sailed under the fire of
+the frigate's heavy guns, and came up to close quarters, where the
+cannon could not reach them. The Americans were helpless, and by sunset
+Commodore Bainbridge had to strike his flag. As soon as he surrendered
+the Moors swarmed over the sides of his ship, broke everything they
+could lay their hands on, stripped officers and men of their uniforms,
+and tumbled them into the small boats. The prisoners were landed at
+night, and led to the castle gate. The sailors were treated as slaves,
+but the officers were received by the Pasha in the great marble-paved
+hall of his palace, where that ruler, dressed in silks and jewels, and
+surrounded by a gorgeous court, asked them many questions, and later
+offered them supper. But the favor of the Pasha was as fickle as the
+wind; within a day or two he was treating the American officers much as
+he treated his other Christian captives, and the crew, three hundred
+and seven in number, were worked as slaves. Meantime the Moors, using
+anchors and cables, succeeded in pulling the _Philadelphia_ off the
+reef, and the frigate was pumped out and made seaworthy. She was brought
+into the harbor, to the delight of the Pasha and his people at owning
+so fine a war-ship. The loss of the _Philadelphia_ was a severe blow,
+not only to American pride, but to American fortunes. The squadron
+was now much too small for service, and Bainbridge and his crew were
+hostages the United States must redeem.
+
+It fell to the lot of Commodore Preble to take charge of the American
+ships in the Mediterranean, and he began to discuss terms of peace
+with Tripoli through an agent of the Pasha at Malta. By these terms
+the frigate _Philadelphia_ was to be exchanged for a schooner, and
+the Moorish prisoners in Preble's hands, sixty in number, were to be
+exchanged for as many of the American prisoners in Tripoli, and the rest
+of the American captives were to be ransomed at five hundred dollars
+a man. Before these terms were agreed upon, however, a more daring
+plan occurred to the American commodore, and on February 3, 1804, he
+entrusted a delicate task to Stephen Decatur, who commanded the schooner
+_Enterprise_. Decatur picked a volunteer crew, put them on board the
+ships _Siren_ and _Intrepid_, and sailed for Tripoli. They reached
+that port on February 7th, and to avoid suspicion the _Intrepid_ drew
+away from the other ship and anchored after dark about a mile west
+of the town. A small boat with a pilot and midshipman was sent in to
+reconnoiter the harbor. They reported that the sea was breaking across
+the western entrance, and as the weather was threatening advised Decatur
+not to try to enter that night. The two American ships therefore stood
+offshore, and were driven far to the east by a gale. The weather was so
+bad that it was not until February 16th that they returned to Tripoli.
+This time the _Intrepid_ sailed slowly toward the town, while the
+_Siren_, disguised as a merchantman, kept some distance in the rear.
+
+The frigate _Philadelphia_, now the Pasha's prize ship, lay at anchor in
+the harbor, and the _Intrepid_ slowly drifted toward her in the light
+of the new moon. No one on ship or shore realized the real purpose of
+the slowly-moving _Intrepid_. Had the men at the forts on shore or the
+watchman at the Pasha's castle suspected her purpose they could have
+blown her from the water with their heavy guns.
+
+The _Intrepid_ drifted closer and closer, with her crew hidden, except
+for six or eight men dressed as Maltese sailors. Decatur stood by the
+pilot at the helm. When the little ship was about one hundred yards
+from the _Philadelphia_ she was hailed and ordered to keep away. The
+pilot answered that his boat had lost her anchor in the storm, and asked
+permission to make fast to the frigate for the night. This was given,
+and the Moorish officer on the _Philadelphia_ asked what the ship in
+the distance was. The pilot said that she was the _Transfer_, a vessel
+lately purchased at Malta by the Moors, which was expected at Tripoli
+about that time. The pilot kept on talking in order to lull the Moors'
+suspicions, and meantime the little _Intrepid_ came close under the port
+bow of the _Philadelphia_. Just then the wind shifted and held the
+schooner away from the frigate, and directly in range of her guns. Again
+the Moors had a chance to destroy the American boat and crew if they had
+known her real object. They did not suspect it, however. Each ship sent
+out a small boat with a rope, and when the ropes were joined the two
+ships were drawn close together.
+
+When the vessels were almost touching some one on the _Philadelphia_
+suddenly shouted, "Americanos!" At the same moment Decatur gave the
+order "Board!" and the American crew sprang over the side of the frigate
+and jumped to her deck. The Moors were huddled on the forecastle.
+Decatur formed his men in line and charged. The surprised Moors made
+little resistance, and Decatur quickly cleared the deck of them; some
+jumped into the sea, and others escaped in a large boat. The Americans
+saw that they could not get the _Philadelphia_ safely out of the harbor,
+and so quickly brought combustibles from the _Intrepid_, and stowing
+them about the _Philadelphia_, set her on fire. In a very few minutes
+she was in flames, and the Americans jumped from her deck to their
+own ship. It took less than twenty minutes to capture and fire the
+_Philadelphia_.
+
+Decatur ordered his men to the oars, and the _Intrepid_ beat a retreat
+from the harbor. But now the town of Tripoli was fully aroused. The
+forts opened fire on the little schooner. A ship commanded the channel
+through which she had to sail, but fortunately for the _Intrepid_ the
+Moors' aim was poor, and the only shot that struck her was one through
+the topgallantsail. The harbor was brightly lighted now. The flames had
+run up the mast and rigging of the _Philadelphia_, and as they reached
+the powder loud explosions echoed over the sea. Presently the cables of
+the frigate burned, and the _Philadelphia_ drifted ashore and blew up.
+In the meantime the _Intrepid_ reached the entrance safely, and joining
+the _Siren_ set sail for Syracuse.
+
+The blowing up of the _Philadelphia_ was one of the most daring acts
+ever attempted by the United States Navy, and won Decatur great credit.
+It weakened the Pasha's strength, and kept his pirate crews in check.
+Instead of making terms with the Moorish ruler, the United States
+decided to attack his capital, and in the summer of 1804, Commodore
+Preble collected his squadron before Tripoli. On August 3d the fleet
+approached the land batteries, and in the afternoon began to throw
+shells into the town. The Moors immediately opened fire, both from the
+forts and from their fleet of nineteen gunboats and two galleys that lay
+in the harbor. Preble divided his ships, and ordered them to close in
+on the enemy's vessels, although the latter outnumbered them three to
+one. Again Decatur was the hero of the fight. He and his men boarded a
+Moorish gunboat and fought her crew hand-to-hand across the decks. He
+captured the first vessel, and then boarded a second. Decatur singled
+out the captain, a gigantic Moor, and made for him. The Moor thrust
+at him with a pike, and Decatur's cutlass was broken off at the hilt.
+Another thrust of the pike cut his arm, but the American seized the
+weapon, tore it away, and threw himself on the Moor. The crews were
+fighting all around their leaders, and a Moorish sailor aimed a blow
+at Decatur's head with a scimitar. An American seaman struck the blow
+aside, and the scimitar gashed his own scalp. The Moorish captain,
+stronger than Decatur, got him underneath, and drawing a knife, was
+about to kill him, when Decatur caught the Moor's arm with one hand,
+thrust his other hand into his pocket, and fired his revolver. The Moor
+was killed, and Decatur sprang to his feet. Soon after the enemy's
+crew surrendered. The other United States ships had been almost as
+successful, and the battle taught the Americans that the Barbary pirates
+could be beaten in hand-to-hand fighting as well as at long range.
+
+[Illustration: DECATUR CAUGHT THE MOOR'S ARM]
+
+The Pasha was not ready to come to terms even after that day's defeat,
+however, and on August 7th Commodore Preble ordered another attack.
+Again the harbor shook under the guns of the fleet and the forts, and at
+sunset Preble had to withdraw. To avoid further bloodshed the commodore
+sent a flag of truce to the Pasha, and offered to pay eighty thousand
+dollars for the ransom of the American prisoners, and to make him a
+present of ten thousand dollars more. The Pasha, however, demanded
+one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and Preble was not willing to
+pay that amount. So later in August he attacked Tripoli again. Each of
+these bombardments did great damage to the city, but the forts were too
+strong to be captured. The blockading fleet, however, held its position,
+and on September 3d opened fire again in the last of its assaults. In
+spite of the heavy firing the Pasha refused to pull down his flag.
+
+On the night of September 4th a volunteer crew took the little
+_Intrepid_ into the harbor. She was filled with combustibles, and when
+she was close to the Moorish ships the powder was to be fired by a fuse
+that would give time for the crew to escape in a small boat. The night
+was dark, and the fleet soon lost sight of this fire-ship. She took the
+right course through the channel, but before she was near the Moors she
+was seen and they opened fire on her. Then came a loud explosion, and
+the _Intrepid_, with her crew, was blown into the air. No one knows
+whether one of the enemy's shots or her own crew fired the powder. This
+was the greatest disaster that befell the United States Navy during all
+its warfare with the Barbary pirates. Soon after Commodore Preble sailed
+for home, though most of his fleet were kept in the Mediterranean to
+protect American sailing vessels.
+
+The government at Washington, tired with the long warfare in the
+Mediterranean, soon afterward ordered the consul at Algiers, Tobias
+Lear, to treat for peace with the Pasha. A bargain was finally struck.
+One hundred Moors were exchanged for as many of the American captives,
+and sixty thousand dollars were paid as ransom for the rest. June 4,
+1805, the American sailors, who had been slaves for more than nineteen
+months, were released from their chains and sent on board the war-ship
+_Constitution_. The Pasha declared himself a friend of the United
+States, and saluted its flag with twenty-one guns from his castle and
+forts.
+
+In the Barbary States rulers followed one another in rapid succession.
+He who was Dey or Pasha one week might be murdered by an enemy the next,
+and that enemy on mounting the throne was always eager to get as much
+plunder as he could. Treaties meant little to any of them, and so other
+countries kept on paying them tribute for the sake of peace.
+
+The United States fell into the habit of buying peace with Algiers,
+Tripoli, Morocco, and Tunis by gifts of merchandise or gold or costly
+vessels. But the more that was given to them the more greedy these
+Moorish rulers grew, and so it happened that from time to time they
+sent out their pirates to board American ships in order to frighten the
+young Republic into paying heavier tribute. Seven years later the second
+chapter of our history with the Barbary pirates opened.
+
+
+II
+
+The brig _Edwin_ of Salem, Massachusetts, was sailing under full canvas
+through the Mediterranean Sea, bound out from Malta to Gibraltar,
+on August 25, 1812. At her masthead she flew the Stars and Stripes.
+The weather was favoring, the little brig making good speed, and the
+Mediterranean offered no dangers to the skipper. Yet Captain George
+Smith, and his crew of ten Yankee sailors, kept constantly looking
+toward the south at some distant sails that had been steadily gaining on
+them since dawn. Every stitch of sail on the _Edwin_ had been set, but
+she was being overhauled, and at this rate would be caught long before
+she could reach Gibraltar.
+
+Captain Smith and his men knew who manned those long, low,
+rakish-looking frigates. But the _Edwin_ carried no cannon, and if
+they could not out-sail the three ships to the south they must yield
+peaceably, or be shot down on their deck. Hour after hour they watched,
+and by sunset they could see the dark, swarthy faces of the leading
+frigate's crew. Before night the _Edwin_ had been overhauled, boarded,
+and the Yankee captain and sailors were in irons, prisoners about to be
+sold into slavery.
+
+They had been captured by one of the pirate crews of the Dey of Algiers,
+and when they were taken ashore by these buccaneers they were stood up
+in the slave market and sold to Moors, or put to work in the shipyards.
+Other Yankee crews had met with the same treatment.
+
+Now the United States had been paying its tribute regularly to the
+pirates, but in the spring of 1812 the Dey of Algiers suddenly woke up
+to the fact that the Americans had been measuring time by the sun while
+the Moors figured it by the moon, and found that in consequence he had
+been defrauded of almost a half-year's tribute money, or twenty-seven
+thousand dollars. He sent an indignant message to Tobias Lear, the
+American consul at Algiers, threatening all sorts of punishments, and
+Mr. Lear, taking all things into account, decided it was best to pay
+the sum claimed by the Dey. The United States sent the extra tribute
+in the shape of merchandise by the sailing vessel _Alleghany_; but
+the Dey was now in a very bad temper, and declared that the stores
+were of poor quality, and ordered the consul to leave at once in the
+_Alleghany_, as he would have no further dealings with a country that
+tried to cheat him. At almost the same time he received a present from
+England of two large ships filled with stores of war,--powder, shot,
+anchors, and cables. He immediately sent out word to the buccaneers to
+capture all the American ships they could, and sell the sailors in the
+slave-markets. The Dey of Algiers appeared to have no fear of the United
+States.
+
+The truth of the matter was that his Highness the Dey, and also the
+Bey of Tunis, had been spoiled by England, who at this time told them
+confidently that the United States Navy was about to be wiped from the
+seas. English merchants assured them that they could treat Captain
+Smith and other Yankee skippers exactly as they pleased, since Great
+Britain had declared war on the United States, and the latter country
+would find herself quite busy at home. Algiers and Tripoli and Tunis,
+remembering their old grudge against the Americans, assured their
+English friends that nothing would delight them so much as to rid the
+Mediterranean of the Stars and Stripes.
+
+The pirates swept down on the brig _Edwin_, and laid hands on every
+American they could find in the neighborhood. They stopped and boarded
+a ship flying the Spanish flag, and took prisoner a Mr. Pollard, of
+Virginia. Tripoli and Tunis permitted English cruisers to enter their
+harbors, contrary to the rules of war, and recapture four English prizes
+that had been sent to them by the American privateer _Abellino_. When
+the United States offered to pay a ransom of three thousand dollars for
+every American who was held as a prisoner the Dey replied that he meant
+to capture a large number of them before he would consider any terms of
+sale.
+
+Our country was young and poor, and our navy consisted of only seventeen
+seaworthy ships, carrying less than four hundred and fifty cannon.
+England was indeed "Mistress of the Seas," with a great war-fleet of
+a thousand vessels, armed with almost twenty-eight thousand guns. No
+wonder that the British consul at Algiers had told the Dey "the American
+flag would be swept from the seas, the contemptible navy of the United
+States annihilated, and its maritime arsenals reduced to a heap of
+ruins." No wonder the Dey believed him. But as a matter of fact the
+little David outfought the giant Goliath; on the Great Lakes and on the
+high seas the Stars and Stripes waved triumphant after many a long and
+desperate encounter, and the small navy came out of the War of 1812 with
+a glorious record of victories, with splendid officers and crews, and
+with sixty-four ships. The English friends of the Barbary States had
+been mistaken, and Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli began to wish they had
+not been so scornful of the Yankees.
+
+It was time to show the pirates that Americans had as much right to
+trade in the Mediterranean as other people. On February 23, 1815,
+a few days after the treaty of peace with England was published,
+President Madison advised that we should send a fleet to Algiers. Two
+squadrons were ordered on this service, under command of Commodore
+William Bainbridge. One collected at Boston, and the other at New York.
+Commodore Stephen Decatur was in charge of the latter division.
+
+Decatur's squadron was the first to sail, leaving New York on May 20,
+1815. He had ten vessels in all, his flag-ship being the forty-four-gun
+frigate _Guerrière_, and his officers and crew being all seasoned
+veterans of the war with England. The fleet of the Dey of Algiers,
+however, was no mean foe. It consisted of twelve vessels, well armed
+and manned, six sloops, five frigates, and one schooner. Its admiral
+was a very remarkable man, one of the fierce tribe of Kabyles from the
+mountains, Reis Hammida by name, who had made himself the scourge
+of the Mediterranean. He had plenty of reckless courage; once he had
+boarded and captured in broad daylight a Portuguese frigate under the
+very cliffs of Gibraltar, and at another time, being in command of three
+Algerine frigates, had dared to attack a Portuguese ship of the line
+and three frigates, in face of the guns leveled at him from the Rock of
+Lisbon, directly opposite.
+
+The city of Algiers itself was one of the best fortified ports on the
+Mediterranean. It lay in the form of a triangle, one side extending
+along the sea, while the other two rose against a hill, meeting at the
+top at the Casbah, the historic fortress of the Deys. The city was
+guarded by very thick walls, mounted with many guns, and the harbor,
+made by a long mole, was commanded by heavy batteries, so that at least
+five hundred pieces of cannon could be brought to bear on any hostile
+ships trying to enter.
+
+Decatur's fleet was only a few days out of New York when it ran into a
+heavy gale, and the wooden ships were badly tossed about. The _Firefly_,
+a twelve-gun brig, sprung her masts, and had to put back to port.
+The other ships rode out the storm, and kept on their course to the
+Azores, keeping a sharp watch for any suspicious-looking craft. As they
+neared the coast of Portugal the vigilance was redoubled, for here was
+a favorite hunting-ground of Reis Hammida, and Decatur knew what the
+Algerine admiral had done before the Rock of Lisbon. They found no
+trace of the enemy here, however. At Cadiz Decatur sent a messenger
+to the American consul, who informed him that three Algerine frigates
+and some smaller ships had been spoken in the Atlantic Ocean, but were
+thought to have returned to the Mediterranean.
+
+Decatur wanted to take the enemy by surprise, and so sailed cautiously
+to Tangier, where he learned that two days earlier Reis Hammida had gone
+through the Straits of Gibraltar in the forty-six-gun frigate _Mashuda_.
+The American captain at once set sail for Gibraltar, and found out there
+that the wily Algerine was lying off Cape Gata, having demanded that
+Spain should pay him half a million dollars of tribute money to protect
+her coast-towns from attack by his fleet.
+
+Lookouts on the _Guerrière_ reported to Decatur that a despatch-boat had
+left Gibraltar as soon as the American ships appeared, and inquiry led
+the captain to believe the boat was bearing messages to Reis Hammida.
+Other boats were sailing for Algiers, and Decatur, realizing the ease
+with which his wily opponent, thoroughly familiar with the inland sea,
+would be able to elude him, decided to give chase at once.
+
+The fleet headed up the Mediterranean June 15th, under full sail.
+The next evening ships were seen near shore, and Decatur ordered the
+frigate _Macedonian_ and two brigs to overhaul them. Early the following
+morning, when the fleet was about twenty miles out from Cape Gata,
+Captain Gordon, of the frigate _Constellation_, sighted a big vessel
+flying the flag of Algiers, and signaled "An enemy to the southeast."
+
+Decatur saw that the strange ship had a good start of his fleet, and was
+within thirty hours' run of Algiers. He suspected that her captain might
+not have detected the fleet as American, and ordered the _Constellation_
+back to her position abeam of his flag-ship, gave directions to try to
+conceal the identity of his squadron, and stole up on the stranger.
+The latter was seen to be a frigate, lying to under small sail, as if
+waiting for some message from the African shore near at hand. One of the
+commanders asked permission to give chase, but Decatur signaled back "Do
+nothing to excite suspicion."
+
+The Moorish frigate held her position near shore while the American
+ships drew closer. When they were about a mile distant a quartermaster
+on the _Constellation_, by mistake, hoisted a United States flag. To
+cover this blunder the other ships were immediately ordered to fly
+English flags. But the crew of the Moorish frigate had seen the flag on
+the _Constellation_, and instantly swarmed out on the yard-arms, and
+had the sails set for flight. They were splendid seamen, and almost
+immediately the frigate was leaping under all her canvas for Algiers.
+The Americans were busy too. The rigging of each ship was filled with
+sailors, working out on the yards, the decks rang with commands, and
+messages were signaled from the flag-ship to the captains. Decatur
+crowded on all sail, fearing that the Algerine frigate might escape him
+in the night or seek refuge in some friendly harbor, and the American
+squadron raced along at top speed, just as the Barbary pirates had
+earlier chased after the little brig _Edwin_, of Salem.
+
+Soon the _Constellation_, which was to the south of the fleet and so
+nearest to the Moorish frigate, opened fire and sent several shots
+on board the enemy. The latter immediately came about, and headed
+northeast, as if making for the port of Carthagena. The Americans also
+tacked, and gained by this manoeuvre, the sloop _Ontario_ cutting across
+the Moor's course, and the _Guerrière_ being brought close enough for
+musketry fire.
+
+As the flag-ship came to close quarters the Moors opened fire, wounding
+several men, but Decatur waited until his ship cleared the enemy's
+yard-arms, when he ordered a broadside. The crew of the Algerine
+frigate, which was the _Mashuda_, were mowed down by this heavy fire.
+Reis Hammida himself had already been wounded by one of the first shots
+from the _Constellation_. He had, however, insisted on continuing to
+give orders from a couch on the quarter-deck, but a shot from the first
+broadside killed him. The _Guerrière's_ gun crews loaded and fired again
+before the first smoke had cleared; at this second broadside one of
+her largest guns exploded, killing three men, wounding seventeen, and
+splintering the spar-deck.
+
+The Moors made no sign of surrender, but Decatur, seeing that there were
+too few left to fight, and not wishing to pour another broadside into
+them, sailed past, and took a position just out of range. The Algerines
+immediately tried to run before him. In doing this the big _Mashuda_
+was brought directly against the little eighteen-gun American brig
+_Epervier_, commanded by John Downes. Instead of sailing away Downes
+placed his brig under the Moor's cabin ports, and by backing and filling
+escaped colliding with the frigate while he fired his small broadsides
+at her. This running fire, lasting for twenty-five minutes, finished the
+Moor's resistance, and the frigate surrendered.
+
+The flag-ship, the _Guerrière_, now took charge of the Algerine prize,
+and Decatur sent an officer, two midshipmen, and a crew on board her.
+The _Mashuda_ was a sorry sight, many of her men killed or wounded, and
+her decks splintered by the American broadsides. The prisoners were
+transferred to the other ships, and orders were given to the prize-crew
+to take the captured frigate to the port of Carthagena, under escort of
+the _Macedonian_.
+
+Before this was done, however, Decatur signaled all the officers to meet
+on his flag-ship. In the cabin they found a table covered with captured
+Moorish weapons,--daggers, pistols, scimitars, and yataghans. Decatur
+turned to Commandant Downes, who had handled the small _Epervier_ so
+skilfully. "As you were fortunate in obtaining a favorable position and
+maintained it so handsomely, you shall have the first choice of these
+weapons," he said. Downes chose, and then each of the other officers
+selected a trophy of the victory. That evening the squadron, leaving
+the _Mashuda_ in charge of the _Macedonian_, resumed its hunt for other
+ships belonging to the navy of the piratical Dey.
+
+The fleet was arriving off Cape Palos on June 19th when a brig was seen,
+looking suspiciously like an Algerine craft. When the Americans set sail
+toward her, the stranger ran away. Soon she came to shoal water, and
+the frigates had to leave the chase to the light-draught _Epervier_,
+_Spark_, _Torch_, and _Spitfire_. These followed and opened fire. The
+strange brig returned several shots, and was then run aground by her
+crew on the coast between the watch-towers of Estacio and Albufera,
+which had been built long before for the purpose of protecting fishermen
+and peasants from the raids of pirates. The strangers took to their
+small boats. One of these was sunk by a shot. The Americans then boarded
+the ship, which was the Algerine twenty-two-gun brig _Estedio_, and
+captured eighty-three prisoners. The brig was floated off the shoals and
+sent with a prize-crew into the Spanish port of Carthagena.
+
+Decatur, being unable to sight any more ships that looked like Moorish
+craft, and supposing that the rest of the pirate fleet would probably be
+making for Algiers, gave commands to his squadron to sail for that port.
+He was determined to bring the Dey to terms as quickly as possible,
+and to destroy his fleet, or bombard the city, if that was necessary.
+When he arrived off the Moorish town, however, he found none of the
+fleet there, and no apparent preparation for war in the harbor. The next
+morning he ran up the Swedish flag at the mainmast, and a white flag
+at the foremast, a signal asking the Swedish consul to come on board
+the flag-ship. Mr. Norderling, the consul, came out to the _Guerrière_,
+accompanied by the Algerine captain of the port. After some conversation
+Decatur asked the latter for news of the Dey's fleet. "By this time it
+is safe in some neutral port," was the assured answer.
+
+"Not all of it," said Decatur, "for we have captured the _Mashuda_ and
+the _Estedio_."
+
+The Algerine could not believe this, and told the American so. Then
+Decatur sent for a wounded lieutenant of the _Mashuda_, who was on his
+ship, and bade him confirm the statement. The Moorish officer of the
+port immediately changed his tactics, dropped his haughty attitude, and
+gave Decatur to understand that he thought the Dey would be willing to
+make a new treaty of peace with the United States.
+
+Decatur handed the Moor a letter from the President to the Dey, which
+stated that the Republic would only agree to peace provided Algiers
+would give up her claim to tribute and would cease molesting American
+merchantmen.
+
+The Moor wanted to gain as much time as possible, hoping his fleet
+would arrive, and said that it was the custom to discuss all treaties in
+the palace on shore. Decatur understood the slow and crafty methods of
+these people, and answered that the treaty should be drawn up and signed
+on board the _Guerrière_ or not at all. Seeing that there was no use in
+arguing with the American the Moorish officer went ashore to consult
+with the Dey.
+
+Next day, June 30th, the captain of the port returned, with power to act
+for his Highness Omar Pasha. Decatur told him that he meant to put an
+end to these piratical attacks on Americans, and insisted that all his
+countrymen who were being held as slaves in Algiers should be given up,
+that the value of goods taken from them should be paid them, that the
+Dey should give the owners of the brig _Edwin_ of Salem ten thousand
+dollars, that all Christians who escaped from Algiers to American ships
+should be free, and that the two nations should act toward each other
+exactly as other civilized countries did. Then the Moorish officer began
+to explain and argue. He said that it was not the present ruling Dey,
+Omar Pasha, called "Omar the Terrible" because of his great courage,
+who had attacked American ships; it was Hadji Ali, who was called the
+"Tiger" because of his cruelty, but he had been assassinated in March,
+and his prime minister, who succeeded him, had been killed the following
+month, and Omar Pasha was a friend of the United States. Decatur replied
+that his terms for peace could not be altered.
+
+The Moor then asked for a truce while he should go ashore and confer
+with the Dey. Decatur said he would grant no truce. The Algerine
+besought him to make no attack for three hours. "Not a minute!" answered
+Decatur. "If your squadron appears before the treaty is actually signed
+by the Dey, and before the American prisoners are sent aboard, I will
+capture it!"
+
+The Moorish captain said he would hurry at once to the Dey, and added
+that if the Americans should see his boat heading out to the _Guerrière_
+with a white flag in the bow they would know that Omar Pasha had agreed
+to Decatur's terms.
+
+An hour later the Americans sighted an Algerine war-ship coming from the
+east. Decatur signaled his fleet to clear for action, and gave orders
+to his own men on the _Guerrière_. The fleet had hardly weighed anchor,
+however, before the small boat of the port captain was seen dashing out
+from shore, a white flag in the bow. The excited Moor waved to the crew
+of the flag-ship. As soon as the boat was near enough Decatur asked
+if the Dey had signed the treaty, and set the American captives free.
+The captain assured him of this, and a few minutes later his boat was
+alongside the flag-ship, and the Americans, who had been seized and held
+by the pirates, were given over to their countrymen. Some of them had
+been slaves for several years, and their delight knew no bounds.
+
+In so short a time did Decatur succeed in bringing the Dey to better
+terms than he had made with any other country. When the treaty had
+been signed the Dey's prime minister said to the English consul, with
+reproach in his voice, "You told us that the Americans would be swept
+from the seas in six months by your navy, and now they make war upon us
+with some of your own vessels which they have taken." As a fact three of
+the ships in Decatur's squadron had actually been won from the English
+in the War of 1812.
+
+The _Epervier_, commanded by Lieutenant John Templer Shubrick, was now
+ordered to return to the United States, with some of the Americans
+rescued from Algiers. The fate of the brig is one of the mysteries of
+the sea. She sailed through the Straits of Gibraltar July 12, 1815, and
+was never heard of again. She is supposed to have been lost in a heavy
+storm in which a number of English merchantmen foundered near the West
+Indies.
+
+Algiers had now been brought to her knees by Decatur, and he was free
+to turn to Tunis and Tripoli. The rulers of each of these countries had
+been misled by the English agents exactly as had the Dey of Algiers, and
+the Bey of Tunis had allowed the British cruiser _Lyra_ to recapture
+some English prizes that the American privateer _Abellino_ had taken
+into harbor during the War of 1812. Like Algiers, both Tunis and Tripoli
+were well protected by fleets and imposing forts. Decatur, however,
+had now learned that downright and prompt measures were the ones most
+successful in dealing with the Moors, who were used to long delays and
+arguments. He anchored off Tunis on July 26th, and immediately sent word
+to the Bey that the latter must pay the United States forty-six thousand
+dollars for allowing the English _Lyra_ to seize the American prizes,
+and that the money must be paid within twelve hours.
+
+The United States consul, Mordecai M. Noah, carried Decatur's message
+to the Bey. The Moorish ruler was seated on a pile of cushions at
+a window of his palace, combing his long, flowing black beard with
+a tortoise-shell comb set with diamonds. Mr. Noah politely stated
+Decatur's terms.
+
+"Tell your admiral to come and see me," said the Bey.
+
+"He declines coming, your Highness," answered the consul, "until these
+disputes are settled, which are best done on board the ship."
+
+The Bey frowned. "But this is not treating me with becoming dignity.
+Hammuda Pasha, of blessed memory, commanded them to land and wait at the
+palace until he was pleased to receive them."
+
+"Very likely, your Highness," said Mr. Noah, "but that was twenty years
+ago."
+
+The Bey considered. "I know this admiral," he remarked at length; "he is
+the same one who, in the war with Sidi Yusuf, burned the frigate." He
+referred to Decatur's burning the _Philadelphia_ in the earlier warfare.
+
+The consul nodded. "The same."
+
+"Hum!" said the Bey. "Why do they send wild young men to treat for peace
+with old powers? Then, you Americans do not speak the truth. You went
+to war with England, a nation with a great fleet, and said you took her
+frigates in equal fight. Honest people always speak the truth."
+
+"Well, sir, and that was true. Do you see that tall ship in the bay
+flying a blue flag?" The consul pointed through the window. "It is the
+_Guerrière_, taken from the British. That one near the small island, the
+_Macedonian_, was also captured by Decatur on equal terms. The sloop
+near Cape Carthage, the _Peacock_, was also taken in battle."
+
+The Bey, looking through his telescope, saw a small vessel leave the
+American fleet and approach the forts. A man appeared to be taking
+soundings. The Bey laid down the telescope. "I will accept the admiral's
+terms," said he, and resumed the combing of his beard.
+
+Later he received Decatur with a great show of respect. The American
+consul was also honored, but the British was not treated so well. When
+a brother of the prime minister paid the money over to Decatur the Moor
+turned to the Englishman, and said, "You see, sir, what Tunis is obliged
+to pay for your insolence. You should feel ashamed of the disgrace you
+have brought upon us. I ask you if you think it just, first to violate
+our neutrality and then to leave us to be destroyed or pay for your
+aggressions?"
+
+Having settled matters with Tunis, Decatur sailed for Tripoli, and
+there sent his demands to the Pasha. He asked thirty thousand dollars
+in payment for two American prizes of war that had been recaptured by
+the British cruiser _Paulina_, a salute of thirty-one guns to be fired
+from the Pasha's palace in honor of the United States flag, and that the
+treaty of peace be signed on board the _Guerrière_.
+
+The Pasha pretended to be offended, summoned his twenty thousand Arab
+soldiers and manned his cannon; but when he heard how Algiers and Tunis
+had already made peace with Decatur, and saw that the Americans were
+all prepared for battle, he changed his tactics and sent the governor
+of Tripoli to the flag-ship to treat for peace. The American consul
+told Decatur that twenty-five thousand dollars would make good the lost
+prize-ships, but that the Pasha was holding ten Christians as slaves in
+Tripoli. Decatur thereupon reduced the amount of his claim on condition
+that the slaves should be released. This was agreed to. The prisoners,
+two of whom were Danes, and the others Sicilians, were sent to the
+flag-ship, and by way of compliment the band of the _Guerrière_ went
+ashore and played American airs to the delight of the people.
+
+The American captain now ordered the rest of his squadron to sail to
+Gibraltar, while the _Guerrière_ landed the prisoners at Sicily. As the
+flag-ship came down the coast from Carthagena she met that part of the
+Algerine fleet that had put into Malta when the Americans first arrived
+in the Mediterranean. The _Guerrière_ was alone, and Decatur thought
+that the Moors, finding him at such a disadvantage, might break their
+treaty of peace, and attack him. He called his men to the quarter-deck.
+"My lads," said he, "those fellows are approaching us in a threatening
+manner. We have whipped them into a treaty, and if the treaty is to be
+broken let them break it. Be careful of yourselves. Let any man fire
+without orders at the peril of his life. But let them fire first if they
+will, and we'll take the whole of them!"
+
+The decks were cleared, and every man stood ready for action. The fleet
+of seven Algerine ships sailed close to the single American frigate in
+line of battle. The crews looked across the bulwarks at each other, but
+not a word was said until the last Algerine ship was opposite. "Where
+are you going?" demanded the Moorish admiral.
+
+"Wherever it pleases me," answered Decatur; and the _Guerrière_ sailed
+on her course.
+
+Early in October there was a great gathering of American ships
+at Gibraltar. Captain Bainbridge's fleet, which included the
+seventy-four-gun ship of the line _Independence_, was there when Decatur
+arrived. The war between the United States and England was only recently
+ended, and the presence of so many ships of the young Republic at the
+English Rock of Gibraltar caused much talk among the Spaniards and other
+foreigners. The sight of ships which had been English, but which were
+now American, added to the awkward situation, and more than one duel was
+fought on the Rock as the result of disputes over the War of 1812.
+
+The Dey of Algiers, left to his own advisers and to the whispers of men
+who were jealous of the United States' success, began to wish he had not
+agreed to the treaty he had made with Decatur. His own people told him
+that a true son of the Prophet should never have humbled himself before
+the Christian dogs. In addition the English government agreed to pay him
+nearly four hundred thousand dollars to ransom twelve thousand prisoners
+of Naples and Sardinia that he was holding. Before everything else the
+Dey was greedy. Therefore when Captain Oliver Hazard Perry, the hero of
+the battle of Lake Erie, brought out in the _Java_ a copy of the treaty
+after it had been ratified by the United States Senate, and it was
+presented to the Dey by the American consul, William Shaler, the ruler
+of Algiers pretended that the United States had changed the treaty,
+and complained of the way in which Decatur had dealt with the Algerine
+ships. Next day he refused to meet Mr. Shaler again, and sent the treaty
+back to him, saying that the Americans were unworthy of his confidence.
+Mr. Shaler hauled down the flag at his consulate, and boarded the _Java_.
+
+Fortunately there were five American ships near Algiers; and these
+were made ready to open fire on the Moorish vessels in the harbor.
+Plans were also made for a night attack. The small boats of the fleet
+were divided into two squadrons, to be filled by twelve hundred
+volunteer sailors. One division was to make for the water battery and
+try to spike its guns, while the other was to attack the batteries
+on shore. Scaling-ladders were ready, and the men were provided with
+boarding-spikes; but shortly before they were to embark the captain
+of a French ship in the harbor got word of the plan and carried the
+information to the Dey. The latter was well frightened, and immediately
+sent word that he would do whatever his good friends from America
+wanted. The next day Mr. Shaler landed again, and the Dey signed the
+treaty.
+
+The fleet then called a second time on the Bey of Tunis, who had been
+grumbling about his dissatisfaction with Decatur's treatment. He
+too, however, was most friendly when American war-ships poked their
+noses toward his palace. After that the Barbary pirates let American
+merchantmen trade in peace, although an American squadron of four ships
+was kept in the Mediterranean to see that the Dey, and the Bey, and the
+Pasha did not forget, and go back to their old tricks.
+
+So it was that Decatur put an end to the African pirates, so far as the
+United States was concerned, and taught them that sailors of the young
+Republic, far away though it was, were not to be made slaves by greedy
+Moorish rulers.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+THE FATE OF LOVEJOY'S PRINTING-PRESS
+
+
+Ever since the thirteen colonies that lay along the Atlantic coast
+had become a nation ambitious men had heard the call, "Go West,
+young man, go West!" There was plenty of fertile land in the country
+beyond the Alleghany Mountains, and it was free to any who would
+settle on it. Adventure beckoned men to come and help in founding new
+states, and many, who thought the villages of New England already
+overcrowded, betook themselves to the inviting West. One such youth was
+Elijah Parrish Lovejoy, who came from the little town of Albion, in
+Maine, and who, after graduating at Waterville College, had become a
+school-teacher. This did not satisfy him; he wanted to see more of the
+world than lay in the village of his birth, and when he was twenty-five
+years old, in May, 1827, he set out westward.
+
+The young man was a true son of the Puritans, brought up to believe
+in many ideas that were already often in conflict with the views of
+men of the South and West. He reached the small city of St. Louis, in
+the pioneer country of Missouri, and there he found a chance to teach
+school. He wrote for several newspapers that were being started, and in
+the course of the next year edited a political paper that was urging
+the election of Henry Clay as President. His interest in politics grew,
+and he might have sought some public office himself had he not suddenly
+become convinced that he was meant to be a minister, and determined to
+prepare for that work at Princeton Seminary. When he returned to St.
+Louis in 1833 his friends helped him to found a weekly religious paper
+called the _St. Louis Observer_.
+
+The editor found time from his newspaper work to ride into the country
+and preach at the small churches that were springing up at every
+crossroads. Missouri was more southern than northern, and he saw much
+of slave-owning people. It was not long before he decided that negro
+slavery was wrong, and that the only way to right the wrong was to do
+away with it altogether. He began to attack slavery in his newspaper and
+in his sermons, and soon slavery men in that part of Missouri came to
+consider him as one of their most bitter foes.
+
+Lovejoy had married, and expected to make St. Louis his permanent
+home. But neither all the men who were interested in the _Observer_,
+nor all the members of his church, approved of his arguments against
+slaveholding, and when he was away at a religious meeting the
+proprietors of his paper issued a statement promising that the editor
+would deal more gently with the question of slavery in the future. When
+Lovejoy returned and read this statement he was indignant; he was not a
+man to fear public opinion, and he attacked his enemies more ardently
+than ever.
+
+The law of the land permitted slavery, and many of the chief citizens
+in the frontier country approved of it. They hated the Abolitionists,
+as those who wanted to do away with slavery were called. When men were
+suspected of having helped to free slaves, or of sheltering runaway
+negroes, they were taken into the country and given two hundred lashes
+with a whip as a lesson. Sometimes Abolitionists were tarred and
+feathered and ridden out of town; often their houses were burned and
+their property destroyed. Lovejoy knew that he might have to face all
+this, but the spirit of the Puritan stock from which he sprang would not
+let him turn from his course.
+
+He went on printing articles against the evils of slavery, he denounced
+the right of a white man to separate colored husbands and wives, parents
+and children, brothers and sisters, or to send his slaves to the market
+to be sold to the highest bidder, or to whip or ill-use them as if they
+had no feelings.
+
+There was danger that the young editor would be mobbed, and the owners
+of the _Observer_ took the paper out of his charge. Friends, however,
+who believed in a free press, bought it, and gave it back to him. Waves
+of public opinion, now for Lovejoy, now against him, swept through St.
+Louis. By the end of 1835 mobs had attacked Abolitionists in Boston,
+New York, and Philadelphia, and the news fanned the flames of resentment
+against them in Missouri.
+
+Lovejoy had good reason to know the danger of his position. One
+September day he went out to a camp-meeting at the little town of
+Potosi. He learned that two men had waited half a day in the village,
+planning to tar and feather him when he arrived, but he was late, and
+they had left. When he returned to St. Louis he found that handbills had
+been distributed through the city, calling on the people to tear down
+the office of the _Observer_. A newspaper named the _Missouri Argus_
+urged patriotic men to mob the New England editor. Crowds, gathered on
+street corners, turned dark, lowering looks upon him as he passed, and
+every mail brought him threatening letters. He would not, however, stop
+either writing or preaching against slavery.
+
+His work constantly called him on journeys to small towns, sometimes
+several days' ride from his home. Late in 1835 he was at a meeting in
+Marion when reports came that St. Louis was in an uproar, that men who
+opposed slavery were being whipped in the streets, and that no one
+suspected of being an Abolitionist would be allowed to stay there.
+Lovejoy had left his wife ill in bed. He started to ride back, a friend
+going some seventy miles with him, half of the journey. The friend urged
+him not to stay in St. Louis, pointing out that his young and delicate
+wife would have to suffer as well as he. Travelers they met all warned
+him that he would not be safe in the city. He rode on to St. Charles,
+where he had left his wife. He talked with her, and she told him to go
+on to his newspaper office if he thought duty called him there.
+
+St. Louis was all excitement and alarm. The newspapers had attacked
+the _Observer_ so bitterly that the owners had stopped printing it. A
+mob had planned to wreck the office, but had postponed the task for a
+few days. Men went to Lovejoy and told him he would not be safe in the
+streets by day or night. Even the men of his church would not stand
+by him, and a religious paper declared "that they would soon free the
+church of the rotten sheep in it," by which they meant Elijah Lovejoy
+and others who opposed slavery.
+
+This Yankee, however, like many others who had gone to that border
+country in the days when bitterness ran high, had a heroic sense of
+duty. He wrote and printed a letter to the people, stating that men had
+no right to own their brothers, no matter what the law might say. The
+letter caused more excitement than ever.
+
+The owners of the _Observer_ went to Lovejoy and requested him to retire
+as its editor. For two days it was a question what the angry mobs would
+do to him. Then a little better feeling set in. Men came to him, and
+told him that he must go on printing his paper or there would be no
+voice of freedom in all that part of the country. A friend bought
+the newspaper from its owners, and urged Lovejoy to write as boldly
+as before. This friend, however, suggested that he should move the
+newspaper across the state line to Alton, Illinois, where feeling was
+not so intense. Lovejoy agreed, and set out for Alton; but while he was
+preparing to issue the paper there the same friend and others wrote him
+that his pen was so much needed in St. Louis that he must come back. He
+did so, and the _Observer_ continued its existence in St. Louis until
+June, 1836.
+
+There was so much strife and ill feeling, however, in Missouri that
+the editor decided his newspaper would be better supported, and would
+exert more influence, in Illinois. Accordingly he arranged to move
+his printing-press to the town of Alton in July. Just before he left
+St. Louis he published severe criticisms of a judge of that city who
+had sided with slave-owners, and these articles roused even greater
+resentment among the rabble who hated Lovejoy's freedom of speech.
+
+If some of the people of Alton were glad to have this fearless editor
+come to their town, many were not. Slavery was too sore a subject for
+them to wish it talked about publicly. Many people all through that
+part of the country looked upon an Abolitionist as a man who delighted
+in stirring up ill feeling. Lovejoy sent his printing-press to Alton by
+steamboat, and it was delivered at the wharf on a Sunday morning, about
+daybreak. The steamboat company had agreed to land the press on Monday,
+and Lovejoy refused to move it from the dock on the Sabbath. Early
+Monday morning five or six men went down to the river bank and destroyed
+the printing-press.
+
+This was the young editor's welcome by the lawless element, but next day
+the better class of citizens, thoroughly ashamed of the outrage, met and
+pledged themselves to repay Lovejoy for the loss of his press. These
+people denounced the act of the mob, but at the same time they expressed
+their disapproval of Abolitionists. They wanted order and quiet, and
+hoped that Lovejoy would not stir up more trouble.
+
+The editor bought a new press and issued his first paper in Alton
+on September 8, 1836. Many people subscribed to it, and it appeared
+regularly until the following August. Lovejoy, however, would speak
+his mind, and again and again declared that he was absolutely opposed
+to slavery, and that the evil custom must come to an end. This led to
+murmurs from the slavery party, and slanders were spread concerning the
+editor's character. All freedom-loving men had to weather such storms
+in those days, and Lovejoy, like a great many others, stuck to his
+principles at a heavy cost.
+
+The murmurs and slanders grew. On July 8, 1837, posters announced
+that a meeting would be held at the Market House to protest against
+the articles in the _Alton Observer_. The meeting condemned Lovejoy's
+writings and speeches, and voted that Abolitionism must be suppressed
+in the town. This was the early thunder that heralded the approach of a
+gathering storm.
+
+The Yankee editor showed no intention of giving up his stand against
+slavery, but preached and wrote against it at every opportunity. As a
+result threats of destroying the press of the _Observer_ were heard on
+the streets of Alton, and newspapers in neighboring cities encouraged
+ill feeling against the editor. The _Missouri Republic_, a paper printed
+in St. Louis, tried to convince the people of Alton that it was a
+public danger to have such men as Lovejoy in their midst, and condemned
+the Anti-Slavery Societies that were being formed in that part of the
+country. Two attempts were made to break into his printing-office during
+the early part of the summer, but each time the attackers were driven
+off by Lovejoy's friends.
+
+The editor went to a friend's house to perform a marriage ceremony
+on the evening of August 21, 1837. His wife and little boy were ill
+at home, and on his return he stopped at an apothecary's to get some
+medicine for them. His house was about a half mile out of town. As
+he left the main street he met a crowd of men and boys. They did not
+recognize him at once, and he hurried past them; but soon some began
+to suspect who he was, and shouted his name to the rest. Those in the
+rear urged the leaders to attack him, but those in front held back; some
+began to throw sticks and stones at him, and one, armed with a club,
+pushed up to him, denouncing him for being an Abolitionist. At last a
+number linked arms and pushed past him, and then turning about in the
+road stopped him. There were cries of "Tar and feather him," "Ride him
+on a rail," and other threats. Lovejoy told them they might do as they
+pleased with him, but he had a request to make; his wife was ill, and he
+wanted some one to take the medicine to her without alarming her. One of
+the men volunteered to do this. Then the editor, standing at bay, argued
+with them. "You had better let me go home," he said; "you have no right
+to detain me; I have never injured you." There was more denouncing,
+jostling and shoving, but the leaders, after a short talk, allowed
+Lovejoy to go on toward his house.
+
+Meantime, however, another band had gone to the newspaper office between
+ten and eleven o'clock, and, seeing by the lights in the building that
+men were still at work there, had begun to throw stones at the windows.
+A crowd gathered to watch the attack. The mayor and some of the leading
+citizens hurried to the building, and argued with the ringleaders. A
+prominent merchant told them that if they would wait until the next
+morning he would break into the newspaper office with them, and help
+them take out the press and the other articles, stow them on a boat,
+put the editor on top, and send them all down the Mississippi River
+together. But the crowd did not want to wait. The stones began to strike
+some of Lovejoy's assistants inside the building, and they ran out by
+a rear door. As soon as the office was empty the leaders rushed in and
+broke the printing-press, type, and everything else in the building.
+Next morning the slavery men in Alton said that the Abolitionist had
+been silenced for the time, at least. They looked upon Lovejoy, and men
+of his kind, as a thorn in the flesh of their peaceful community.
+
+There were still a small number of "freedom-loving" people in Alton,
+however, and these stood back of Elijah Lovejoy. Although two
+printing-presses had now been destroyed, these men called a meeting
+and decided that the _Observer_ must continue to be printed. Money was
+promised, and the editor prepared to set up his press for the third
+time. He issued a short note to the public, in which he said: "I now
+appeal to you, and all the friends of law and order, to come to the
+rescue. If you will sustain me, by the help of God, the press shall be
+again established at this place, and shall be sustained, come what will.
+Let the experiment be fairly tried, whether the liberty of speech and of
+the press is to be enjoyed in Illinois or not." The money was raised,
+and the dauntless spokesman for freedom sent to Cincinnati for supplies
+for his new office.
+
+That autumn enemies scattered pamphlets accusing Lovejoy and other
+Abolitionists of various crimes against the country. Although few
+people believed them, the circulars increased the hostile feelings, and
+disturbed many of the editor's friends. Some of the latter began to
+doubt whether the _Observer_ ought to continue its stirring articles.
+Some thought it should be only a religious paper. But Lovejoy answered
+that he felt it was his duty to speak out in protest against the great
+evil of slavery. He finally offered to resign, if the supporters of
+the paper thought it best for him to do so. They could not come to any
+decision, and so let him continue his course.
+
+The third printing-press arrived at Alton on September 21st, while
+Lovejoy was away attending a church meeting. The press was landed from
+the steamboat a little after sunset, and was protected by a number of
+friends of the _Observer_. It was carted to a large warehouse to be
+stored. As it passed through the street some men cried, "There goes
+the Abolition press; stop it, stop it!" but no one tried to injure it.
+The mayor of Alton declared that the press should be protected, and
+placed a constable at the door of the warehouse, with orders to remain
+till a certain hour. As soon as this man left, ten or twelve others,
+with handkerchiefs tied over their faces as disguise, broke into the
+warehouse, rolled the press across the street to the river, broke it
+into pieces, and threw it into the Mississippi. The mayor arrived and
+protested, but the men paid no attention to him.
+
+Lovejoy's business had called him to the town of St. Charles, near St.
+Louis, and he preached there while his third press was being attacked.
+After his sermon in the evening he was sitting chatting with a clergyman
+and another friend when a young man came in, and slipped a note into
+his hand. The note read:
+
+    "MR. LOVEJOY:
+
+    "Be watchful as you come from church to-night.
+
+        A FRIEND."
+
+Lovejoy showed the note to the two other men, and the clergyman invited
+him to stay at his house. The editor declined, however, and walked to
+his mother-in-law's residence with his two friends. No one stopped them,
+and when they came to the house Lovejoy and the clergyman went in, and
+sat down to chat in a room on the second floor. About ten o'clock they
+heard a knock on the door at the foot of the stairs. Mrs. Lovejoy's
+mother went to the door, and asked what was wanted. Voices answered,
+"We want to see Mr. Lovejoy; is he in?" The editor called down, "Yes, I
+am here." As soon as the door was opened, two men rushed up-stairs, and
+into the sitting-room. They ordered Lovejoy to go down-stairs, and when
+he resisted, struck him with their fists. Mrs. Lovejoy heard the noise,
+and came running from her room. A crowd now filled the hall, and she had
+to fight her way through them. Several men tried to drag the editor out
+of the house, but his wife clung to him, and aided by her mother and
+sister finally persuaded the assailants to leave.
+
+Exhausted by the struggle, Mrs. Lovejoy fainted. While her husband
+was trying to help her, the mob came back, and, paying no attention to
+the sick woman, insisted that they were going to ride Lovejoy out of
+town. By this time a few respectable citizens had heard the noise, and
+came to his aid. A second time the rabble was driven away; but they
+stayed in the yard, and made the night hideous with their threats to
+the Abolitionist. Presently some of the men went up to Lovejoy's room
+the third time, and one of them gave him a note, which demanded that he
+leave St. Charles by ten o'clock the next morning. Lovejoy's friends
+begged him to send out an answer promising that he would leave. Although
+he at first declined to do this, he finally yielded to their urging. He
+wrote, "I have already taken my passage in the stage, to leave to-morrow
+morning, at least by nine o'clock." This note was carried out to the
+crowd on the lawn, and read to them. His friends thought the mob would
+scatter after that, and they did for a time; but after listening to
+violent speeches returned again. The noise was now so threatening that
+Lovejoy's friends begged him to fly from the house. His wife added her
+pleadings to theirs, and at last he stole out unnoticed by a door at the
+rear. He hated to leave his wife in such a dangerous situation, however,
+and so, after waiting a short time, he went back. His friends reproached
+him for returning, and their reproaches were justified, for, like hounds
+scenting the fox, the mob menaced the house more noisily than ever.
+Lovejoy saw that he must leave again in order to protect his wife and
+friends. This he succeeded in doing, and walked about a mile to the
+residence of a Major Sibley. This friend lent him a horse, and he rode
+out of town to the house of another friend four miles away. Next day
+Mrs. Lovejoy joined him, and they went on together to Alton.
+
+One of the very first people they met in Alton was a man from St Charles
+who had been among those who had broken into their house the night
+before. Mrs. Lovejoy was alarmed at seeing him in Illinois, because the
+mob in St. Charles had declared that they were going to drive Lovejoy
+out of that part of the country. In order to quiet her fears her husband
+asked some friends to come to his house, and ten men, well armed, spent
+the next night guarding it, while he himself kept a loaded musket at his
+side. The storm-clouds were gathering about his devoted head.
+
+Even the leading citizens of this Illinois town now felt that it was
+Lovejoy's own fault if his newspaper was attacked. They hated mobs, but
+most of them hated Abolitionists even more. If he would stop attacking
+slavery, the crowds would stop attacking him. It was evident that
+the lawless element did not intend to let him continue to print his
+newspaper, and it was almost as clear that the mayor and authorities
+were not going to protect him. Three times now his press had been
+destroyed.
+
+This son of the Puritans was not to be driven from his purpose by
+threats or blows, but he was forced to see that it was a great waste
+of money to have one press after another thrown into the Mississippi
+River. His friends in the town of Quincy urged him to set up his press
+there, and he felt much inclined to do so. He decided to wait, however,
+until the next meeting of the Presbyterian Synod, when he would learn
+whether the men of his church sided with him or not. This meeting
+ended in discussion, breaking up along the old lines of those who were
+friends and those who were enemies of slavery. Some of the members had
+already joined Anti-Slavery Societies, while others, although they were
+opposed to mob-violence, did not approve of the newspaper's attack on
+slaveholding citizens. In a stirring speech Lovejoy said that they were
+to decide whether the press should be free in that part of the United
+States. He ended with an appeal for justice. "I have no personal fears,"
+he declared. "Not that I feel able to contest the matter with the whole
+community. I know perfectly well I am not. I know, sir, that you can
+tar and feather me, hang me up, or put me into the Mississippi, without
+the least difficulty. But what then? Where shall I go? I have been made
+to feel that if I am not safe at Alton, I shall not be safe anywhere.
+I recently visited St. Charles to bring home my family, and was torn
+from their frantic embrace by a mob. I have been beset night and day at
+Alton. And now if I leave here and go elsewhere, violence may overtake
+me in my retreat, and I have no more claim upon the protection of any
+other community than I have upon this; and I have concluded, after
+consultation with my friends, and earnestly seeking counsel of God, to
+remain at Alton, and here to insist on protection in the exercise of my
+rights."
+
+This speech made a great impression upon its hearers. The words were
+those of a man who had thought long upon his subject, and had made up
+his mind as to what he should do. He expressed no enmity toward the men
+who had treated him so ill, and he did not complain of the members of
+his own church who were lukewarm in their support. A man who was present
+said that Lovejoy's speech reminded him of the words of St. Paul when
+brought before Festus, or of Martin Luther speaking to the council at
+Worms.
+
+Having decided to stay, Lovejoy ordered his fourth printing-press. This
+was due to arrive early in November, and as the time drew near there
+was no little excitement and anxiety among the friends of peace in the
+town. Whenever the puff of a steamboat was heard men hurried to the
+banks of the Mississippi. Some meant to defend the press from attack;
+others meant to hurl it into the river as they had already done with
+its predecessors. The press had an eventful journey. The first plan was
+to land it at a place called Chippewa, about five miles down the river,
+and then carry it secretly into Alton. But the roads grew bad, and
+this plan was abandoned. The press reached St. Louis on Sunday night,
+November 5th, and it was arranged that the steamer should land it at
+Alton about three o'clock Tuesday morning. As soon as this was known,
+Lovejoy and his friend Gilman went to the mayor and told him of the
+threat that had been made to destroy the press, asking him to appoint
+special constables to protect it. The town council voted that Lovejoy
+and his friends be requested not to persist in setting up an Abolition
+press in Alton, but the mayor refused to sign this request.
+
+Monday night forty or fifty citizens, intent on seeing that the press
+was protected, gathered at the warehouse of Godfrey, Gilman and Company
+where the press was to be stored. Some thirty of them formed a volunteer
+company, with one of the city constables in command. They were armed
+with rifles and muskets loaded with buckshot or small balls. The editor
+of the _Observer_ was not there. Only a night or two before his house
+had been attacked, and his sister had narrowly escaped serious injury.
+So he arranged with a brother, who was staying with him, to take turns
+standing guard at his house and at the office.
+
+At three o'clock the steamboat arrived at the dock. Lovejoy's enemies
+had stationed sentinels along the river, and as the boat passed they
+gave the alarm by blowing horns, so that when the dock was reached a
+large crowd had gathered. Some one called the mayor, and he came down
+to the warehouse. He begged the volunteer company to keep quiet, and
+said he himself would see to the safe storing of the press. No serious
+trouble followed. The crowd watched the stevedores carry the press to
+the warehouse, but did not attack it, except to throw a few stones. It
+was stood in the garret of the stone warehouse, safe from the enemy.
+
+On Tuesday every one knew that the "Abolition press" had arrived, and
+Tuesday night the same volunteers went down to the warehouse again.
+Everything was quiet, and by nine o'clock all but about a dozen left the
+place. Lovejoy stayed by the press, it being his brother's turn to guard
+his house. The warehouse stood high above the river, apart from other
+buildings, with considerable open space on the sides to the river and to
+the north.
+
+About ten o'clock that night loafers and stragglers began to come
+from saloons and restaurants, and gather in the streets that led to
+the warehouse. Some thirty, armed with muskets, pistols, and stones,
+marched to the door, and demanded admittance. Mr. Gilman, one of the
+owners of the warehouse, standing at the garret door, asked what they
+wanted. The leader answered, "The press." Mr. Gilman said that he would
+not give up the press. "We have no ill feelings toward any of you," he
+added, "and should regret to harm you; but we are authorized by the
+mayor to defend our property, and shall do so with our lives." The
+mob leader answered that they meant to have the press at any cost,
+and leveled a pistol at Mr. Gilman, who drew back from the door. The
+crowd began to throw stones, and broke a number of windows. Then they
+fired through the windows. The men inside returned the shots. One or
+two of the mob were wounded; and this checked them for a time. Soon,
+however, others came with ladders, and materials for setting fire to
+the roof of the building. They kept on the side of the warehouse where
+there were no windows, and where they could not be driven away by the
+defenders. It was a moonlight night, and the small company inside the
+building did not dare go out into the open space in front. At this
+point the mayor appeared and carried a flag of truce through the mob to
+Lovejoy's friends, asking that the press be given up, and the men in
+the warehouse depart peacefully without other property being destroyed.
+He told them that unless they surrendered the mob would set fire to
+the warehouse. They answered that they had gathered to defend their
+property, and intended to do it. He admitted that they had a perfect
+right to do this, and went back to report the result of his mission to
+the leaders. Outside a shout went up, "Fire the building, drive out the
+Abolitionists, burn them out!" A great crowd had gathered, but there
+were no officers of the law ready to defend the press.
+
+Ladders were placed against the building, and the roof was set on fire.
+Five men volunteered to go out and try to prevent the firing. They
+left the building by the riverside, fired at the men on the ladder,
+and drove them away. The crowd drew back, while the five returned to
+the store. The mob did not venture to put up their ladder again, and
+presently Lovejoy and two or three others opened a door and looked out.
+There appeared to be no one on this side, and Lovejoy stepped forward
+to reconnoiter. Some of his enemies, however, were hidden behind a pile
+of lumber, and one of them fired a double-barreled gun. The editor
+was hit by five balls. He turned around, ran up a flight of stairs in
+the warehouse, and into the counting-room. There he fell, dying a few
+minutes later.
+
+With their leader killed some of the company wanted to give up the
+battle, while others insisted on fighting it out. They finally resolved
+to yield. A clergyman went to one of the upper windows and called out
+that Elijah Lovejoy had been killed and that they would give up the
+press if they might be allowed to go unmolested. The crowd answered
+that they would shoot them all where they were. One of the defenders
+determined to go out at any risk and make terms. As soon as he opened
+the door, he was fired upon and wounded. The roof was now blazing, and
+one of their friends reached a door and begged them to escape by the
+rear. All but two or three laid down their arms, running out at the
+southern door, and fled down the bank of the river. The mob fired at
+them, but only one was wounded. The crowd rushed into the warehouse,
+threw the press out the window, breaking it into pieces, and scattered
+the pieces in the Mississippi. At two o'clock they had disappeared,
+having accomplished their evil purpose of preventing a "free press" in
+Alton.
+
+Elijah Lovejoy was only thirty-five years old when he met his martyr's
+death. His life in Missouri and Illinois had been one constant fight
+against slavery, and for liberty of speech. His Puritan ancestry made it
+impossible for him to give up the battle he knew to be right. The story
+of his heroic struggle and death aroused lovers of liberty all over the
+country, and newspapers everywhere denounced the acts of the mob at
+Alton. Such acts meant that men could not speak their minds on public
+questions, and a "free press" had been one of the dearest rights of
+American citizens. Men in the North at that time had by no means agreed
+that slavery must be abolished, but they did all believe in the freedom
+of the press. For that cause Lovejoy had been a martyr.
+
+More than two decades were to pass before the question of slavery was to
+be settled forever, and in the years between 1837 and 1860 many men of
+the same stock and stripe as Elijah Lovejoy were to give up their lives
+in heroic defense of their belief in freedom. He was one of the first
+of a long line of heroes. His voice sounded a call that was to echo
+through the border states for years to come, inspiring others to take up
+his cause. A freedom-loving country should place among its noblest sons
+this dauntless editor and preacher.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+HOW MARCUS WHITMAN SAVED OREGON
+
+
+The Hudson's Bay Company, whose business was to buy skins and furs
+from the American Indians, had located a trading-post at Fort Walla
+Walla, in the country of the Cayuse and Nez Percés Indians. This was
+in what was known as Oregon Territory in 1842, although it is now
+near the southeast corner of the state of Washington. Here was a very
+primitive settlement, the frame houses of a few white men and the tents
+of Indians. Very little effort had been made to grow grain or fruit or
+to raise sheep or cattle, since the Hudson's Bay Company wanted the
+Indians to be continually on the hunt for furs, and discouraged them
+from turning into farmers. Besides the traders and the Indians there was
+a small missionary camp near at hand, located on a beautiful peninsula
+made by two branches of the Walla Walla River. This place was called
+by the Indians Wai-i-lat-pui, meaning the region of rye grass. Beyond
+the fertile ground on the river's banks were borders of timber-land,
+and beyond them plains stretching to the foot-hills of the great Blue
+Mountains. In 1842 this wonderful country was free to any who cared to
+come and settle there, but as yet very few had ventured so far into the
+wilderness.
+
+The chief man at the missionary camp, Dr. Marcus Whitman, was called to
+Fort Walla Walla on the first day of October, 1842, to see a sick man.
+He found a score or so of traders and Hudson's Bay clerks, almost all
+Englishmen, gathered there, and accepted their invitation to stay to
+dinner. The men were a genial company, and had already taken a liking
+to Whitman, who was frank and amiable, and an interesting story-teller.
+Gradually the conversation at the dinner table came round to a subject
+that was vastly important to the men present, although the outside world
+seemed to be paying little attention to it--to which country was this
+great territory of Oregon to belong, to the United States or to England?
+The general opinion appeared to be that under the old treaties it would
+belong to the country that settled it first.
+
+In the midst of the discussion there was the sound of hoof-beats
+outside, the door of the company's office was flung open, and an express
+messenger ran into the dining-room. "I'm just from Fort Colville!" he
+cried. "A hundred and forty Englishmen and Canadians are on the march to
+settle here!"
+
+There was instant excitement. A young priest threw his cap in the
+air, shouting, "Hurrah for Oregon--America's too late; we've got the
+country!" The traders clapped each other on the shoulder, and made a
+place for the messenger at the head of the table. As he ate he told them
+how he had ridden from the post three hundred and fifty miles up the
+Columbia River to let all the fur-traders know that the English were on
+the way to colonize the country.
+
+Marcus Whitman smiled, and pretended to enjoy the celebration; but in
+reality he was already considering whether he could not do something
+to save this vast and fruitful region for his own nation. It was an
+enormous tract of land, of untold wealth, and stretching over a long
+reach of the Pacific coast. As he considered, Whitman heard the Hudson's
+Bay Company's men grow more and more excited, until they declared that
+they intended to take possession of all the country west to the Pacific
+slope the following spring.
+
+The missionary had been expecting this struggle between the English
+and the Americans for the ownership of Oregon, but had not thought
+it would come to a head quite so soon. He left the men at Fort Walla
+Walla as early as he could, and rode back to the little settlement
+at Wai-i-lat-pui. There he told his wife and friends the news he had
+learned at the trading-post. "If our country is to have Oregon," he
+said, "there is not a day to lose."
+
+"But what can we do?" the others asked him.
+
+"I must get to Washington as quick as I can, and let them know the
+danger."
+
+His friends understood what that meant, a journey on horseback across
+almost an entire continent, through hostile Indians, over great rivers
+and mountain ranges, and in the depths of winter. Some one pointed out
+that under the rules of the American Mission Board that had sent them
+into the far west none of their number could leave his post without
+consent from the headquarters in Boston. "Well," said Whitman, "if the
+Board dismisses me, I will do what I can to save Oregon to the country.
+My life is of but little worth if I can save this country to the
+American people."
+
+His wife, a brave, patriotic woman who had shared his hard travels
+westward without a murmur, agreed with him that he must go. They all
+insisted, however, that he should have a companion. "Who will go with
+me?" asked Whitman. In answer a man who had only lately joined the small
+encampment, Amos L. Lovejoy, immediately volunteered.
+
+Urging upon their friends the need of keeping the plan a secret from the
+Hudson's Bay Company fur-traders, the two men quickly prepared, and left
+the camp on October 3d. They had a guide, three pack-mules, and for the
+start of their journey an escort of a number of Cayuse braves, men of
+an Indian tribe that was not large, but was wealthy, and that seemed to
+have taken a liking to Whitman and his friends at the mission settlement.
+
+The leader himself had one fixed idea in his mind, to reach Washington
+before Congress adjourned. He was convinced that only through his
+account of the riches of Oregon could the government learn what the
+country stood in danger of losing.
+
+The little company got a good start, and with fresh horses, riding
+southeast toward the border of what is now the state of Idaho, they
+reached Fort Hall in eleven days. Here was stationed Captain Grant, who
+had always done his best to hinder immigration into Oregon, and had
+induced many an American settler to go no farther westward. He knew
+Whitman of old, and six years before had tried to stop his expedition to
+the Walla Walla River, but Whitman had overcome his arguments, and had
+taken the first wagon that ever crossed the Rocky Mountains into Oregon.
+As he had tried to prevent Whitman from going west before, so now he
+tried to prevent him from going east. He told him that the Blackfeet
+Indians had suddenly grown hostile to all white men, that the Sioux and
+Pawnees were at war with each other, and would let no one through their
+country, and finally that the snow was already twenty feet deep in the
+passes of the Rockies, and travel through them was altogether out of the
+question.
+
+This information was far from reassuring, and, backed as it was by
+Captain Grant's entreaties and almost by his commands, would have
+deterred many a man from plunging into that winter wilderness. Whitman,
+however, was a man who could neither be turned aside nor discouraged.
+His answer to all protests at Fort Hall was to point to the official
+permit he had carried west with him, ordering all officers to protect
+and aid him in his travels, and signed by Lewis Cass, Secretary of
+War, and to declare that he intended to push on east, hostile Indians,
+mountains, and blizzards notwithstanding. Captain Grant saw that he
+could not stop Whitman, and, much to his chagrin, had to let him pass
+the fort.
+
+The route Whitman had plotted out lay first east and then south, in the
+general direction of the present site of Salt Lake City. His objective
+points were two small military posts, Fort Uintah and Fort Uncompahgra.
+As soon as the two men left Fort Hall they ran into terribly cold
+weather. The deep snow kept them back, and they had to pick any shelter
+they could find, and crawl slowly on, sometimes taking a day to cover
+a few miles. At Fort Uintah they procured a guide to the second post,
+which was on the Grand River, and at the latter point a Mexican agreed
+to show them the way to Taos, a settlement in what is now the state of
+New Mexico. So far their southeasterly course had allowed them to skirt
+the high mountains, but here they had to cross a range, and in the pass
+ran full into a terrific snow-storm.
+
+It was impossible to go forward in the teeth of that gale, so Whitman,
+Lovejoy, and their guide looked about for shelter. They found a rocky
+defile with a mountain shoulder to protect it, and led their horses and
+pack-mules into this pocket. In this dark, cold place they stayed for
+ten days, trying each morning to push on through the pass, and being
+blown back each time. On the eleventh day the wind had abated somewhat,
+and they tried again. They went a short distance when, coming around a
+corner, a fresh storm broke full upon them, blinding and freezing the
+men, and pelting the animals with frozen snow so that they were almost
+uncontrollable.
+
+The native guide now admitted that he was no longer sure of the way,
+and refused to go any farther. Clearly the only thing to be done was to
+return for the eleventh time to the sheltered ravine. But now the snow
+had drifted across their trail, and none of the three men was at all
+certain of the road back. Whitman dismounted, and kneeling in the snow,
+prayed that they might be saved for the work that they had to do.
+
+Meantime the guide resolved to try an old hunting expedient, and turned
+one of the lead mules loose. The mule was confused at first, and
+stumbled about, heading one way and then another, but finally started to
+plunge back through the drifts as if to a certain goal. "There," shouted
+the guide, "that mule will find the camp if he can live long enough in
+this storm to reach it." The men urged their horses after the plunging
+beast, and slipping and sliding and beating their half-frozen mounts,
+at last came around the mountain shoulder and got in the lee of the
+ravine. That bit of hunter's knowledge and that mule had much to do with
+saving the great northwest to the United States.
+
+Once safe in this comparative shelter the guide turned to Dr. Whitman.
+"I will go no farther," said he; "the way is impassable."
+
+Whitman knew that the man meant what he said, and he had just seen for
+himself what a storm could do to travelers, but he said as positively in
+the ravine as he had already said in the comfortable protection of Fort
+Hall, "I must go on." He considered their situation a minute, and then
+said to Lovejoy, "You stay in camp, and I'll return with the guide to
+the fort and get a new man."
+
+The pack-mules needed rest, and so this plan was agreed to. Whitman and
+the obstinate guide went back, while Lovejoy waited in the ravine and
+tried to nourish the mules by gathering brush and the inner bark of
+willows for them to eat. Fortunately mules can live on almost anything.
+
+For a week Lovejoy stayed in the ravine, only partly sheltered from wind
+and snow, before Whitman returned. He brought a new guide with him, and,
+the storm having now lessened, the little party was able to get through
+the pass and strike out for the post at Taos.
+
+The route Whitman was taking was far from direct, was in fact at least a
+thousand miles longer than if they had headed directly east from Walla
+Walla, but they were avoiding the highest Rockies, and were traveling
+to a certain extent in the shelter of the ranges, where there was much
+less snow and plenty of fire-wood could be found. The winter of 1842-43
+was very cold, and if they had journeyed direct the continual storms and
+lack of all fuel for camp-fires might have caused a different ending
+to their cross-country ride. As it was they suffered continually from
+frozen feet and hands and ears, and lost a number of days when one or
+the other could not sit his saddle.
+
+Traveling far to the south they came to the Grand River, one of the most
+dangerous rivers in the west. The current, even in summer, is rapid,
+deep, and cold. Now, in winter, solid ice stretched two hundred feet
+from either shore, and between the ice was a rushing torrent over two
+hundred feet wide.
+
+The guide studied the swift, boiling current, and shook his head. "It's
+too risky to try to cross," he declared.
+
+"We must cross, and at once," said Whitman positively. He dismounted,
+and, picking out a willow tree near the shore, cut a pole about eight
+feet long. He carried this back to his horse, mounted, and put the pole
+on his shoulder, gripping it with his left arm. "Now you shove me off,"
+he said to the men. Lovejoy and the guide did as he ordered, and Whitman
+and his horse were pushed into the stream. They disappeared under the
+water, but soon came up, struggling and swimming. In a minute or two the
+horse struck rocky bottom and could wade. Whitman jumped off, broke the
+ice with his pole, and helped the animal to get to the shore.
+
+Meantime Lovejoy and the guide, breaking the ice on their side, headed
+their horses and the pack-mules into the river. Animals in that country
+are always ready to follow where their leader goes, and they all swam
+and splashed their way across. The men found plenty of wood at hand, and
+soon had a roaring fire, by which they camped, and dried out thoroughly
+before riding on.
+
+The delays caused by their stay in the mountains and physical hardships
+had made their store of provisions run low. At one time they had to
+kill a dog that had joined them, and a little later one of the mules
+for food. Eating and sleeping little, and pushing on as rapidly as they
+could they finally reached the old city of Santa Fé, the metropolis of
+the southwest. But here Whitman only stopped long enough to buy fresh
+provisions.
+
+They were now heading for Bent's Fort near the head of the Arkansas
+River. The storms in the hills were past, and they were riding over
+vast treeless prairies, where there was plenty of grass for the horses,
+and any amount of wild game if they could have stopped long enough to
+replenish their larder with it. Again and again they were forced to
+prairie expedients. Once, as they reached one of the tributaries of
+the Arkansas River, after a long and tedious day on the plains, they
+found the river frozen over with a layer of smooth, clear ice, hardly
+strong enough to bear a man. They must have wood, but although there was
+plenty of it on the other side, there was none on their shore of the
+stream. Whitman took the ax from his kit, and lying down on the thin
+ice, contrived with great caution and patience to make his way across.
+On the other bank he cut long poles and short cross-pieces. These he
+pushed across the ice to Lovejoy, and with them they made enough of a
+bridge for the latter to urge the horses and mules to try to cross. They
+all got over safely, though with much slipping and splashing. In cutting
+his last pole Whitman split the ax-helve. When they camped he bound the
+break with a deerskin thong, but that night a thieving wolf found the
+ax at the edge of the camp, wanted the fresh deerskin, and dragged away
+ax and thong. The loss would have been very serious if it had happened
+earlier in their journey.
+
+When they were within four days' ride of Bent's Fort they met a
+caravan traveling toward Taos. The leader told Whitman that a party of
+mountaineers was about leaving Bent's Fort for St. Louis, but added that
+Whitman and Lovejoy, hampered by their pack animals, would not be in
+time to join them.
+
+Whitman was very anxious to join the mountaineers if he could, and
+decided to leave Lovejoy and the guide with the pack-mules. Taking the
+fastest horse, and a small store of food, he rode on alone, hoping
+to catch the party. To do this he would have to travel on Sunday,
+something they had not done before.
+
+Lovejoy saw Dr. Whitman start on his ride, but when the former reached
+Bent's Fort four days later he was astonished to find that Whitman had
+not arrived there, nor been heard from. As that part of the country was
+full of packs of gray wolves, now half-starved on account of the snow,
+Lovejoy was alarmed.
+
+If not a prey to the wolves, Whitman must be lost; so his friend took
+a good guide from the Fort and started to search for him. He traveled
+up-river a hundred miles, and there fell in with Indians who told him
+of a lost white man who was trying to find the Fort, and whom they had
+directed down the river. Lovejoy went back, and late that afternoon saw
+Whitman come riding in, convinced that his journey had been so much
+delayed because he had traveled on Sunday.
+
+The party of mountaineers had already left, but a messenger had been
+sent after them, and they stayed in camp, waiting for Whitman. Tired as
+he was, he started out immediately with a new guide, particularly eager
+to join this company, because they were now nearing the outposts of
+civilization, where the worst white men and Indians beset the pioneers.
+Lovejoy waited at Bent's Fort, and went east with the next caravan that
+started for St. Louis.
+
+Whitman came safely through to St. Louis, where he had friends. He was
+at once surrounded by trappers and traders in Indian goods and furs
+who wanted news of the plains. In his turn he asked news of Congress,
+and learned that the Ashburton Treaty, settling a part of the boundary
+between Canada and the United States, had been approved and signed, but
+that the question of Oregon had not been settled, and from the reports
+of what had been said in the debates at Washington he knew that none of
+the American statesmen realized what a great prize Oregon Territory was.
+
+He must reach the capital before Congress adjourned if possible. The
+rivers were frozen, and he had to rely on a journey by stage, slow at
+all times, but especially so in midwinter. He toiled slowly eastward,
+taking one coach after another, swinging and swaying and rocking across
+the center of the country, and reaching the capital in time to plead the
+cause of the northwest.
+
+Washington was used to many strange types of men in those pioneer days,
+but even among such Marcus Whitman was a striking figure. He was of
+medium height, compact of build, with big shoulders and a large head.
+His hair was iron gray, and that, as well as his moustache and beard,
+had not been cut for four months. He was of pioneer type, living so
+long among Indians and trappers, and watching so constantly for wolves
+and bears, that he seemed awkward and uncouth in an eastern city. His
+clothes were a coarse fur jacket with buckskin breeches, fur leggings,
+and boot moccasins. Over these he wore a buffalo overcoat, with a
+head-hood for bad weather. He did not show an inch of woven garment.
+
+Whitman reached Washington in March, 1843, and immediately urged his
+case before President Tyler, Secretary of State Daniel Webster, and
+many congressmen. He found the densest ignorance concerning Oregon
+Territory, a tract of territory which has since been divided into the
+three states of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. A senator had said of
+that territory, "What is the character of this country? As I understand
+it there are seven hundred miles this side of the Rocky Mountains that
+are uninhabitable; where rain never falls; mountains wholly impassable,
+except through gaps and depressions, to be reached only by going
+hundreds of miles out of the direct course.... Of what use would it be
+for agricultural purposes? I would not, for that purpose, give a pinch
+of snuff for the whole territory. I wish the Rocky Mountains were an
+impassable barrier. If there was an embankment of even five feet to be
+removed I would not consent to expend five dollars to remove it and
+enable our population to go there." Another statesman declared, "With
+the exception of land along the Willamette and strips along other water
+courses, the whole country is as irreclaimable and barren a waste as the
+Desert of Sahara. Nor is this the worst; the climate is so unfriendly
+to human life that the native population has dwindled away under the
+ravages of malaria." And newspaper opinions were no more favorable.
+The Louisville _Journal_ wrote, "Of all the countries upon the face of
+the earth Oregon is one of the least favored by heaven. It is the mere
+riddlings of creation. It is almost as barren as Sahara and quite as
+unhealthy as the Campagna of Italy. Russia has her Siberia and England
+has her Botany Bay, and if the United States should ever need a country
+to which to banish her rogues and scoundrels, the utility of such a
+region as Oregon would be demonstrated. Until then, we are perfectly
+willing to leave this magnificent country to the Indians, trappers and
+buffalo hunters that roam over its sand-banks."
+
+Marcus Whitman had ridden four thousand miles, and starved, frozen,
+and never rested in order to overcome such opinions. The President and
+Daniel Webster were polite to him, but neither seemed to think much of
+the northwest. As he was describing the richness of the country, its
+fertile soil, great forests, precious minerals, and delightful climate,
+Webster interrupted. "But Oregon is shut off by impassable mountains and
+a great desert, which make a wagon road impossible," said he. Whitman
+answered, "Six years ago I was told there was no wagon road to Oregon,
+and it was impossible to take a wagon there, and yet in despite of
+pleadings and almost threats, I took a wagon over the road and have
+it now." The missionary's earnest, forceful manner impressed both
+President Tyler and Secretary Webster, and gradually they began to think
+it might be worth while to protect the claim of the United States to
+that country. Finally Whitman said, "All I ask is that you won't barter
+away Oregon, or allow English interference until I can lead a band of
+stalwart American settlers across the plains: for this I will try to do."
+
+"Dr. Whitman," answered President Tyler, "your long ride and frozen
+limbs speak for your courage and patriotism; your missionary credentials
+are good vouchers for your character;" and he granted the request.
+
+This was all Whitman wanted, because he believed that under the treaty
+then in force between the United States and England the nation that
+should colonize the country was to own it. He knew that up to that time
+the English Hudson's Bay Company had bought out all American traders or
+driven out all settlers, but he hoped he could lead enough emigrants
+there now to hold it for the United States.
+
+He next went to the American Missionary Board in Boston, which had
+originally sent him out to Oregon. There he met with cold treatment,
+and was told he should not have left the camp at Wai-i-lat-pui without
+permission from Boston, and that his trip across the continent was a
+wild-goose chase. This unmerited rebuke must have hurt him sorely.
+He was, however, so filled with eagerness to lead his party of
+pioneers west that he did not let it daunt him, but went on with his
+preparations. In this he was very much helped by his companion Lovejoy,
+who was gathering a large number of emigrants on the frontier awaiting
+Whitman's return.
+
+The meeting point of the emigrants was the little town of Weston, not
+far from where Kansas City now stands. Here and at various near-by
+settlements the pioneers gathered early in the year 1843, waiting for
+Dr. Whitman to join them, and for the spring grass to grow high enough
+to feed their cattle. As it happened, that year the grass was late, and
+the caravan did not get under way until the first week in June. Whitman
+himself was delayed through the need of leaving careful instructions
+for those who were to cross the plains later in the year. The caravan
+started before Whitman arrived, and he did not overtake the advance
+guard until they had reached the Platte River. When he did actually join
+the emigrants he looked after everything, mending broken prairie wagons,
+cheering tired mothers, acting as surgeon and doctor, hunting out fords
+through quicksands and rivers, searching for water and grass in the
+desert plains, seeking new passes through the mountains, and at night
+superintending the building of camp-fires and keeping watch against an
+attack by wolves or other wild animals.
+
+The journey from the Platte River as far as Fort Hall, which was near
+the eastern border of Oregon Territory, was much like other pioneer
+travels through the west. Whitman had been over this trail several times
+and the difficulties he encountered were not new to him. At Fort Hall
+he had to meet Captain John Grant again, who, as an agent of the Fur
+Company, did not want new farmers to settle in Oregon.
+
+[Illustration: THE LAST SIX HUNDRED MILES WERE THE HARDEST]
+
+Instead of appealing only to a few men Captain Grant now spoke to
+several hundred resolute pioneers. He told them of the terrors of the
+long journey through the mountains and the impossibility of hauling
+their heavy prairie wagons over the passes; he recounted the failures
+of other pioneers who had tried what they had planned to do; he showed
+them in the corral wagons, farm tools, and other pioneer implements
+that earlier emigrants had had to leave when they ventured into the
+mountains. He stated the difficulties so clearly that this company
+was almost persuaded, as earlier companies had been, to follow his
+suggestions, leave their farming implements behind, and try to make a
+settlement without any of the tools or comforts that were so greatly
+needed in that country. Whitman, however, spoiled Grant's plans. He said
+to his followers, "Men, I have guided you thus far in safety. Believe
+nothing you hear about not being able to get your wagons through; every
+one of you stick to your wagons and your goods. They will be invaluable
+to you when you reach the end of your journey. I took a wagon over to
+Oregon six years ago." The men believed their leader, refused to obey
+Captain Grant, and prepared to start on the trail into the high Rockies.
+
+It was the last six hundred miles of the journey to Oregon that usually
+made the most severe test of the settlers' endurance. From Fort Hall
+the nature of the traveling changed entirely, and was apt to resemble
+the retreat of a disorganized army. Earlier caravans, although they had
+taken Captain Grant's advice and left many wagons, horses, and camp
+comforts behind, had suffered untold hardships. Oxen and horses, worn
+by their long trip across the plains, and toiling for long stretches
+through the high passes, were apt to perish in large numbers and
+frequently fell dead in their yokes on the road. Wagons already baked in
+the blazing sun of the desert would fall to pieces when they struck a
+sharp rock or were driven over a rough incline. Families were obliged to
+join company and throw away everything that tended to impede their speed.
+
+The approaching storms of autumn, which meant impassable snow, would not
+allow them to linger. In addition to this there were grizzlies in the
+mountains and the constant fear of attack from Indians. Such pioneers as
+strayed from the main company were likely to fall in with an enemy that
+was continually hovering on either flank of the march, ready to swoop
+down upon unprotected men or women. This fear added to the speed of the
+journey, and as they progressed the road over which they traveled was
+strewn with dead or worn-out cattle, abandoned wagons, discarded cooking
+utensils, yokes, harness, chests, log chains, and all kinds of family
+heirlooms that the settlers had hoped to carry to their new homes.
+Sometimes the teams grew so much weakened that none dared to ride in
+the wagons, and men, women, and children would walk beside them, ready
+to give a helping push up any steep part of the road. A pioneer who
+had once made this journey said, referring to a former trip across the
+mountains, "The fierce summer's heat beat upon this slow west-rolling
+column. The herbage was dry and crisp, the rivulets had become but lines
+in the burning sand; the sun glared from a sky of brass; the stony
+mountainsides glared with the garnered heat of a cloudless summer. The
+dusky brambles of the scraggy sage-brush seemed to catch the fiery rays
+of heat and shiver them into choking dust, that rose like a tormenting
+plague and hung like a demon of destruction over the panting oxen and
+thirsty people.
+
+"Thus day after day, for weeks and months, the slow but urgent retreat
+continued, each day demanding fresh sacrifices. An ox or a horse would
+fall, brave men would lift the useless yoke from his limp and lifeless
+neck in silence. If there was another to take his place he was brought
+from the loose band, yoked up and the journey resumed. When the stock
+of oxen became exhausted, cows were brought under the yoke, other wagons
+left, and the lessening store once more inspected; if possible another
+pound would be dispensed with.
+
+"Deeper and deeper into the flinty mountains the forlorn mass drives its
+weary way. Each morning the weakened team has to commence a struggle
+with yet greater difficulties. It is plain the journey will not be
+completed within the anticipated time, and the dread of hunger joins the
+ranks of the tormentors.... The Indians hover in the rear, impatiently
+waiting for the train to move on that the abandoned trinkets may be
+gathered up. Whether these are gathering strength for a general attack
+we cannot tell. There is but one thing to do--press on. The retreat
+cannot hasten into rout, for the distance to safety is too great. Slower
+and slower is the daily progress."
+
+Marcus Whitman, however, had known these difficulties before, and
+guarded his caravan from many of them.
+
+Up to that date almost no man had crossed into Oregon by the route
+he was taking. A few missionaries had made the journey on horseback,
+driving some head of cattle with them, and three or four wagons drawn
+by oxen had reached the Snake River at an earlier date, but it was the
+general opinion of trappers that no large company of people could travel
+down the Snake River because of the scarcity of pasturage and the rugged
+road through the mountains. It was also thought that the Sioux Indians
+would oppose the approach of such a large caravan because the emigrants
+might kill or drive away the buffaloes, which were already diminishing
+in number and were hunted by this tribe for food.
+
+When they came to cross the Snake River Whitman gave orders to fasten
+the wagons together in one long line, the strongest ones being placed in
+the lead. When the teams were in position Whitman tied a long rope about
+his waist and fastened the other end to the first team. Riding his horse
+into the current he swam across the river. He called to the other riders
+to follow him, and at the same time to pull on the rope that was tied to
+the first team. In this way the leaders were started into the water, and
+all were drawn over in safety. At times, however, it took a great deal
+of pulling on the ropes by many men to drag the weaker teams to a safe
+foothold on the farther bank. The Snake River at the place where Whitman
+forded it was divided into three separate rivers by islands, and as
+the last stream on the Oregon shore was a deep and rapid current fully
+a mile wide, it can be seen what a task it was to get so many wagons,
+tired ox-teams, and the great company of men, women and children across
+it. But Whitman had solved many such problems before. When he and his
+wife went to Oregon six years earlier she had said it was a shame that
+her husband should wear himself out in getting their wagon through.
+"Yesterday," she said, "it was overset in the river and he was wet from
+head to foot getting it out; to-day it was upset on the mountainside,
+and it was hard work to save it."
+
+There were over a thousand people in this expedition that was going out
+to colonize Oregon for the United States. They had about one hundred
+and twenty wagons drawn by ox-teams, which averaged six yoke of oxen to
+a team, and, in addition, several thousand horses and cattle, led or
+driven by the emigrants. Although they started to travel in one body
+they soon found they could do better by dividing into two columns,
+marching within easy hailing distance of each other, so long as they
+were in danger of attack by the Indians, and later separating into small
+parties, better suited to the narrow mountain paths and the meagre
+pasture lands.
+
+It is interesting to learn how such a company traveled. At four o'clock
+in the morning the sentinels who were on guard waked the camp by shots
+from their rifles, the emigrants crept from their canvas-covered wagons
+or tents built against the side of the wagons, and soon the smoke of
+camp-fires began to rise in the air. Sixty men, whose duty it was to
+look after the cattle, would start out from the corral, or enclosed
+space, spreading through the horses and cattle, who had found pasturage
+over night in a great semicircle about the camp. The most distant
+animals were sometimes two miles away. These sixty scouts looked for
+Indian trails beyond the herd and tried to discover whether any of
+the animals had been stolen or had strayed during the night. If none
+were lost the herders drove the animals close to the camp, and by five
+o'clock horses, oxen, and cattle were rounded up, and the separate
+emigrants chose their teams and drove them into the corral to be yoked.
+The corral was a circle about one hundred yards deep, formed by wagons
+fastened together by ox-chains, making a barrier that could not be
+broken by any vicious ox or horse, and a fortification in case of an
+attack by Indians.
+
+The camp was very busy from six to seven o'clock; the women prepared
+breakfast; the tents were packed away, the wagons loaded and the oxen
+yoked and fastened to their owners' wagons. Each of the two divisions
+had about sixty wagons, and these were separated into sixteen platoons.
+Each platoon took its turn at leading, and in this way none of the
+wagons had to travel continually in the dust. By seven o'clock the
+corral was broken up; the women and children had found their places in
+the wagons, and the leader, or pilot as he was called, mounted his horse
+and was ready to lead the way for the day's journey. A band of young men
+who were not needed at the wagons, well mounted and armed, would start
+on a buffalo hunt, keeping within easy reach of the caravan and hoping
+to bring back food for the night's encampment.
+
+At seven o'clock the trumpet sounded the advance, and the wagon that
+was to lead for that day slowly rolled out of the camp and headed
+the line of march. The other wagons fell in behind it, and guided by
+the horsemen, the long line commenced its winding route through the
+mountains.
+
+The country through which Whitman had chosen to travel was beautiful
+in the extreme; at times the road lay through the great heights of the
+Rockies, with a panorama of wonderful charm stretched on the horizon;
+at times it lay beside broad rivers where the clearness of the air
+brought out all the colors of late summer foliage. The party of hunters
+were also scouts for the caravan, searching the rivers for the most
+promising fords. Having found one to their liking, they would signal
+with a flag to the pilot and his guides to show in which direction to
+lead the wagons. These guides kept constantly on the alert, for it would
+be hard if they had to march a mile or two out of their way or retrace
+their steps because of wrong advice. The rest of the emigrants trusted
+the route entirely to their leaders and rode or marched stolidly along,
+occasionally stopping to gather a few flowers for the women and children
+in the wagons. At noon the whole line stopped for dinner. The scouting
+party would carefully choose a good camping place, looking especially
+for the grass and water that were so much needed at the end of five
+hours of hard traveling. The teams were not unyoked, but only turned
+loose from their wagons, and the latter were drawn up in columns, four
+abreast. No corral was formed, as there was little danger from Indians
+or risk of animals straying in the daytime.
+
+At this noon rest many matters were discussed by the caravan leaders.
+Whitman and one or two others had been chosen to decide disputes between
+the different members of the party. Orders for the good of the caravan
+would be given out at this time, and Dr. Whitman would visit any who
+were sick and advise with the various families as to new difficulties
+they had met with.
+
+When dinner was eaten and the teams rested the march was resumed, and
+continued until sundown, when the scouts picked out the best camping
+place for the night. The wagons were driven into a great circle,
+fastened each to each, and the cattle freed to seek a pasture; tents
+were pitched, fires started, and all hands were busy. The scene was
+almost like a small frontier town.
+
+The caravan was divided into three companies, and each of the companies
+subdivided into four watches. Each company had the duty of acting as
+sentries for the camp every third night, and each watch took its turn.
+The first watch was set at eight o'clock in the evening, just after the
+evening meal. For a short time there would be talking, perhaps singing,
+or the music of the violin or flute. Usually, however, the day's
+traveling had been hard and trying, and at an early hour the emigrants
+went to sleep.
+
+Late in the summer of 1843 Whitman's pioneers left the mountains behind
+them, and came down into the valleys watered by the tributaries of
+the Columbia River. As they approached the missionary settlement at
+Wai-i-lat-pui a band of Cayuse and Nez Percés Indians came to meet them,
+bringing pack-mules loaded with supplies. Few messengers could have been
+more welcome. They told Whitman that his wife and friends were still at
+the little clearing where he had left them almost a year before, and
+were eagerly looking forward to the arrival of the new settlers. The
+leader thought that the caravan could finish its journey without him
+now, so he chose one of his most reliable Indian guides, Istikus, and
+placed him in charge of the company. Whitman himself hurried on to the
+mission. Back of him rolled the long train of canvas-covered wagons
+that had traveled so far over prairies, rivers, and mountains. Almost
+a thousand men, women, and children were coming into this far western
+section of the continent to settle and hold the country for the United
+States.
+
+Whitman's ride changed the situation. No more statesmen could speak
+of the impassable mountains or the impossibility of taking settlers'
+wagons into Oregon. Before Whitman left Washington Daniel Webster sent
+a message to England stating that the United States would insist on
+holding all territory south of the forty-ninth degree of latitude. When
+President Tyler was told that a caravan of nearly a thousand people
+under Whitman's leadership had started for Oregon, a second and more
+positive message to the same effect was sent to England. All over the
+United States men were now demanding that their government should claim
+the country as far as the Pacific coast, and one great political party
+took as its watchword the motto, "Oregon, fifty-four, forty,--or fight,"
+referring to the degree of latitude they wanted for the boundary line.
+The Hudson's Bay Company, finding so large a colony of pioneers settling
+among them, was forced to give over its efforts to hold the northwest
+entirely for itself. In time the English statesmen agreed to the claims
+of the United States, and on July 17, 1846, a treaty was signed, fixing
+the boundary between Canada and the United States at the forty-ninth
+degree, which gave Oregon to the Republic.
+
+The settlers prospered, and the little missionary colony near the Walla
+Walla River grew in size. Whitman resumed his work among the Indians,
+and seemed to win their friendship. There seemed no reason why the
+native tribes and their white friends should not live in peace in such
+an undeveloped country. After a time, however, fear or greed or false
+leaders stirred up certain Indians and sent them on the war-path against
+their friends. No one knew the real cause for the outburst, but on
+November 29, 1847, a band of the Cayuse crept down on the little cluster
+of houses at Wai-i-lat-pui and killed fourteen of the white settlers.
+Marcus Whitman was one of the first to fall. He was in his house, with
+several Indians as usual in the room with him. One was sitting close to
+him, asking for some medicine, when another came up behind and struck
+him with a tomahawk. These two then gave the signal, and their allies
+in other houses fell upon the white men and women. After the massacre
+forty men, women, and children were carried away from the valley by the
+Indians, but most of them were later rescued by the Hudson's Bay Company
+and sent back to their homes. Other white settlers joined forces and
+marched against the treacherous Cayuse, but the latter fled through the
+country, scattering into different tribes, and the leaders of the attack
+were not captured until nearly two years later.
+
+Daniel Webster had said in the Senate: "What do we want with the vast,
+worthless area, this region of savages and wild beasts, of deserts, of
+shifting sands and whirlwinds of dust, of cactus and prairie dogs? To
+what use could we ever hope to put these great deserts, or these endless
+mountain ranges, impenetrable, and covered to their base with eternal
+snow? What can we ever hope to do with the western coast, a coast of
+three thousand miles, rock-bound, cheerless, and uninviting, and not
+a harbor on it? What use have we for such a country?" But though many
+great statesmen agreed with Webster a simple missionary who had been to
+Oregon looked into the future, saw the value of the vast expanse, and
+had the courage and determination to ride across the continent for aid,
+and then bring back a thousand settlers to help him realize his dream.
+Marcus Whitman is one of the noblest examples of that great type of
+pioneers who won the western country for the United States.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+HOW THE MORMONS CAME TO SETTLE UTAH
+
+
+In the winter of 1838-39 a large number of people moved into the country
+on the east bank of the Mississippi River in the state of Illinois. They
+had taken the name of "Latter-Day Saints," but were generally called
+Mormons, and were followers of a new religion that had been founded by
+a man named Joseph Smith a few years earlier. This strange new religion
+had attracted many people to it, and the greater number of them had
+first moved to Ohio, and then into the new state of Missouri, but they
+were not well received by the people of either of those states, and had
+finally been driven from Missouri at the point of the sword. Fortunately
+for them there was plenty of unoccupied land in the West, and their
+leader decided to take refuge near the town of Quincy in Illinois. At
+that time a man had only to reside in the state for six months in order
+to cast a vote for president, and as an election was near at hand the
+politicians of Illinois were glad to welcome the Mormons. Looking about,
+the newcomers found two "paper" cities, or places that had been mapped
+out on paper with streets and houses, but had never actually been
+built. The Mormon leaders bought two large farms in the "paper" town of
+Commerce, and many thousand acres in the country adjoining, and there
+they laid out their new city, to which they gave the strange name of
+Nauvoo.
+
+The Mormon city lay along the Mississippi River, and its streets and
+public buildings were planned on a large scale. People flocked to the
+place, and as the Mormon missionaries were eager workers the number of
+converts grew rapidly. A temple was built, which a stranger who saw
+it in 1843 said was the wonder of the world. Many Mormon emigrants
+came from England, usually by ship to New Orleans, and thence by river
+steamboat up the Mississippi to Nauvoo. By the end of 1844 at least
+fifteen thousand people had settled there, and as many more were
+scattered through the country in the immediate neighborhood. Nauvoo was
+the largest city in Illinois, and its only rival in that part of the
+West was St. Louis. Joseph Smith had obtained a charter, and both the
+political parties, the Whigs and the Democrats, were doing their best to
+make friends of his people. Nauvoo had little of the rough look of most
+newly-settled frontier towns, and handsome houses and public buildings
+sprang up rapidly along its fine wide streets.
+
+[Illustration: NAUVOO HAD HANDSOME HOUSES AND PUBLIC BUILDINGS]
+
+Unfortunately for the Mormons their leader was a man who made enemies as
+easily as he made friends. He had aroused much ill feeling when he lived
+in Missouri. As a result, when, one day in May, 1842, Governor Boggs
+of Missouri was shot and seriously wounded while sitting at the window
+of his home, many people laid the crime to Smith or his followers, and
+believed that the prophet himself, as Smith was called, had ordered the
+shooting. The officers of Missouri asked the governor of Illinois to
+hand Smith over to them. This was not done, and consequently ill feeling
+against the prophet grew stronger. In the meantime a man named John C.
+Bennett, who had joined the Mormons at Nauvoo, and had been the first
+mayor of the city, deserted the church, and turned into one of the most
+bitter of its enemies. He denounced the Mormons in letters he wrote to
+the newspapers, and exposed what he called their secrets. This led other
+people to attack the ideas of the Mormons, and it was not long before
+there was almost as much dislike of them in Illinois as there had been
+in Missouri.
+
+Even in the Mormon church itself there were men who would not agree
+with all the prophet Joseph Smith said. A few of these men set up a
+printing-press and published a paper that they called the _Nauvoo
+Expositor_. Only one issue of this sheet appeared, dated June 7, 1844.
+That was enough, however, to raise the wrath of Joseph Smith and his
+elders, and they ordered the city marshal to destroy the press. The
+marshal broke the press and type in the main street of the city, and
+burned the contents of the newspaper office.
+
+The editors hastily fled to the neighboring town of Carthage. The
+people there and in all the neighboring villages denounced the
+destruction of the press, and declared that the time had come to force
+the Mormons to obey the laws, and, if they would not do so, to drive
+them out of Illinois. Military companies were formed, cannon were sent
+for, and the governor of the state was asked to call out the militia.
+
+The governor went to the scene of the trouble to investigate. He found
+all that part of the east shore of the Mississippi divided between
+the Mormons and their enemies. He ordered the mayor of Nauvoo to send
+Mormons to him to explain why they had destroyed the printing-press, and
+when he had heard their story the governor told them that Smith and his
+elders must surrender to him, or the whole military force of the state
+would be called out to capture them. But the prophet had not been idle.
+He had put his city under martial law, had formed what was called the
+Legion of the Mormons, and had called in his followers from the near-by
+villages. He had meant to defend his new city; but when he heard the
+governor's threat to arrest him, he left Nauvoo with a few comrades and
+started for the Rocky Mountains. Friends went after him, and begged
+him not to desert his people. He could not resist their appeal to him
+to return, and he went back, although he was afraid of the temper of
+his enemies. As soon as he returned to Illinois he was arrested on the
+charge of treason and of putting Nauvoo under martial law, and together
+with his brother Hyrum was sent to the jail at Carthage.
+
+Some seventeen hundred men, members of the militia, had gathered at the
+towns of Carthage and Warsaw, and the enemies of the Mormons urged the
+governor to march at the head of these troops to Nauvoo. He knew that
+in the excited state of affairs there was danger that if these troops
+entered the city they might set it on fire and destroy much property.
+He therefore ordered all except three companies to disband; with one
+company he set out to visit the Mormon city, and the other two companies
+he left to guard the jail at Carthage.
+
+The governor marched to Nauvoo, spoke to the citizens, and, having
+assured them that he meant no harm to their church, left about sundown
+on his road back to Carthage. In the meantime, however, events had been
+happening in the latter place that were to affect the whole history of
+the Mormons.
+
+The two Smiths, Joseph and Hyrum, with two friends, Willard Richards and
+John Taylor, were sitting in a large room in the Carthage jail when a
+number of men, their faces blackened in disguise, came running up the
+stairway. The door of the room had no lock or bolt, and, as the men
+inside feared some attack, Hyrum Smith and Richards leaped to the door
+and shutting it stood with their shoulders against it. The men outside
+could not force the door open, and began to shoot through it. The two
+men at the door were driven back, and on the second volley of shot
+Hyrum Smith was killed. As his brother fell the prophet seized a six
+shooting revolver that one of their visitors had left on the table, and
+going to the door opened it a few inches. He snapped each barrel at the
+men on the stair; three barrels missed fire, but each of the three that
+exploded wounded a man. As the prophet fired Taylor and Richards stood
+close beside him, each armed with a hickory cane. When Joseph Smith
+stopped shooting the enemy fired another volley into the room. Taylor
+tried to strike down some of the guns that were leveled through the
+broken door.
+
+"That's right, Brother Taylor, parry them off as well as you can!"
+cried Joseph Smith. He ran to the window, intending to leap out, but as
+he jumped two bullets fired through the doorway struck him, and also
+another aimed from outside the building. As soon as the mob saw that the
+prophet was killed they scattered, alarmed at what had been done.
+
+The people of Carthage and the neighboring country expected that the
+Legion of the Mormons would immediately march on them and destroy them.
+Families fled in wagons, on horseback, and on foot. Most of the people
+of the near-by town of Warsaw crossed the Mississippi in order to put
+the river between them and their enemies. In this state of excitement
+the governor did not know which party to trust, so he rode to the town
+of Quincy, forty miles away, and at a safe distance from the scene of
+trouble. But the Mormons made no attempt to avenge the death of their
+leader; they intended to let the law look after that.
+
+Week by week, however, it grew harder for them to live on friendly terms
+with the other people of Western Illinois, and more and more troubles
+arose to sow distrust. The Gentiles, as those who were not Mormons were
+called, began to charge the Mormons with stealing their horses and
+cattle, and the state repealed the charter that had been granted to the
+city of Nauvoo.
+
+During that summer of 1845, the troubles of Nauvoo's people increased.
+One night in September a meeting of Gentiles at the town of Green Plains
+was fired on, and many laid the attack to the Mormons. Whether this was
+true or not, their enemies gathered in force and scoured the country,
+burning the houses, barns, and crops of the Latter-Day Saints, and
+driving them from the country behind the walls of Nauvoo. From their
+city streets the saints rode out to pay their enemies in kind, and so
+the warfare went on until the governor appointed officers to try to
+settle the feud. The people, however, wanted the matter settled in only
+one way. They insisted that the Mormons must leave Illinois. In reply
+word came from Nauvoo that the Saints would go in the spring, provided
+that they were not molested, and that the Gentiles would help them
+to sell or rent their houses and farms, and give them oxen, horses,
+wagons, dry-goods, and cash in exchange for their property. The Gentile
+neighbors would not promise to buy the goods the Mormons had for sale,
+but promised not to interfere with their selling whatever they could. At
+last the trouble seemed settled. Brigham Young, the new leader of the
+Mormons, said that the whole church would start for some place beyond
+the Rocky Mountains in the spring, if they could sell enough goods to
+make the journey there. So the people of Nauvoo prepared to abandon the
+buildings of their new flourishing city on the Mississippi, and spent
+the winter trading their houses for flour, sugar, seeds, tents, wagons,
+horses, cattle, and whatever else might be needed for the long trip
+across the plains.
+
+The Mormons now looked forward eagerly to their march to a new home,
+and many of them traveled through the near-by states, buying horses and
+mules, and more went to the large towns in the neighborhood to work
+as laborers and so add to the funds for their journey. The leaders
+announced that a company of young men would start west in March, and
+choose a good situation for their new city. There they would build
+houses, and plant crops which should be ready when the rest of the
+Mormons arrived. But they knew there was always a chance that the people
+of the country would attack them, and therefore they sent messengers to
+the governors of the territories they would cross, asking for protection
+on the march. On February 10th Brigham Young and a few other men crossed
+the Mississippi and selected a spot on Sugar Creek as the first camp
+for the people who were to follow. Young and the twelve elders of the
+Mormons traveled together, and wherever their camp was pitched that
+place was given the name of "Camp of Israel."
+
+The emigrants had a test of hardship even when they first moved across
+the Mississippi. The temperature dropped to twenty degrees below zero,
+and the canvas-covered wagons and tents were a poor shelter from the
+snow-storms for women and children who had been used to the comforts
+of a large town. Many crossed the Mississippi on ice. When they were
+gathered on Sugar Creek Brigham Young spoke to them from a wagon. He
+told them of the perils of the journey, and then called for a show of
+hands by those who were willing to start upon it; every hand was raised.
+On March 1st the camp was broken up, and the long western march began.
+The Mormons were divided into companies of fifty or sixty wagons, and
+every night the cattle were carefully rounded up and guards set to
+protect them from attack. From time to time they built more elaborate
+camps, and men were left in charge to plant grain, build log cabins,
+dig wells, and fence the farms, in order that they might give food and
+shelter to other Mormons who would be making the journey later. The
+weather was all against their progress. Until May it was bitter cold,
+and there were heavy snow-storms, constant rains, sleet, and thick mud
+to be fought with, but like many other bands of American pioneers the
+Mormons pushed resolutely on, some days marching one mile, some days
+six, until May 16th, when they reached a charming spot on a branch of
+the Grand River, and built a camp that they called "Mount Pisgah." Here
+they plowed and planted several acres of land. While this camp was being
+pitched, Brigham Young and some of the other leaders went on to Council
+Bluffs and at a place north of Omaha, now the town of Florence, located
+the last permanent camp of the expedition.
+
+The trail of the Mormons now stretched across all the western country.
+At each of the camps men, women, and children were living, resting and
+preparing supplies to cover the next stage of their journey. But in
+spite of the care with which the march was planned those who left Nauvoo
+last suffered the most. There was a great deal of sickness among them,
+and owing to illness they were often forced to stop for several days at
+some unprotected point on the prairies. Twelve thousand people in all
+shared that Mormon march.
+
+The Gentiles in Illinois did not think that the Mormons were leaving
+Nauvoo as rapidly as they should. Every week from two to five hundred
+Mormon teams crossed the ferry into Iowa, but the neighbors thought that
+many meant to stay. Ill feeling against them grew, and a meeting at
+Carthage called on people to arm and drive out all Mormons who remained
+by mid-June. Six hundred men armed, ready to march against Nauvoo.
+
+When the Mormons first announced that they meant to leave their
+prosperous city in Illinois men came hurrying from other parts of the
+country to pick up bargains in houses and farms that they thought they
+would find there. Many of these new citizens were as much alarmed at the
+threats of the neighbors as were the Mormons themselves; some of them
+armed, and asked the governor to send them aid. The men at Carthage grew
+very much excited, and started to march on Nauvoo. Word came, however,
+that the sheriff, with five hundred men, had entered the city, prepared
+to defend it, and the Gentile army retreated. A few weeks afterward the
+hostilities broke out again, and seven hundred men with cannon took the
+road to the city.
+
+Those of the Mormons who were left, a few hundreds in number, had built
+rude breastworks for protection; some of the Gentile army took these,
+and the rest marched through the corn fields, and entered the city on
+another side. A battle followed between the Gentiles in the streets and
+the Mormons in their houses, and lasted an hour before the Gentiles
+withdrew to their camp in the corn fields.
+
+Peaceful citizens now tried to settle the matter. They arranged that all
+the Mormons should leave immediately, and promised to try to protect
+them from any further attacks. So matters stood until May 17th, when
+the sheriff and his men marched into the city, and found the last of
+the Mormons waiting to leave by the ferry. The next day they were told
+to go at once, and to make sure that they did bands of armed men went
+through the streets, broke into houses, threw what goods were left out
+of doors and windows, and actually threatened to shoot the people.
+The few remaining Saints, most of them those who had been too ill to
+take up the march earlier, were now thoroughly frightened, and before
+sundown the last one of them had fled across the Mississippi. A few days
+later this last party, six hundred and forty in number, began the long
+wearisome journey to the far west, and the empty city of Nauvoo was at
+last in the hands of the Gentiles.
+
+The object of the Mormons was to find a place where they might be free
+to live according to their own beliefs. So far they had been continually
+hunting for what they called their own City of Zion. As they spent that
+winter of 1846-47 in their camp near Council Bluffs, they tried to
+decide where they would be safest from persecution. The far west had few
+settlements as yet, and they were free to take what land they would,
+but the Mormons wanted a site on which to lay the foundations of a city
+that should one day be rich and prosperous. They decided to send out a
+party of explorers, and in April, 1847, one hundred and forty-three men,
+under command of Brigham Young, with seventy-three wagons filled with
+food and farm tools, left the headquarters to go still farther west.
+They journeyed up the north fork of the Platte River, and in the valleys
+found great herds of buffaloes, so many in number that they had to
+drive them away before the wagons could pass. Each day the bugle woke
+the camp about five o'clock in the morning. At seven the journey began.
+The wagons were driven two abreast by men armed with muskets. They were
+always prepared for attacks from Indians, but in the whole of their long
+journey no red men ever disturbed them. Each night the wagons were drawn
+up in a half-circle on the river bank, and the cattle driven into this
+shelter. At nine the bugle sent them all to bed. So they made their way
+over the Uinta range to Emigration Canyon. Down this canyon they moved,
+and presently came to a terrace from which they saw wide plains, watered
+by broad rivers, and ahead a great lake filled with little islands.
+Three days later the company camped on the plain by the bank of one of
+the streams, and decided that this should be the site of their new city.
+They held a meeting at which they dedicated the land with religious
+ceremonies, and at once set to work to lay off fields and start plowing
+and planting. Some of them visited the lake, which they called the Great
+Salt Lake, and bathed in its buoyant waters. Day by day more of the
+pioneers arrived, and by the end of August they had chosen the site of
+their great temple, built log cabins and adobe huts, and christened the
+place the "City of the Great Salt Lake." This name was later changed to
+Salt Lake City.
+
+It took some time for this large body of emigrants to build their
+homes. Wood was scarce and had to be hauled over bad roads by teams that
+were still worn out by the long march, therefore many built houses of
+adobe bricks, and as they did not know how to use this clay the rains
+and frost caused many of the walls to crumble, and when snow fell the
+people stretched cloths under their roofs to protect themselves from
+the dripping bricks. Many families lived for months in their wagons.
+They would take the top part from the wheels, and setting it on the
+ground, divide it into small bedrooms. The furniture was of the rudest
+sort; barrels or chests for tables and chairs, and bunks built into
+the side of the house for beds. But at last they were free from their
+enemies in this distant country. Men in Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois had
+hounded them from their settlements, but in this far-off region they
+had no neighbors except a few pioneer settlers, and wandering bands of
+Indians, who were glad to trade with them. A steady stream of converts
+to the Mormon church followed that first trail across the plains. A
+missionary sent to England brought many men and women from that country
+to the city on the Great Salt Lake. Brigham Young and the other leaders
+encouraged their followers above all else to cultivate the land. Most of
+the Mormons were farmers, and what shops there were dealt only in the
+necessities of life. Food was a matter of the first importance, and they
+had to rely entirely upon their own efforts to provide it. Every one was
+given a piece of land for his house, and most of them had their own
+farms in the outlying country. When they were sure of their food they
+began to build their temple and other public buildings, and these, like
+their streets, were all planned on the lines of a great future city.
+They first called their territory Deseret, but later changed it to the
+Indian name of Utah.
+
+Salt Lake City, and the territory of Utah, of which it was the chief
+settlement, might have remained for years almost unknown to the rest
+of the United States had not gold been discovered in California in the
+winter of 1849. The news of untold riches in the land that lay between
+Utah and the Pacific Ocean brought thousands of fortune hunters across
+the plains, and many of them traveled by way of Salt Lake City. That
+rush of men brought trade in its track and served to make the Mormons'
+capital well known. The quest for gold opened up the lands along the
+Pacific and helped to tie the far west to the rest of the nation. Soon
+railroads began to creep into the valleys beyond the Rocky Mountains,
+and wherever they have gone they have brought men closer together. But
+in Utah the Mormons were the first settlers, and no one could come and
+drive them out of their chosen land. At last they had found a city
+entirely of their own. They had not been allowed to live in Nauvoo, and
+so they built a new capital. Like all founders of new religions the
+Mormons had to weather many storms, but after they had passed through
+cold, hunger, and hardships of many kinds they came to their promised
+land.
+
+Such is the story of the founding of Salt Lake City, the home of the
+Mormon people.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+THE GOLDEN DAYS OF 'FORTY-NINE
+
+
+In 1848 California was largely an unexplored region, the home of certain
+old Spanish missions, with a few seaport towns scattered along the
+coast. Some pioneers from the East had settled inland after California
+had been separated from Mexico, and were ranching and farming. One of
+these pioneers, a well-to-do man named John A. Sutter, had staked out
+a considerable tract of land near the American River. He built a fort
+or stockade as headquarters, and made his plans to cultivate the tract.
+He had a number of men working for him, building a sawmill on the south
+branch of the American River, about forty miles from his main house.
+These workmen were in charge of James Wilson Marshall, who intended to
+have a dry channel serve as the tail-race for the mill, and was widening
+and deepening it by loosening the earth. At night the water of the
+stream was allowed to run through this channel, and wash out the gravel
+and sand. One day early in January, as Marshall was walking along the
+bank of the race, he noticed some shining yellow flakes in the soil.
+He thought these flakes might be gold, and gathering some of the earth
+carefully washed and screened it. In this way he obtained what looked
+like gold-dust. Early the next morning he went back to the race, and
+after some searching found a yellow scale larger than the others. He
+showed this, together with those he had obtained the day before, to some
+of the workmen, and they helped him to gather about three ounces. Later
+in the day Marshall went to his employer Sutter, who was at the fort,
+and there the two men tested the flakes as well as they were able, and
+reached the conclusion that they were really gold-dust.
+
+It was important to keep the discovery as quiet as possible. Searching
+along the dry channel Sutter and Marshall found more of the gold flakes.
+In some places the yellow scales were very plentiful, and seemed to
+promise that large quantities of the valuable mineral could be found
+near at hand. It was impossible, however, to keep the news from the
+workmen who had helped in finding the flakes. Before long the news
+spread, and in March, 1848, two newspapers of California mentioned the
+discovery on the south fork of the American River.
+
+The country was so sparsely settled, and life so primitive, that no
+great excitement was caused by this news for some months. But in May a
+Mormon, coming from the settlement of Coloma to San Francisco, walked
+down the main street waving a bottle filled with gold-dust and shouting
+"Gold! Gold! Gold from the American River!"
+
+His words, and the sight of the glittering bottle, caused tremendous
+excitement in San Francisco, and in the twinkling of an eye men took
+possession of sailboats, sloops, launches, any kind of craft, and
+started up the Sacramento River. Those who could not get boats to take
+the quicker course hurried off on horses or mules, in wagons or on foot.
+It was like a fairy tale. The seaport town of San Francisco, which had
+been well filled, was practically deserted overnight. Shopkeepers closed
+their stores, families hurried from their houses, and every class of
+people pushed toward the American River. The roads that led thither,
+which had usually been almost as empty as the prairies, were now filled
+with a wildly rushing throng. A man who had crossed the Strait of
+Carquines in April was the only passenger on the ferry, but when he
+returned two weeks later he found two hundred wagons trying to drive on
+board the ferry-boat.
+
+Business on the coast came to a standstill. The newspapers that had
+been started stopped publication. The churches closed, and all the town
+officers deserted their posts. As soon as a ship touched the coast and
+the crew heard of the finding of gold they deserted, and the captain
+and mates, seeing themselves without a crew, usually dashed after the
+others. Empty vessels lay at the docks. A large ship belonging to the
+Hudson's Bay Company, which had put into San Francisco harbor, was in
+charge of the captain's wife, every one else having left for the gold
+fields. Prices in all the country from San Francisco to Los Angeles
+jumped prodigiously. If men were to stay at their work they demanded
+and received twice their former wages. Shovels and spades sold for ten
+dollars apiece. They, and a few other mining implements, were the only
+things still manufactured. The cry of gold had turned men's heads like
+the magic wand of some fairy.
+
+Inland California presented a strange sight. The roads that ran from San
+Francisco to Sutter's Fort had formerly lain between prosperous farm
+lands, but now the crops were going to waste, the houses were empty, and
+the cattle free to wander through fields of grain. Along the American
+River, on the other hand, hills and valleys were filled with sheltering
+tents, and huts built of brush and rocks thrown together in a hurry. Men
+could not stop for comfort, but worked all day on the river bank. There
+were almost as many ways of searching for the gold as there were men.
+Some tried to wash the sand and gravel in pans; some used closely woven
+Indian baskets; some used what were called cradles. The cradle was a
+basket six or eight feet long, mounted on rockers, and open at one end;
+at the other end was a coarse screen sieve. Cleats were nailed across
+the bottom of the cradle. One workman would dig the gravel from the
+river bank, another carry it to the sieve, a third pour water over it,
+and a fourth rock the cradle The screen separated the stones from the
+gravel, the water washed away the earth and carried the heavier soil out
+of the cradle, thus leaving the black sand filled with the gold. This
+was later carried to a pan and dried in the sun. The sand could then be
+blown away, and the gold would be left.
+
+Men knew that fortunes were to be found here. On a creek a few miles
+below Coloma, seventeen thousand dollars' worth of gold was taken from
+a ditch three hundred feet long, four wide, and two deep. Another small
+channel had yielded no less than twelve thousand dollars. Many men
+already had bags and bottles that held thousands of dollars' worth of
+the precious mineral. One man, who had been able to get fifty Indians to
+work for him as washers, obtained sixteen thousand dollars from a small
+creek in five weeks' time.
+
+All this quickly changed the character of upper California. Every man
+wanted to be a miner, and no longer a cattleman or farmer, as before. It
+looked as though the towns would shrivel up, because of the tremendously
+high wages demanded by the men who were needed there. Cooks in San
+Francisco were paid three hundred dollars a month, and all kinds of
+mechanics secured wages of fifteen or twenty dollars a day. The forts
+found it impossible to keep soldiers on duty. As soon as men were paid
+off they rushed to the American River. Sailors deserted as fast as they
+could, and the American war-ships that came to anchor off Monterey did
+not dare to allow a single man to land. Threats of punishment or offers
+of reward had no influence over the sailors. They all felt certain they
+could make fortunes in a month at the gold fields.
+
+Soon men began to wonder whether they could not duplicate in other
+places the discovery that Marshall had made on Sutter's land. Wherever
+there was a river or stream explorers began to dig. They were well
+rewarded. Rich placers of gold were found along the course of almost all
+the streams that flowed to the Feather and San Joaquin Rivers. Along
+the course of the Stanislaus and Toulumne Rivers was another field
+for mining. By midsummer of 1848 settlers in southern California were
+pouring north in thousands, and by October at least ten thousand men
+were washing and screening the soil of river banks.
+
+[Illustration: WHEREVER THERE WAS A STREAM, EXPLORERS BEGAN TO DIG]
+
+The Pacific coast was very far away from the rest of the United States
+in that day. News usually traveled by ship, and sailors brought the
+report of the discovery of gold to Honolulu, to Oregon City, and to the
+ports at Victoria and Vancouver. Letters carried the first tidings to
+the people in the East, and by the middle of the summer Washington and
+New York had learned what was happening in California, and adventurers
+along the Atlantic coast were beginning to turn their faces westward.
+The letters often greatly exaggerated the truth. A New York paper
+printed reports which stated that men were picking gold out of the earth
+as easily as hogs could root up groundnuts in a forest. One man, who
+employed sixty Indians, was said to be making a dollar a minute.
+Small holes along the banks of streams were stated to yield many pounds
+of gold. But even allowing for much exaggeration it was evident that men
+were making fortunes in that country.
+
+Colonel Mason, in charge at San Francisco, sent Lieutenant Loeser with
+his report to Washington. The lieutenant had to take a roundabout
+route. He went from Monterey to Peru, from there to Panama, across the
+Isthmus, took boat to Jamaica, and from there he sailed to New Orleans.
+When he reached the capital he delivered his message, and showed a
+small tea chest which held three thousand dollars' worth of gold in
+lumps and flakes. This chest was placed on exhibition, and served to
+convince those who saw it that California must possess more gold than
+any other country yet discovered. President Taylor announced the news
+in an official message. He said that the mineral had been found in such
+quantities as could hardly be believed, except on the word of government
+officers in the field. During the winter of 1848-49 thousands of men in
+the East planned to start for this El Dorado as soon as they could get
+their outfits together, and spring should open the roads.
+
+The overland route to the West was long and very difficult. At that
+time, though the voyage by sea was longer, it was easier for men who
+lived on the Atlantic coast. They might sail around Cape Horn, or to the
+Isthmus of Panama, or to Vera Cruz, and in the two latter cases cross
+land, and hope to find some ship in the western ocean that would take
+them to San Francisco. Business men in the East seized the opportunity
+to advertise tents, beds, blankets, and all manner of camp equipment,
+as well as pans, rockers, and every kind of implement for washing gold
+from the gravel. The owners of ships of every description, many of them
+unseaworthy, fitted up their craft, and advertised them as ready to sail
+for San Francisco. The ports of Boston, Salem, Newburyport, New York,
+Baltimore, and New Orleans were crowded with brigs and schooners loading
+for the Pacific. A newspaper in New York stated that ten thousand people
+would leave for the gold country within a month.
+
+All sorts of schemes were tried. Companies were formed, each member
+of which paid one hundred dollars or more to charter a ship to take
+them around the Horn. Almost every town in the East had its California
+Association, made up of adventurers who wanted to make their fortunes
+rapidly. By the end of January, 1849, eighty vessels had sailed by way
+of Cape Horn, and many others were heading for Vera Cruz, and for ports
+on the Isthmus of Panama. The newspapers went on printing fabulous
+stories of the discoveries. One had a letter stating that lumps of gold
+weighing a pound had been found in several places. Another printed
+a letter from a man who said he would return in a few months with a
+fortune of half a million dollars in gold. A miner was said to have
+arrived in Pittsburgh with eighty thousand dollars in gold-dust that he
+had gathered in a few weeks. Whenever men met they discussed eagerly the
+one absorbing topic of the fortunes waiting on the coast.
+
+The adventurers who sailed around Cape Horn had in most cases the
+easiest voyages. There were plenty of veteran sea-captains ready to
+command the ships. A Boston merchant organized "The Mining and Trading
+Company," bought a full-rigged vessel, sold places in it to one hundred
+and fifty men, and sailed from Boston early in January, 1849. The
+first place at which she touched was Tierra del Fuego, and she reached
+Valparaiso late in April. There she found two ships from Baltimore, and
+in two days four more arrived from New York, and one from Boston. July
+6th she entered the Golden Gate of San Francisco, and found it crowded
+with vessels from every port. The ships were all deserted, and within an
+hour all this ship's crew were on shore. The town itself was filled with
+bustle and noise. Gambling was practically the only business carried on,
+and the stores were jammed with men paying any price for outfits for the
+gold country. This company chose a place on the Mokelumne River, and
+hastened there, but they found it difficult to work on a company basis.
+The men soon scattered and drifted to other camps; some of them found
+gold, others in time made their way east poorer than when they came.
+
+Those who went by the Isthmus had many adventures. Two hundred young
+men sailed to Vera Cruz, and landed at that quaint old Mexican city.
+There they were told that bands of robbers were prowling all through the
+country, that their horses would die of starvation in the mountains,
+and that they would probably be killed, or lose themselves on the wild
+trail. Fifty of them decided not to go farther, and sailed back in a
+homeward-bound ship to New York. Those who went on were attacked by a
+mob at the town of Jalapa, and had to fight their way through at the
+point of revolvers. In several wild passes bandits tried to hold them
+up, but the Easterners put them to flight and pushed on their way. All
+through the country they found relics and wreckage of the recent days
+when General Scott had marched an army into Mexico.
+
+There was more trouble at Mexico City. A religious procession was
+passing along the plaza, and the Americans did not fall upon their
+knees. The crowd set upon them, and they had to form a square for their
+protection, and hold the mob at bay until Mexican officers came to their
+rescue. Only after fighting a path through other towns and a long march
+did they reach the seaport of San Blas. One hundred and twenty of them
+took ship from there to San Francisco. Thirty, however, had left the
+others at Mexico City, thinking they could reach the sea-coast more
+quickly by another route. The ship they caught could get no farther
+than San Diego. From there they had to march on foot across a blazing
+desert country. Their food gave out, and they lived on lizards, birds,
+rattlesnakes, and even buzzards, anything they could find. Worn and
+almost starving they reached San Francisco, ten months after they had
+left New York. Such adventures were common to the American Argonauts of
+1849.
+
+Those gold-seekers who went by the Isthmus of Panama had to stop at the
+little settlement of Chagres, where one hundred huts of bamboo stood on
+the ruins of the old Spanish fort of San Lorenzo. The natives, lazy and
+half-clad, gazed in astonishment at the scores of men from the eastern
+United States, who suddenly began to hurry through their town. Here the
+gold-hunters bargained for river boats, which were usually rude dugouts,
+with roofs made of palmetto branches and leaves, and rowed by natives.
+It was impossible with such rowers to make much speed against the strong
+current of the Chagres River. Three days were required to make the
+journey to Gorgona, where the travelers usually landed. At this place
+they had to bargain afresh for pack-mules to carry them the twenty-four
+miles that lay between Gorgona and Panama. Many men, who could not find
+any mules left in the town, deserted their baggage and started for the
+Pacific coast on foot. The chances were that no ship would be waiting
+for them there, and they would have to warm their heels in idleness for
+days.
+
+General Persifor F. Smith, who had been ordered to take command of the
+United States troops at San Francisco, was one of those who had to
+wait for a ship at Panama. Here he heard reports that a good deal of
+the new-found gold was being sent to foreign countries. Some said that
+the British Consul had forwarded fifteen thousand ounces of California
+gold to England, and that more than nine million francs' worth of the
+mineral had been received in the South American ports of Lima and
+Valparaiso. As a result hundreds of men from those ports were taking
+ship to California. General Smith did not like the idea of foreigners
+profiting by the discovery of gold in California, and issued an order
+that only citizens of the United States should be allowed to enter the
+public lands where the diggings were located. When the _California_,
+a steamship from New York, reached Panama in January, 1849, with
+seventy-five Peruvians on board, General Smith warned them that they
+would not be allowed to go to the mines, and sent word of this order
+to consuls along the Pacific coast of South America. In spite of his
+efforts, however, foreigners would go to Upper California, and the
+American prospectors were too busy with their own searches to prevent
+the strangers from taking what gold they could find.
+
+When the _California_ arrived at Panama she was already well filled
+with passengers, but there were so many men waiting for her that the
+captain had to give in to their demands, and crowd his vessel with
+several hundred more gold-seekers. Loaded with impatient voyagers, the
+steamship sailed up the coast, and reached San Francisco about the end
+of February. Immediately every one on board, except the captain, the
+mate, and the purser, deserted the ship, and dashed for the gold fields.
+The next steamer to reach Panama, the _Oregon_, found an even larger
+crowd waiting at that port. She took more passengers on board than she
+was intended to carry, but fortune favored the gold-seekers, and the
+_Oregon_, like the _California_, discharged her adventurous cargo in
+safety at San Francisco. Hundreds of others who could not board either
+of these steamers ventured on the Pacific in small sailing vessels, or
+any manner of ship that would put out from Panama bound north.
+
+It is interesting to know the story of some of these pilgrimages. One of
+the Argonauts has told how he organized, in a little New England town,
+a company of twenty men. Each man subscribed a certain sum of money in
+return for a share in any profits, and in this way ten thousand dollars
+was raised. The men who were to go on the expedition signed a paper
+agreeing to work at least two years in the gold fields for the company.
+The band went from the New England town to New York, where they found
+the harbor filled with ships that were advertised to sail for Nicaragua,
+Vera Cruz, or Chagres. The leader of the company chose a little brig
+bound for the latter port, and in this the party, with some twenty-five
+other passengers, set sail in March. They ran into a heavy storm, but
+in three weeks reached the port on the Isthmus. There they had to wait
+some days, as all the river boats had gone up to Gorgona. When the boats
+were ready, thirty natives poled ten dugouts up the river. When the men
+landed they were told that there was no ship at Panama; that half the
+gold-seekers in that town were ill, and that there was no use in pushing
+on. So the party built tents on the bank of the river, and stayed there
+until the rainy season drove them to the coast. There they camped again,
+and waited for a ship to arrive. There was one vessel anchored in the
+harbor, but the owner was under a bond to keep it there as a coal-ship.
+The leader of the company, however, persuaded the owner to forfeit this
+bond, and four hundred waiting passengers paid two hundred dollars
+apiece to be conveyed to California. The ship was hardly seaworthy,
+and took seven weeks of sailing and floating to reach the harbor of
+Acapulco. There the vessel was greeted by a band of twenty Americans,
+ragged and penniless, who had come on foot from the City of Mexico. They
+had waited so long for a ship that twenty of the passengers agreed to
+give them their tickets, and take their places to wait until the next
+vessel should arrive. It was almost seven months after that New England
+party had left New York before they arrived at the Golden Gate of San
+Francisco.
+
+There was very little choice between the Panama and the Nicaragua routes
+to the West. Among those who tried the latter road were a number of
+young men who had just graduated from Yale College. They boarded a
+ship in New York that was advertised to sail during the first week in
+February, and expected to land in San Francisco in sixty days. It was
+March, however, before the ship, crowded with voyagers, set sail south
+from Sandy Hook. Three weeks brought her to the mouth of the San Juan
+River. The ship's company was landed at the little tropical town of San
+Juan de Nicaragua. A small steamboat had been brought along to take them
+up the river, but when the machinery was put together the boat was found
+to be worthless. Like the voyagers by Panama, these men then had to
+trust to native dugouts, and in this way they finally got up the river
+to San Carlos. Had it not been for their eagerness to reach California
+such a trip would have been a delight to men who had never seen the
+tropics before. The San Juan River flowed through forests of strange
+and beautiful trees. Tamarind and dyewood trees, tall palms, and giant
+cacti, festooned with bright-colored vines, made a background for the
+brilliant birds that flew through the woods. Fruit was to be had for the
+taking, and the weather at that time of the year was delightful. But the
+thought of the fortunes waiting to be picked up in California filled the
+minds of most of the travelers.
+
+After leaving the boats this party traveled by mule to Leon. Nicaragua
+was in the midst of a revolution, and the Americans acted as a guard
+to the President on the road to Leon. Near the end of July the company
+separated. Some finally sailed from the port of Realejo, and after many
+dangers and a voyage of almost five months succeeded in reaching San
+Francisco. Others reached Panama, set sail in a small boat, and were
+never heard from again; while yet a third party boarded a vessel at a
+Nicaraguan port, and managed to reach California after almost perishing
+from hunger and thirst.
+
+Such were the adventures of some of those who tried to reach the gold
+fields of the West by sea. Hundreds of men made the trip by one of these
+routes, and as soon as spring arrived thousands set out overland. It was
+understood that large parties would leave from western Missouri early
+in March, and as a result many men, some alone, some in bands of twenty
+or thirty, gathered there from all parts of the East. Sometimes they
+formed military companies, wore uniforms, and carried rifles. The main
+place of gathering was the town of Independence, which grew to the size
+of a large city in a few weeks. Men came on foot and on horseback; some
+with canvas-covered wagons, prairie schooners, and pack-mules; some with
+herds of cattle; some bringing with them all their household goods. All
+the Middle West seemed to be in motion. In a single week in March, 1849,
+hundreds of wagons drove through Burlington, Iowa. Two hundred from
+Memphis went along the Arkansas River, and hundreds more from Michigan,
+Wisconsin, Illinois, and Pennsylvania crossed the border of Iowa.
+
+The spring was late, and as the overland trip could not be taken until
+the grass was high enough to feed the cattle, the great company had to
+wait along the frontiers from Independence to Council Bluffs. As men
+gathered at these towns they would form into companies, and then move
+on to a more distant point, in order to make room for later arrivals.
+Twenty thousand gathered along these frontiers before the signal was
+given to start westward. The march began about May 1st, and from then
+on, day and night, scores of wagons crossed the Missouri River, and the
+country looked like a field of tents.
+
+From Independence most of the emigrants crossed rolling prairies for
+fifteen days to the Platte River at Grand Island. The route then wound
+up the valley of the Platte to the South Fork, and from there to the
+North Fork, where a rude post-office had been built, at which letters
+might be left to be carried back east by any travelers who were going
+in that direction. From here the emigrants journeyed to the mountain
+passes. They usually stopped at Laramie, which was the farthest western
+fort of the United States. By this time the long journey would be
+telling on many of the companies, and the road be strewn with all sorts
+of household goods, thrown away in order to lighten the burden on the
+horses.
+
+At the South Pass, midway of the Rocky Mountains, two roads divided;
+those who took the southern road traveled by the Great Salt Lake to
+the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and so into California. The northern road
+lay partly along the course of the Snake River to the headwaters of the
+Humboldt, and from there the emigrants might choose a path still farther
+to the north toward the Columbia River, or westward to the Sacramento.
+Many went by the trail along the Humboldt, although this route was one
+of the most difficult. "The river had no current," said one of the
+gold-hunters. "No fish could live in its waters, which wound through
+a desert, and there was not enough wood in the whole valley to make a
+snuff-box, nor vegetation enough on its banks to shelter a rabbit. The
+stream flowed through desert sands, which the summer heat made almost
+unbearable for men and horses." Following its course the travelers came
+to a lake of mud, surrounded for miles by a sandy plain. Across this
+they had to march for thirty-four hours to reach the Carson River. Along
+the trail lay the bodies of horses, mules, and oxen, and broken wagons
+parched and dried out in the blazing sun.
+
+The first of the overland travelers who crossed the mountains late in
+the summer brought such reports to the officers at the Pacific posts
+that the latter decided that relief parties must be sent back to help
+those who were still toiling in the desert. It was known that some had
+been attacked by Indians, and obliged to leave their covered wagons;
+that some had lost all their cattle, and were almost without food.
+Therefore relief parties were hurried into the mountains from the
+western side. They found the overland trail crowded with men on foot and
+in wagons. Many were sick, and almost all were hungry. One man carried
+a child in his arms, while a little boy trudged by his side, and his
+invalid wife rode on a mule. The soldiers gave food to all who needed
+it, and urged them to push on to the army posts. Day after day they met
+the same stream of emigrants, all bent on reaching the golden fields of
+California.
+
+Late in the autumn, with winter almost at hand, the voyagers were still
+crossing the deserts and mountains. The soldiers could not induce many
+of them to throw away any of their goods. They crept along slowly, their
+wagons loaded from baseboard to roof. The teams, gradually exhausted,
+began to fall, and progress was almost impossible. Then the rescuers
+hurried the women to near-by settlements, and forced the men to abandon
+some of their baggage in an effort to reach shelter before the winter
+storms should come. By the end of November almost all the overland
+emigrants had crossed the mountains.
+
+[Illustration: THE TEAMS, EXHAUSTED, BEGAN TO FAIL]
+
+The city of San Francisco had sprung up almost overnight. In 1835 a
+Captain Richardson had landed on the shore of Yerba Buena Cove, and
+built a hut of four redwood posts, covered by a sail. Five years
+afterward this village of Yerba Buena contained about fifty people and
+a dozen houses. In 1846 the American war-ship _Portsmouth_ anchored
+there, and her captain raised the "Stars and Stripes" on the Plaza. At
+that time there were not more than fifty houses and two hundred people.
+When the town became American the Plaza was renamed Portsmouth Square,
+and a year later the settlement was christened San Francisco. That was
+in January, 1847; and by midsummer of 1849 the town had become a city.
+It was an odd place to look at. The houses were made of rough unpainted
+boards, with cotton nailed across the walls and ceiling in place of
+plaster; and many a thriving business was carried on in canvas tents.
+There were few homes. The city was crowded; but most of the population
+did not intend to stay. They came to buy what they needed, or sell what
+they brought with them, and then hasten away to the mines. So many eager
+strangers naturally drove the prices up enormously, especially when
+it seemed as though gold could be had for the taking. The restaurants
+charged three dollars for a cup of coffee, a slice of ham, and two eggs.
+Houses and lots sold for from ten thousand to seventy-five thousand
+dollars each, and everything else was in proportion. What happened in
+San Francisco also happened in many other California towns. Sacramento
+was the result of the gold-craze. Speculators bought large tracts of
+land in any attractive place, gave it a high-sounding name, and sold
+city lots. Many of these so-called cities, however, shriveled up
+within a year or two. The seaports flourished because they were the
+gateways through which the newcomers passed in their rush to locate in
+the gold country.
+
+These seaports became the goal of merchants everywhere. Necessary
+articles were so scarce that they were shipped long distances. Flour
+was brought from Australia and Chili, rice and sugar from China, and
+the cities along the Atlantic provided the dry-goods, the tools,
+and the furniture. At one time a cotton shirt would sell for forty
+dollars, a tin pan for nine, and a candle for three. But on the other
+hand cargoes of goods that were not needed, silks and satins, costly
+house-furnishings, were left on the beaches and finally sold for a song.
+
+From the seaports the new arrivals hurried either up the Sacramento and
+the Feather Rivers to the northern gold fields, or up the San Joaquin
+to the southern country. Usually they were guided by the latest story
+of a rich find, and went where the chances seemed best. Several men
+would join forces and pitch their tents together, naming their camp
+Rat-trap Slide, Rough and Ready Camp, Slap-jack Bar, Mad Mule Gulch,
+Git-up-and-Git, You Bet, or any other name that struck their fancy.
+There were no laws to govern these little settlements, and the men
+adopted a rough system of justice that suited themselves. But as the
+numbers increased it was evident that California must have a better
+form of government, and steps were taken to have that rich stretch of
+land along the Pacific admitted as a state to the United States.
+
+In three years California had grown from the home of about two thousand
+people to the home of eighty thousand. The finding of gold had changed
+that almost unknown wilderness into a thriving land in the twinkling of
+an eye. Railroads were built to reach it, and more and more men poured
+west. Some men made great fortunes, but more in a few months abandoned
+their claims and drifted to the cities, or made their way slowly back
+to the eastern farms and villages from which they had set out. The
+Forty-niners, as the gold-seekers were called, found plenty of adventure
+in California, even if they did not all find a short-cut to wealth.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+HOW THE UNITED STATES MADE FRIENDS WITH JAPAN
+
+
+One of the beautiful names that the Japanese have given to their country
+is "Land of Great Peace," and at no time was this name more appropriate
+than in the middle of the nineteenth century. Two hundred years before
+the last of the civil wars of Japan had come to an end, and the people,
+weary of years of bloodshed, had turned delightedly to peaceful ways.
+The rice-fields were replanted, artisans returned to their crafts,
+shops opened again, and poets and painters followed the call of their
+arts. The samurai, or warriors, sheathed their swords, though they
+still regarded them as their very souls. They hung their armor in their
+ancestral halls, and spent their time in sport or idleness. The daimios,
+or nobles of Japan, lived either in the city of Yedo or at their country
+houses, taking their ease, and gradually forgetting the arts of war on
+which their power had been founded. All the people were quite contented,
+and had no desire to trade with the rest of the world. As a matter of
+fact they knew almost nothing about other countries, except through
+English or Russian sailors who occasionally landed on their coasts.
+Japan was satisfied to be a hermit nation.
+
+On the afternoon of the seventh day of July, 1853, or the third day of
+the sixth month of Kayéi, in the reign of the Emperor Koméi, the farmers
+working in the muddy rice-fields near the village of Uraga saw a strange
+sight. It was a clear summer afternoon, and the beautiful mountain Fuji,
+its cone wreathed in white clouds, could be seen from sea and shore.
+What startled the men in the fields, the people in the village, and the
+boatmen in the harbor, was a fleet of vessels coming to anchor in the
+bay of Yedo. These monsters, with their sails furled, although they were
+heading against the wind, were shooting tongues of smoke from their
+great black throats. "See the fire-vessels!" cried the Japanese to each
+other. When the peasants asked the priests where the monsters came from
+the wise men answered that they were the fire-vessels of the barbarians
+who lived in the West.
+
+The monsters were four ships of the United States navy, the
+_Mississippi_, _Susquehanna_, _Plymouth_, and _Saratoga_, all under
+command of Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry. The fleet dropped anchor
+in the wide bay, forming a line broadside to the shore. The gun-ports
+were opened, and sentries set to guard against attack by pirates, or
+by fire-junks. As the anchors splashed in the water rockets shot up
+from one of the forts on shore signaling to the court at Yedo that the
+barbarians had reached Japan.
+
+The town of Uraga was usually not a very busy place, and the government
+officers spent their time drinking tea, smoking, and lounging in the
+sun, and occasionally collecting custom duties from junks bound to other
+harbors. But there was a great bustle on the day the strange ships
+arrived. The chief magistrate, or buni[=o], his interpreter, and suite
+of attendants, put on their formal dress of hempen cloth, and fastened
+their lacquered ornamented hats to their heads; with two swords in each
+belt, the party marched to the shore and boarded their state barge.
+Twelve oarsmen rowed it to the nearest foreign ship, but when they
+tried to fasten ropes to the vessel so that they might go on board, the
+barbarians threw off the ropes, and gestured to them to keep away.
+
+The Japanese officer was surprised to find that, although he was
+gorgeously robed, and his companions carried spears and the Tokugawa
+trefoil flag, the barbarians were not at all impressed. They told him,
+through an interpreter, that their commander wished to confer with the
+governor himself. The officer answered that the governor was not allowed
+to board foreign ships. After some further discussion the surprised
+Japanese was permitted to climb the gangway ladder and meet the
+barbarians on the deck of their vessel.
+
+Commodore Perry knew that the Japanese loved mystery, high-sounding
+names, and ceremonies, and so he stayed in his cabin and would not show
+himself to the visitors. A secretary carried his messages, and explained
+that the mysterious commodore had come on a friendly mission and bore
+a letter from the President of the United States to the Emperor of
+Japan, which he wished to present with all proper ceremony. He declined
+to go to Nagasaki, and insisted that he should remain in Yedo Bay,
+and added that although his visit was entirely friendly, he would not
+allow any inquisitive sightseers to prowl about his fleet. Very much
+impressed with the power of this hidden barbarian, the Japanese officer
+immediately ordered all the small boats, the punts and sampans that had
+gathered about the fleet, to row away.
+
+The officer and his body-guard returned to shore, and told the villagers
+that the visitors were very remarkable men, who were not at all
+impressed by their costumes or weapons. The Japanese had no such title
+as commodore in their language, and they referred to Perry as Admiral,
+and credited him with almost as much majesty as their own hidden Mikado,
+or as the mighty Shogun.
+
+The western coast of Japan was much excited that night. Rockets from the
+forts, and huge watch-fires on the cliffs, told the whole country that
+a most unusual event had happened. The peasants set out their sacred
+images, and prayed to them as they had not done in years. It was evident
+that the gods of Japan were punishing the people for their neglect
+by sending these great fire-vessels to disturb the coast. To add to
+the general excitement a wonderful light appeared in the sky about
+midnight, spreading a pale red and blue path across the heavens, as
+though a dragon were flying through space. Priests and soothsayers made
+the most of this display of Northern Lights, and pointed out that the
+fire-vessels, clearly revealed in the harbor, must have something to do
+with the strange omen.
+
+The governor of Uraga himself, with a retinue of servants, all clad in
+embroidered gowns and lacquered helmets, and each carrying two swords,
+went out to the flag-ship next morning. He had evidently overlooked
+the fact that the barbarians had been told on the day before that
+the governor could not pay such a visit to their fleet. The governor
+was used to being received with a great deal of attention, and to
+having people bow to the ground as he went by; but on the deck of the
+_Susquehanna_ the sailors looked at him with simple curiosity, and when
+he asked to speak with the mysterious admiral, he was told that he
+would only be allowed to speak with the captains. These men said that
+their commander would only wait three days for an answer from Yedo as
+to whether the Mikado would receive the letter of the President. They
+showed him the magnificent box that held the letter, and the governor's
+curiosity grew even greater. When he left the flag-ship he had promised
+to urge the Americans' cause.
+
+Next day, the men dressed in silk and brocade, painted helmets, and
+gleaming sashes, eager to visit the ships again, were surprised to learn
+that the barbarian prince would transact no business. His interpreter
+declared that it was a day of religious observance, known as Sunday.
+The people on shore heard the sailors of the fleet singing hymns,
+a strange sound in those waters. Hastily the Japanese offered new
+presents at the shrines of their own gods to ensure protection from the
+barbarians. 8 By now the hermit people thought they might have to guard
+themselves, and began to build earthworks along the shore. Farmers,
+fishermen, shopkeepers, women, and children were pressed into service.
+Rude embankments were thrown up, and enormously heavy brass cannon
+were placed at openings. The old samurai, who had almost forgotten
+warfare, sought out their weapons, and gathered their troops. Their
+armor consisted of jackets of silk, iron and paper. Their arms were old
+matchlocks and spears. They could have fought each other, but they were
+several hundred years behind the barbarians in military matters. On
+the hills they set up canvas tents, with flags bearing flaming dragons
+and the other emblems of their clans. In the days of their civil wars
+bright-colored trappings had played an important part.
+
+Yedo was then the chief city of Japan. When Perry arrived in 1853 it
+was the home of the Shogun Iyéyoshi, who was the real ruler of the
+land, although the Mikado was called the sovereign. Yedo had been the
+home of a long line of Shoguns of the Tokugawa family who had ruled
+the country, calling themselves "Tycoons." They had built up the city,
+and filled it with palaces and temples that had never been equaled in
+magnificence. The people of Yedo, numbering over a million, were greatly
+excited when they heard of the fleet of war-ships lying in their great
+bay. The Shogun, his courtiers and his warriors bestirred themselves at
+once. Soldiers were summoned, armor polished, swords unsheathed, castles
+repaired, and everything possible done to make an impression on the
+strangers.
+
+The chief men knew that they could not oppose this foreign admiral. Once
+they had had war-vessels of their own, but years of peace had reduced
+their navy, and they could not defend their coasts. The Shogun was
+afraid that the admiral might insist upon seeing the Mikado at Ki[=o]to,
+and that would be a great blow to his own dignity. After hours of
+debate and discussion he chose two daimios to receive the letter of the
+American President, Millard Fillmore, and sent word to all coast towns
+to man their forts.
+
+Perry had played the game well, and so far had allowed no Japanese
+to see him. He wanted to make a treaty with Japan, and he knew that
+to succeed he must impress this Oriental people with his dignity. He
+allowed his captains and two daimios to arrange a meeting to be held
+at a little town called Kurihâma, near the port of Uraga. Each side
+had tried to outdo the other in politeness. The American captains had
+received the Japanese officers with great respect, had served them
+wines, and seated them in upholstered armchairs. The Japanese regretted
+that they could not provide their guests with armchairs or with wine on
+shore, but the visitors assured them that they would be willing to adopt
+Japanese customs.
+
+By July 13th the scene for the meeting was ready. Hundreds of yards of
+canvas, with the Tokugawa trefoil, had been stretched along the road to
+Kurihâma. Hundreds of retainers, clad in all the colors of their feudal
+days, were gathered about the tents, and on the beach stood as many
+soldiers, glittering in their lacquered armor. The American officers
+were almost as brilliantly dressed as the Japanese. They wore coats
+with a great many bright brass buttons, and curious shaped hats cocked
+on their heads. They brought musicians with them who played on cornets
+and drums, and the music was quite unlike anything the natives had ever
+heard before. Three hundred of the barbarians landed and marched from
+the beach to the main tent, while the eager-eyed people lined the road
+and wondered at their strange appearance.
+
+Two or three big sailors carried the American flag, and back of them
+came two boys with the mysterious red box that had been shown to the
+officers of the port. Back of them marched the great commodore, clad in
+full uniform, and on either side of him strode a black man armed with a
+large sabre. Many of the Japanese had never seen a white man before, and
+still fewer had ever looked upon a negro. They were therefore very much
+impressed by the procession.
+
+The officers of the Shogun received their magnificent visitor at the
+door of the pavilion. After greetings the two boys handed the box to the
+negro guards, who opened the scarlet cloth envelope and the gold-hinged
+rosewood cases, and laid the President's letter on a lacquered stand
+brought from Yedo. A receipt for the President's letter was then handed
+to the commodore, who said that he would return to Japan the next
+spring, probably in April or May. The meeting lasted half an hour, and
+then, with the same pomp and ceremony, the Americans returned to their
+ships.
+
+For eight days the fleet remained in the bay. One party of sailors
+landed, but made no trouble, and was actually so polite that the
+people offered them refreshments of tea and fruit. At close range the
+barbarians were not so terrifying as the natives had thought them at
+first, and when they embarked for their fleet the people urged them to
+come back again. On July 17th the war-ships steamed away, leaving the
+cliffs covered with people, who gazed in astonishment at vessels that
+had no canvas spread, but were driven entirely by fire.
+
+Perry's object in visiting Japan was to obtain a treaty that would allow
+trade relations between the United States and this hermit nation. He
+wanted to give the Japanese people time to consider President Fillmore's
+letter, and so he planned to keep his squadron in Eastern waters until
+the following spring, when he would return to learn the result of his
+mission at Yedo. There was much of interest to him in China, and he
+spent the autumn and part of the winter making charts of that coast, and
+visiting ports where American merchants were already established.
+
+Meantime the letter of the American President had caused great
+excitement in Japan. Almost as soon as Perry left a messenger was sent
+to the Shinto priests at the shrines of Isé to offer prayers for the
+peace of the empire, and to urge that the barbarians be swept away. A
+week later the Shogun Iyéyoshi died, and left the government at odds as
+to what to do.
+
+Some of the daimios remembered the military ardor of their ancestors,
+and wanted to fight the barbarians, rather than make a treaty with
+them. Others thought that it would be madness to oppose an enemy who
+had such powerful ships that they could capture all the Japanese junks,
+and destroy the coast cities. One powerful nobleman declared that it
+would be well for Japan to meet the barbarians, and learn from them
+how to build ships and lead armies, so that they would be able in time
+to defeat them at their own arts. The Mikado had little to do in the
+discussion. The actual ruler was the new Shogun Iyésada, son of the
+former Shogun.
+
+While Commodore Perry was cruising along the coast of China he heard
+that French and Russian merchants were planning to visit Japan. He was
+afraid that his country might lose the benefits of his visit unless
+he could obtain a treaty before these other countries did. Therefore,
+although a midwinter cruise to Japan was difficult and dangerous, he
+determined to risk this and return at once. Four ships set sail for Yedo
+Bay February 1, 1854, and a week later the commodore followed with three
+others.
+
+In the city of Yedo the new Shogun was very busy preparing either for
+peace or war. A long line of forts was hurriedly built on the edge of
+the bay in front of the city. Thousands of laborers were kept at work
+there, a great number of cannon were cast, and shops worked day and
+night turning out guns and ammunition. An old law had directed that all
+vessels of a certain size were to be burned, and only small coasting
+junks built. This law was repealed, and all the rich daimios hurriedly
+built war-ships. These ships flew a flag representing a red sun on a
+white background, and this later became the national flag of Japan. A
+native who had learned artillery from the Dutch was put in charge of the
+soldiers; old mediæval methods of fighting were abandoned, and artillery
+that was somewhat like that of European countries was adopted.
+
+In spite of all this bustle and preparation, however, the Shogun and his
+advisers thought it would be wisest for them to agree to a treaty with
+the United States. Therefore a notice was issued on December 2, 1853,
+which stated that "owing to want of military efficiency, the Americans
+would, on their return, be dealt with peaceably." At the same time the
+old practice of Fumi-yé, which consisted in trampling on the cross and
+other emblems of Christianity, and which had been long practiced in the
+city of Nagasaki, was abolished.
+
+Some men in the country were insisting that the time had come for the
+Japanese to visit the West, and learn the new arts and trades. One of
+these was a scholar, Sakuma, who urged the government to send Japanese
+youths to Europe to learn shipbuilding and navigation. The Shogun did
+not approve of this idea; but a pupil of the scholar, named Yoshida
+Shoin, heard of it, and decided to go abroad by himself. Sakuma gave him
+money for his expenses, and advised him how he might get passage on one
+of the American ships, when the fleet should return to Japan.
+
+As soon as the Shogun learned that Commodore Perry was about to return
+he chose Hayâshi, the chief professor of Chinese in the university,
+to serve as interpreter. The Americans had used Chinese scholars in
+their communications with the Japanese, and Hayâshi was a man of great
+learning and courtly manners. The Shogun also found a native who
+understood English, although the Americans did not know this. This man,
+Nakahama Manjiro, with two companions, had been picked up at sea by an
+American captain, and taken to the United States, where he obtained a
+good education. He and his two mates then decided that they would return
+to their native land, and went to Hawaii, where they built a whale-boat,
+and then sailed for the coast of China on board an American merchantman.
+In time the wanderers reached home, and when the Shogun heard of
+Manjiro's travels he made him a samurai, or wearer of two swords. The
+whale-boat that he had built was used as a model for others, and the
+traveler taught his friends some of the knowledge of the Western people.
+
+On February 11, 1854, the watchmen on the hills of Idzu saw the American
+fleet approaching. Two days later the great war-ships of the barbarians
+steamed up the bay. The seven vessels dropped anchor not far from
+Yokos[)u]ka, and the captain of the flag-ship received visits from the
+governor and his interpreters. Again the same exaggerated forms of
+politeness were observed, and presents of many kinds, fruits, wines, and
+confectionery, were exchanged. The Japanese suggested that Perry should
+land and meet them at Kamakura or Uraga, but the commodore replied,
+through his captain, that he should stay where he was until the Japanese
+had decided what they would do. He gave them until February 21st to
+decide about the treaty.
+
+Boats were sent out from the fleet daily to make surveys of the bay, but
+none of the crews were allowed to land. At length the Japanese stated
+that they were ready to treat with the American officers, and Captain
+Adams was sent to Uraga to inspect the place where the fleet was to
+anchor, and the new building in which the treaty was to be signed. The
+captain, with his aides, entered the hall of reception, and was met by
+a daimio named Izawa. The daimio was fond of joking. After many polite
+greetings Captain Adams handed the nobleman a note from Commodore Perry.
+Izawa took out his great spectacles, but before he put them on he folded
+up his large fan with a loud snap. The Americans, alarmed at the noise,
+clapped their hands to their revolvers. Izawa could not help laughing at
+their confusion, but quickly adjusted his spectacles, and after reading
+the note, said that he was much gratified at the commodore's greeting.
+Rice and tea, cake and oranges were served the guests. A long argument
+followed. Captain Adams said that the building was large enough for
+simple talking, but not for the display of presents; and that Commodore
+Perry would much rather go to the city of Yedo. The Japanese answered
+that they much preferred that the meeting should take place at Uraga or
+Kanagawa. The debate, carried on through Chinese interpreters, was a
+lengthy one.
+
+Two days later the commodore moved his fleet ten miles farther up the
+bay. From here his crews could see the great temple-roofs, castles, and
+pagodas of Yedo itself, and could hear the bells in the city towers.
+This advance of the fleet convinced the Shogun that Perry meant to go to
+Yedo. Some of his court had thought that it would be a national disgrace
+if the barbarians were permitted to enter that city, but the government
+now decided to yield the point, and suggested a place directly opposite,
+at Yokohama, for the place of treaty.
+
+No such scene had ever been witnessed in the hermit land of Japan as
+the one that took place there on the morning of March 8, 1854. The bay
+of Yedo was covered with great state barges and junks with many-colored
+sails. On shore were hundreds of soldiers, the servants of the great
+daimios, dressed in the gorgeous costumes of earlier centuries. Held
+back by ropes were thousands of country people who had gathered from all
+over that part of Japan to see the strange men from the West. Everywhere
+was color. Tents, banners, houses, and the costumes of men, women and
+children blazed with it. The American sailors in all their voyages in
+the East had never seen such a brilliant picture.
+
+Perry was not to be outdone. His men left the ships to the noise of
+cannon that echoed and re-echoed along the shore. Twenty-seven boats
+brought five hundred men, and as soon as they landed the marines formed
+a hollow square, while three bands played martial music. The great
+commodore, now looked upon by the Japanese with awe, embarked from the
+_Powhatan_ in his white gig; more guns were fired; more flags waved; and
+with great pomp, Perry landed on the beach. His object was to impress
+the hermit people with the dignity of his nation.
+
+A number of meetings followed before the treaty was completed. The
+Americans insisted that vessels in need of wood, coal, water, or
+provisions should be allowed to get them from shore, and that the
+Japanese should care for shipwrecked sailors. They also wanted the two
+ports, Shimoda and Hakodate, opened to them. The Japanese were willing,
+provided they would not travel inland farther than they could return the
+same day, and that no American women should be brought into the country.
+But when the Japanese objected to the arrival of women, Commodore Perry
+threw back his cloak and exclaimed, "Great heavens, if I were to permit
+any such stipulation as that in the treaty, when I got home the women
+would pull out all the hairs of my head!" The Japanese were surprised at
+Perry's excitement, thinking that they must have offended him greatly.
+When the interpreters explained what he had actually said, however, both
+sides laughed and continued peacefully. They grew more and more friendly
+as the meetings progressed. They dined together and exchanged gifts.
+The Americans liked the sugared fruits, candied nuts, crabs, prawns,
+and fish that the Japanese served in different forms, while the hermit
+people developed a great fondness for the puddings and champagne the
+Americans offered them. When it came to gifts, the eyes of the Japanese
+opened wide at the many surprising things the barbarians had invented.
+They were delighted with the rifles, the clocks, the stoves, the
+sewing-machines, the model of a steam locomotive, and the agricultural
+tools, scales, maps, and charts that Perry had brought to the Mikado.
+These presents were to open the minds of the Japanese to the march of
+progress in the rest of the world; and to teach them the uses of steam
+and electricity, the printing-press, newspapers, and all the other
+inventions that were products of Europe and America.
+
+In exchange, the art-loving people of Japan gave their visitors
+beautiful works in bronze, lacquer, porcelain, bamboo, ivory, silk, and
+paper, and great swords, spears and shields, wonderfully inlaid and
+decorated, that were handed down from their feudal days.
+
+While the fleet stayed Japanese spy-boats kept watch in the bay, to see
+that their young men did not board the foreign ships in their desire to
+see something of the world. Time and again the young Yoshida Shoin and
+a friend tried to break through the blockade, but every time they were
+sent back to shore. At last the two left Yedo for the port of Shimoda.
+
+The Americans set up telegraph poles, and laid rails to show the working
+of the model locomotive. They gave an exhibition of the steam-engine.
+This caused great excitement in the country near Yedo, and every one who
+could went to see the strange performance. Already there was a struggle
+between those who were eager to learn the inventions of the Americans,
+and those who were afraid that the new ideas would spoil old Japan. Many
+an ambitious youth stared at the Mikado's presents, and tried to learn
+more of their secrets from the sailors on their way to or from the fleet.
+
+The treaty was signed on March 31, 1854, and agreed that shipwrecked
+sailors should be cared for, provisions needed by ships should be
+obtained in the ports, and American vessels allowed to anchor in the two
+harbors of Shimoda and Hakodate. Actual trade was not yet allowed, nor
+were Americans to be permitted to reside in Japan. The hermit nation was
+not at all eager to enter into competition with other countries, nor to
+allow foreigners to trade with her. Commodore Perry knew, however, that
+even the slight terms he had gained would prove the beginning of the
+opening up of Japan to the rest of the world.
+
+April 18, 1854, Perry left the bay of Yedo for Shimoda, and there the
+fleet stayed until early in May. While the squadron was there two
+Americans, who were botanizing on land, met the youth Yoshida Shoin
+and his friend. The young Japanese gave the Americans a letter, but
+seeing some native officers approaching, he and his friend stole away.
+A few nights later the watch on the war-ship _Mississippi_ heard voices
+calling, "Americans, Americans!" They found the two Japanese youths in
+a small boat, and took them on board. Paper and writing materials were
+found hidden in their clothes, and they explained that they wanted to
+go with the fleet to America, and write down what they saw there. The
+commodore, however, felt that he was in honor bound to send the two
+young men back to their homes; and did so. Yoshida later came to be
+one of the leaders of the new Japan that ended the long line of Shogun
+rulers, and made the Mikado the actual emperor.
+
+The fleet cruised from one port to another, now well received by the
+people, who had forgotten their fear of the barbarians' fire-vessels.
+The governors of the different provinces gave presents to Perry,
+among them blocks of native stone to be used in building the great
+obelisk that was rising on the banks of the Potomac River in memory of
+Washington. On July 17th the last of the squadron left Napa for Hong
+Kong.
+
+The Americans had shown the Japanese that they were a friendly people,
+with no desire to harm them. A race that had lived shut off from the
+rest of the world for so many centuries was naturally timid and fearful
+of strange people. From time to time European ships had landed in Japan,
+and almost every time the sailors had done injury to the natives. Perry,
+however, convinced them that the United States was a friend, and the
+treaty, slight though its terms were, marked the dawn of a new era in
+Japan. Like the sleeping princess, she woke at the touch of a stranger
+from overseas.
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+THE PIG THAT ALMOST CAUSED A WAR
+
+
+Off the far northwestern corner of the United States lie a number of
+small islands scattered along the strait that separates the state of
+Washington from Vancouver Island. One of these goes by the name of San
+Juan Island, a green bit of land some fifteen miles long and seven wide.
+The northern end rises into hills, while the southern part is covered
+with rich pastures. In the hills are coal and limestone, and along the
+shore is splendid cod, halibut, and salmon fishing. In the year 1859 a
+farmer named Hubbs pastured his sheep at the southern end of San Juan,
+and had for a neighbor to the north a man in the employ of the English
+Hudson's Bay Company, whose business it was to raise pigs. The pigs
+throve on San Juan, and following their fondness for adventure left
+Mr. Griffiths' farm and overran the whole island. Day after day Hubbs
+would find the pigs grubbing in his pasture, and finally in a moment
+of anger he warned his neighbor that he would kill the next pig that
+came on his land. Griffiths heard the warning, but evidently the pigs
+did not, for the very next day one of them crossed the boundary line
+and ventured into Mr. Hubbs' field. Here it began to enjoy itself in
+a small vegetable patch that Mr. Hubbs had planted. As soon as he saw
+the trespasser Hubbs went for his gun, and returning with it, shot the
+intruding pig.
+
+When Griffiths found his dead pig he was as angry as Hubbs had been,
+and he immediately set out in his sailboat and crossed the strait to
+Victoria, a little city on Vancouver Island, where officers of the
+British Government had their headquarters. He stated his case, and
+obtained a warrant of arrest for his neighbor Hubbs. Then he sailed back
+to San Juan with the constable, and going to his neighbor's house read
+the warrant to him. Hubbs indignantly replied that he was an American
+citizen, and did not have to obey the order of the English officer.
+Thereupon the constable left the house, vowing that he would return with
+a force of men and compel the farmer to obey him.
+
+Mr. Hubbs was a shrewd man, and believed that the constable would be
+as good as his word. As soon as he had left Hubbs therefore sent a
+note to Port Townsend, which was in Washington Territory, asking the
+United States officers there to protect him from arrest for killing his
+neighbor's pig. When he received the note General William S. Harney, who
+was in command, ordered Lieutenant-Colonel Casey to take a company of
+soldiers and camp on San Juan Island to protect Mr. Hubbs.
+
+Now that thoughtless pig had actually lighted a fuse that threatened
+to lead to a very serious explosion. As it happened San Juan lay near
+the middle of the Strait of Juan de Fuca and commanded both shores. The
+people at Victoria could see the American soldiers setting out in their
+boats from Port Townsend, and landing on the green island. So long as it
+had been the home of a few farmers San Juan had caused little concern,
+but now that troops were camping upon it it presented quite a different
+look. Victoria was all excitement. The governor, Sir James Douglas,
+heard the news first, and then Admiral Prevost, who was in command
+of some English war-ships anchored in the little bay near the city.
+The admiral was very angry and threatened to blow the Yankees off the
+island. He gave orders to move his fleet to one of the harbors of San
+Juan, and his cannon were ready to fire shot over the peaceful fields,
+where sheep and pigs had divided possession. Sir James Douglas, the
+governor, however, was a more peaceful man. He persuaded the admiral not
+to be in a hurry, but suggested that it would be wise to have a company
+of British regulars camp somewhere on San Juan. This would serve as a
+warning to the United States troops. Accordingly Captain Delacombe was
+sent over, and pitched his tents on the northern end of the island that
+belonged to the Hudson's Bay Company.
+
+As a result of the pig having trespassed in Mr. Hubbs' vegetable patch,
+the flag of the United States flew above the tents on the southern part
+of San Juan, and the British flag over the tents on the northern end.
+Mr. Hubbs was left in peace, and Mr. Griffiths went on raising pigs; but
+the people in Victoria shook their fists across the strait at the people
+in Port Townsend, and in each of those cities there was a great deal of
+talk about war. The talk was mostly done by men who had nothing to do
+with the army. The soldiers on the little island soon became the best of
+friends, and spent their time in field sports and giving dinner-parties
+to each other.
+
+No part of the boundary line of the United States has given more trouble
+than that in the northwest. The Hudson's Bay Company had once claimed
+practically all of what was known as Oregon Territory for England, but
+after Marcus Whitman brought his pioneers westward the Hudson's Bay
+Company gradually withdrew, and left the southern part of that land to
+the United States. For forty years the two countries had disputed about
+the line of division, and the political party that was led by Stephen
+A. Douglas had taken as its watchword, "Fifty-four, forty,--or fight!"
+which meant that unless the United States should get all the land up
+to the southern line of Alaska, they would go to war with England.
+Fortunately President Polk was not so grasping, and the boundary was
+finally settled in 1846 on latitude forty-nine degrees. That was a clear
+enough boundary for most of the northwest country, but when one came
+close to the Pacific the coast grew ragged, and was dotted with little
+islands. Vancouver was by the treaty to belong to England, and the
+agreement said that the boundary at this corner should be "the middle
+of the channel." Now it happened that San Juan and its small neighbors
+lay midway between the two shores, and the treaty failed to say which
+channel was meant, the one on the American or the one on the British
+side of San Juan.
+
+As a matter of fact this question of the channel was very important
+for the British. It would lead them to the coast of Canada, or the
+United States to Alaska. The one to the west, called the Canal de Haro,
+was much straighter than the other, and deep enough for the largest
+war-ships. Naturally the United States wanted the boundary to run
+through this channel, and the British equally naturally wanted the
+boundary to run through the opposite channel, called Rosario Strait,
+because midway between lay the little island, which would make a
+splendid fortress, and might prevent the passage of ships in case of
+war between the two nations. So long as the islands were simply pasture
+lands the question of ownership was only a matter for debate, but when
+the pig was killed, and the troops of both countries camped on San Juan
+the question became a much more vital one.
+
+News of what had happened on San Juan was sent to Washington and to
+London; and General Winfield Scott hurried by way of Panama to Mr.
+Hubbs' farm. He found that all the United States troops on that part
+of the coast that could be spared had been crowded on to the southern
+part of the island. This seemed unnecessary, and General Scott agreed
+with Sir James Douglas that only one company of United States and one
+of British soldiers should stay in camp there. The little island thus
+became the scene of what was known as "a joint military occupation." In
+the meantime there were many lengthy meetings at Washington and London,
+and the two countries decided that they would leave the difficult
+question of the boundary line to arbitration. So the statesmen at
+Washington drew up papers to prove that the right line lay in the middle
+of the Canal de Haro, and statesmen at London drew up other papers to
+show that the correct line was through the middle of Rosario Strait,
+which would give them San Juan and allow their ships to sail in perfect
+safety between the islands and the Vancouver shore. The statesmen and
+lawyers took their time about this, while the soldiers amused themselves
+fishing for cod and salmon, and the farmers cared for their sheep and
+pigs as peacefully as in the days before Hubbs had shot Griffiths' pig.
+
+After some time the two nations decided to ask the Emperor of Germany to
+decide the question of the boundary line. The Emperor appointed three
+learned men to determine the question for him. They listened to the
+arguments of both sides, and after much study made their report to the
+Emperor, who gave his decision on October 23, 1872, and handed a copy
+of it to Mr. Bancroft for the United States, and to Lord Odo Russell
+for England. His decision was that the claim of the United States was
+correct, and that the middle of the Canal de Haro should be the boundary
+of that northwestern corner. This gave San Juan to the United States,
+much to the disappointment of the people of Vancouver Island, who knew
+that a fort on that little strip of land could control all navigation
+through the Strait of Juan de Fuca. One month after the decision was
+given the British troops cut down their flagstaff on the northern end
+and left San Juan.
+
+San Juan lies opposite the city of Victoria, which has grown to be
+one of the largest ports of British Columbia. Instead of lessening in
+importance the island has grown in value, because that part of the
+country has filled up rapidly, and both sides of the line are more and
+more prosperous. The question of who should own San Juan would have been
+decided some day, but it was that prowling pig that brought matters to
+a head, and for a few weeks at least threatened to draw two countries
+into war. On such slight happenings (although in this case it was a very
+serious matter for the pig) often hang the fates of nations if we trace
+history back to the spark that fired the fuse.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+JOHN BROWN AT HARPER'S FERRY
+
+
+In the days when Kansas was the battle-ground between those men who
+upheld negro slavery, and those who attacked it, a man named John Brown
+went from the east to that territory. Several of his sons had already
+gone into Kansas, and had sent him glowing accounts of it. Many New
+England families were moving west by 1855, and building homes for
+themselves on the splendid rolling prairies across the Mississippi. John
+Brown, however, went with another purpose. The years had built up in
+him such a hatred for negro slavery that it filled his whole thoughts.
+Kansas was the field where slave-owners and abolitionists, or those
+who opposed slavery, were to fight for the balance of power. Therefore
+he went to Kansas and made his home in the lowlands along the eastern
+border, near a region that the Indians had named the Swamp of the Swan.
+
+There were a great many men in Kansas at that time who had no real
+convictions in regard to slavery, and to whom the question was one of
+politics, and not of religion, as it was to John Brown. Those were days
+of warfare on the border, and men from the south and the north were
+constantly clashing, fighting for the upper hand in the government,
+and taking every possible advantage of each other. Five of John Brown's
+sons had already settled in Kansas when he came there with a sick son
+and a son-in-law. Early in October, 1855, they reached the home of the
+pioneers. They found the houses very primitive, small log shanties, the
+walls plastered with mud. The father joined his boys in getting in their
+hay, and set traps in the woods to secure game for food. But trouble was
+brewing in the town of Lawrence, which was the leading city of Kansas.
+Word come to the Swamp of the Swan that men who favored slavery were
+marching on the town, intending to drive out the free-state Northerners
+there. This was a direct call to John Brown to take the field. His
+family set to work preparing corn bread and meat, blankets and cooking
+utensils, running bullets, and loading guns. Then five of the men set
+out for Lawrence, which was reached at the end of a twenty-four hours'
+march.
+
+The town of Lawrence, a collection of many rude log houses, was filled
+with crowds of excited men and women. John Brown, looking like a
+patriarch with his long hair and beard, arrived at sundown, accompanied
+by his stalwart sons armed with guns and pistols. He was at once put
+in charge of a company, and set to work fortifying the town with
+earthworks, and preparing for a battle. In a day or two, however, an
+agreement was reached between the free-state and the slave-state
+parties, and immediate danger of warfare disappeared. Satisfied with
+this outcome, Brown and his sons took to the road again, and marched
+back to their home. There they stayed during the next winter. In the
+cold of the long ice-bound months, the passions of men lay dormant. But
+with the coming of spring the old feud smouldered afresh.
+
+Bands of armed men from the South arrived in Kansas, and one from
+Georgia came to camp near the Brown settlement on the Swamp of the Swan.
+On a May morning John Brown and four of his sons walked over to the new
+camp to learn the Georgians' plans. He had some surveying instruments
+with him, and the newcomers took him for a government surveyor and
+therefore a slave man, for almost every official that was sent into
+Kansas held the Southern views. Pretending to be a surveyor, the father
+directed his sons to busy themselves in making a section line through
+the camp. The men from Georgia looked on, talking freely. Presently one
+of them said: "We've come here to stay. We won't make no war on them
+as minds their own business; but all the Abolitionists, such as them
+Browns over there, we're going to whip, drive out, or kill,--any way to
+get shut of them!" The strangers went on to name other settlers they
+meant to drive out, not suspecting who their listeners were, and John
+Brown wrote every word down in his surveyor's book. A few days later the
+Georgians moved their camp nearer to the Brown settlement, and began
+to steal horses and cattle belonging to the free-state men. Brown took
+his list, and went to see the men whose names were on it. They held a
+meeting, and decided that it was time to teach the "border ruffians,"
+as such men as the Georgians were called, a lesson. News of the meeting
+spread rapidly, and soon it was generally known that the free-state men
+about Osawatomie, which was the name of the town near which the Browns
+lived, were prepared to take the war-path.
+
+The old bitter feelings flamed up again in May of 1856. On the
+twenty-first of the month, a band of slavery men swept down on the town
+of Lawrence, and while the free-state citizens looked on, sacked and
+burned the place. John Brown and his sons hurried there, but when they
+reached Lawrence the houses were in ashes. He denounced the free-state
+men as cowards, for to his ardent nature it seemed an outrage that
+men should let themselves be treated so by ruffians. When a discreet
+citizen said that they must act with caution John Brown burst out at
+him: "Caution, caution, sir! I am eternally tired of hearing that word
+caution--it is nothing but the word for cowardice!" There was nothing
+for him to do, however, and he was about to turn toward home when a boy
+came dashing up. He reported that the ruffians in the Swamp of the Swan
+had warned all the women in the Brown settlement that they must leave
+Kansas by Saturday or Sunday, or they would be driven out. The women
+had been frightened, and taking their children, had fled in an ox-cart
+to the house of a relative at a distance. The boy added that two houses
+and a store near the settlement had been burned.
+
+Those were dark days on the border, days that hardened men's natures.
+Such a man as John Brown felt that it was his duty to stamp out the
+pest of slavery at any cost. He turned to his sons and to some German
+friends whose homes had been burned. "I will attend to those fellows,"
+said he. "Something must be done to show these barbarians that we too
+have rights!" A neighbor offered to carry the little band of men in his
+wagon. They looked to their guns and cutlasses. Peace-loving people in
+Lawrence grew uneasy. Judging from Brown's expression, they feared that
+he was going to sow further trouble.
+
+Eight men drove back to the Browns' settlement, and found that the
+messenger's story was correct. They called a meeting of those who were
+to be driven out of Kansas, according to the ruffians' threats. At the
+meeting they decided to rid the country of the outlaws, who had only
+come west to plunder, and some of whom had been employed in chasing
+runaway slaves who had escaped from their masters. Their plans made,
+Brown's band rode to a little saloon on the Pottawatomie Creek where the
+raiders made their headquarters. Within an hour's walk were the men's
+cabins. Members of Brown's band stopped at the door of each cabin that
+night, and asked for the men they wanted. If the inmates hesitated to
+open the door it was broken open. Two of the men on their list could
+not be found, but five were led out into the woods and killed. It was a
+horrible deed, barbarous even in those days of bloodshed. But Brown's
+men felt that they were forced to do it.
+
+John Brown thought that this one desperate act might set Kansas free;
+but it only marked the beginning of a long and bloody drama. As soon
+as the facts were known he and his sons became outlaws with prices on
+their heads. Even his neighbors at Osawatomie were horrified at his act.
+Two of his sons who had not been with him were arrested, and the little
+settlement became a center of suspicion. The father withdrew to the
+woods, and there about thirty-five men gathered about him. They lived
+the life of outlaws, and neither slave-state nor free-state officers
+dared to try to capture them. By chance a reporter of the New York
+_Tribune_ came on their camp. He wrote: "I shall not soon forget the
+scene that here opened to my view. Near the edge of the creek a dozen
+horses were tied, all ready saddled for a ride for life, or a hunt
+after Southern invaders. A dozen rifles and sabres were stacked against
+the trees. In an open space, amid the shady and lofty woods, there was
+a great blazing fire with a pot on it; a woman, bareheaded, with an
+honest sunburnt face, was picking blackberries from the bushes; three or
+four armed men were lying on red and blue blankets on the grass; and two
+fine-looking youths were standing, leaning on their arms, on guard near
+by.... Old Brown himself stood near the fire, with his shirt sleeves
+rolled up, and a large piece of pork in his hand. He was cooking a pig.
+He was poorly clad, and his toes protruded from his boots. The old man
+received me with great cordiality, and the little band gathered about
+me."
+
+This band, living in forest and swamp, was always ready to strike a
+blow for the free-state cause. The slavery men were getting the upper
+hand, and Northern families who had settled in Kansas began to look to
+John Brown for protection. The "border ruffians" grew worse and worse,
+attacking small defenseless settlements, burning homes and carrying
+off cattle. Sometimes it was only the fear of retaliation from Brown's
+company that kept the raiders from still greater crimes. Occasionally
+they met; once they fought a battle at Black Jack, and twenty-four
+of the enemy finally surrendered to nine of Brown's men. One of the
+leader's sons was badly wounded, and the father had to nurse him in the
+woods.
+
+Affairs grew worse during the summer. The vilest scum of the slave
+states poured into Kansas, and the scenes on the border grew more and
+more disgraceful. There were pitched battles, and at last the governor
+of the territory, thoroughly scared, surrendered his power into the
+hands of the slave-holders, and fled for his life. The slave-state men
+thought that the time had come to strike a blow that should settle the
+question in Kansas permanently. They prepared to gather an army in
+Missouri, intending to cross into Kansas, and so terrify settlers from
+the North that they would make no further resistance. Conditions looked
+desperate to John Brown, and he left the territory for a short time to
+see what he could do to get help for his cause.
+
+A large band of emigrants from the North were on the march toward
+Kansas, and Brown rode to meet them. The emigrants had heard of him, and
+welcomed him to their midst. He encouraged them and urged them to fight
+for freedom, and went on his way hoping to rouse more free-state men to
+enter Kansas.
+
+The East was now thoroughly awake to the lawless situation on the
+border, and a new governor, Geary by name, was sent out from Washington.
+Meetings were held in the large cities, and money, arms, and men
+began to pour into Kansas. Several hundred men from Missouri attacked
+Osawatomie, which was defended by Abolitionists, and a battle followed.
+John Brown was there, and when his party won the day he gained the
+nickname of "Osawatomie Brown," by which he was generally called
+thereafter.
+
+Fired by this success, the leaders of the free-state army planned to
+capture Lawrence. The new governor feared that such an act would mean
+the beginning of a general civil war, and did his best to prevent it.
+He succeeded in this. The free-state men were divided into two parties,
+those whose aim was to have Kansas admitted to the Union as a free
+state, and those who, like John Brown, were bent on abolishing slavery
+throughout the United States. Governor Geary assured the former men
+that Kansas would be free soil, and he tried to induce Brown to leave
+that part of the country for a time in the interest of peace. Brown was
+willing to do as Governor Geary wished, thinking that Kansas was safe
+for the present. He wanted to turn his attention to other parts of the
+country, where he thought he was more needed. In September, 1856, he
+started east with his sons. He was now a well-known figure, hated by
+all slave-owners, a hero to Abolitionists, and distrusted by that large
+number of men whose object was to secure peace at any cost.
+
+There were many people in the North at that time who were helping
+runaway slaves to escape from their masters, and in certain parts of
+the country there were stations of what was called the "Underground
+Railroad." Negroes fleeing from the tyranny of Southern owners were
+helped along from one station to another, until they were finally safe
+across the Canadian border. The law of the country said that negro
+slaves were like any other form of property, and that it was the duty of
+citizens to return runaways to their masters. There were also scattered
+through the border states a number of men whose business it was to catch
+fugitive slaves and take them back south. These men were usually of a
+brutal type, and the poor refugee who fell into their clutches was made
+to suffer for his attempt at escape. Story after story of the sufferings
+of slaves came to John Brown's ears, and he felt that it was his duty
+to throw himself into the work of the Underground Railroad, and help as
+many slaves as possible to cross into Canada.
+
+This work was not enough for him, however; he wanted to strike some blow
+at the slave-owners themselves. The Alleghany Mountain range was one
+of the main roads for fugitives, for there men could hide in the thick
+forests of the mountainside, and could make some show of defense when
+the slave-catchers and bloodhounds came in pursuit. John Brown knew this
+country well. He traveled through the North, talking with other men who
+felt as he did, and trying to work out a plan which should force the
+country to decide this question of negro slavery. At last he decided to
+make a raid into Southern territory, and free slaves for himself.
+
+In the heart of the Alleghanies, and almost midway between Maine and
+Florida, is a great natural gateway in the mountains. Here the Potomac
+and the Shenandoah Rivers meet, and seem to force their way through the
+natural barrier. This pass is Harper's Ferry, and in 1859 it was the
+seat of a United States arsenal. To the south was a country filled
+with slaves, who looked to Harper's Ferry as the highroad to freedom.
+Not far from the arsenal rose the Blue Ridge Mountains, the heights of
+which commanded the pass. It was John Brown's plan to lead men from
+the Maryland side of the Potomac River to attack the arsenal, and when
+it was captured to carry arms and ammunition across the Shenandoah to
+Loudoun Heights in the Blue Ridge, and hide there. From here his band
+could make raids to the south, freeing slaves, and shielding them from
+their masters, while using the mountains for a shelter.
+
+There were many other men in the United States bent on destroying
+slavery, but few so impulsive as John Brown. His plan was rash in the
+extreme, and even its success would have profited only a few slaves. But
+Brown was a born crusader. The men who followed him were all impulsive,
+and many of them were already trained in the rude ways of frontier life.
+They knew what he had done in Kansas, and were ready to fight on his
+side anywhere else. They had a real reverence for John Brown. The tall
+man with the long, almost white hair, keen eyes, and flowing beard was
+no ordinary leader. He had the power to convince men that his cause was
+just, and to hold them in his service afterward.
+
+In June, 1859, John Brown, with two of his sons, and two friends,
+started south. He rented a farm about five miles from Harper's Ferry,
+in a quiet, out-of-the-way place. There were several cabins in the
+neighborhood, and as his followers gradually joined him, they occupied
+these shelters. A daughter kept house for him during the summer. The men
+farmed in the daytime, and planned their conspiracy at night. The leader
+did everything he could to win the friendship of his neighbors. He had
+some knowledge of medicine, and attended all who were sick. Frequently
+he preached in the little Dunker chapel near by. He was always ready
+to share his food or give the shelter of his roof to any travelers.
+Slowly he collected guns and ammunition, and late in September sent
+his daughter north, and arranged to make his attack. At first some of
+the other men objected to his plans. One or two did not approve of his
+seizing the government arsenal, and thought they should simply make a
+raid into Virginia as the slave-state men had formerly carried war into
+Kansas. Their leader, however, was determined, and nothing could turn
+him. Already he feared lest some suspicion of his purpose might have
+spread, and was eager to make his start. He set Sunday night, October
+16th, as the time for the raid. That morning he called his men together
+and read to them from the Bible. In the afternoon he gave them final
+instructions, and added: "And now, gentlemen, let me impress this one
+thing upon your minds. You all know how dear life is to you, and how
+dear life is to your friends. And in remembering that, consider that
+the lives of others are as dear to them as yours are to you. Do not,
+therefore, take the life of any one, if you can possibly avoid it; but
+if it is necessary to take life in order to save your own, then make
+sure work of it."
+
+At eight o'clock that night the old farm was alive with action. John
+Brown called: "Men, get on your arms; we will proceed to the Ferry."
+His horse and wagon were driven up before the door, and some pikes, a
+sledge-hammer, and a crowbar were put in it. John Brown pulled on his
+old Kansas cap, and cried: "Come, boys!" and they went into the lane
+that wound down the hill to the highroad.
+
+Each of the band had been told exactly what he was to do. Two of the
+men were to cut the telegraph lines, and two others were to detain the
+sentinels at the bridge. Men were detailed to hold each of the bridges
+over the two rivers, and others to occupy the engine house in the
+arsenal yard.
+
+The night was cold and dark. John Brown drove his one-horse farm-wagon,
+and the men straggled behind him. They had to cover five miles through
+woods and over hills before they came down to the narrow road between
+the cliffs and the Cincinnati and Ohio canal. Telegraph wires were cut,
+the watchman on the bridge was arrested, and the band found their way
+open into Harper's Ferry.
+
+Their object was to seize the arms in the arsenal and rifle factory.
+They marched to the armory gate, where they found a watchman. "Open the
+gate," one of Brown's men ordered. The watchman said that he could not,
+and another of the band declared that there was no time for talk, but
+that he would get a crowbar and hammer from the wagon. He twisted the
+crowbar in the chain that held the gate, and broke it open; then leaving
+the watchman in the care of two men, the rest made a dash for the
+arsenal.
+
+A great deal happened in a short time. Guards were overpowered, the
+bridge secured, and the river forded close to the rifle-works. Not a gun
+had to be fired, and both soldiers and civilians did as they were bid
+by the armed men. Others of the raiders hurried out into the country,
+and meeting some colored men, told them their plans, and the latter at
+once agreed to join them. Each of the negroes was sent at once to stir
+up the slaves in the neighborhood, and bring them to Harper's Ferry. The
+raiders then came to the house of Colonel Lewis Washington. They knocked
+on the door, and were admitted. Colonel Washington asked what they
+wanted. The leader answered, "You are our prisoner, and must come to the
+Ferry with us." The Virginian replied, "You can have my slaves, if you
+will let me remain." He was told, however, that he must go back with
+them; and so he did, together with a large four-horse wagon and some
+arms, guns, swords, and cartridges.
+
+Others of the band had brought in more Virginia prisoners. An east-bound
+train on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad that reached Harper's Ferry
+about one o'clock in the morning was detained, and the passengers were
+kept there until sunrise. John Brown was in command at the arsenal,
+and the rest of his band were acting at different points. By morning
+the people of the village were all alarmed. They did not know what the
+raiders meant to do, but many of them fled to the mountains, spreading
+the news as they went.
+
+In spite of some little confusion among his followers, practically all
+of John Brown's plans had been successful up to this point. He had
+captured the armory, and armed about fifty slaves. His next object was
+to get the store of guns and ammunition that he had left at his farm.
+Here came the first hitch in his plans. He ordered two of his men, Cook
+and Tidd, to take some of the freed slaves in Colonel Washington's
+wagon, and drive to the house of a man named Terrence Burns, and take
+him, his brother and their slaves prisoners. Cook was to stay at Burns's
+house while Tidd and the negroes were to go to John Brown's farm, load
+the guns in the wagon, and bring them back to a schoolhouse near the
+Ferry, stopping on the way for Cook and his prisoners. This the two men
+did; but they were so slow in getting the arms from the farm to the
+schoolhouse, a distance of not over three miles, that much valuable
+time was lost. Cook halted to make a speech on human equality at one
+of the houses they passed, and Tidd stopped his wagon frequently and
+talked with passers-by on the road. They had the first load of arms at
+the schoolhouse by ten o'clock in the morning, but it was four o'clock
+in the afternoon before the second load arrived. All the guns and arms
+should have been at the schoolhouse by ten o'clock, if the men had
+followed John Brown's orders strictly.
+
+John Brown probably still intended to carry his arms, together with the
+prisoners and their slaves, up to Loudoun Heights, where he would be
+safe for some time, but his men were so slow in obeying his orders that
+the enemy was given time to collect. The train that had left Harper's
+Ferry that morning carried word of the raid throughout the countryside,
+and men gathered in the neighboring villages ready to march on Harper's
+Ferry and put an end to the disturbance. John Brown held thousands of
+muskets and rifles in the arsenal, while the men who were marching
+to attack him were for the most part armed with squirrel guns and
+old-fashioned fowling-pieces. The militia collected rapidly, and marched
+toward the Ferry from all directions. By noon the Jefferson Guards had
+seized the bridge that crossed the Potomac. Meantime John Brown had
+girded to his side a sword that had belonged to Lafayette, that had been
+taken from Colonel Lewis Washington's house the night before, called
+his men from the arsenal into the street, and said, "The troops are on
+the bridge, coming into town; we will give them a warm reception." He
+walked back and forth before the small band, encouraging them. "Men, be
+cool!" he urged. "Don't waste your powder and shot! Take aim, and make
+every shot count! The troops will look for us to retreat on their first
+appearance; be careful to shoot first."
+
+The militia soon advanced across the bridge and up the main street.
+When they were some sixty or seventy yards away from the raiders John
+Brown gave the order to fire. Some of the militia fell. Other volleys
+followed; and the attacking party was thrown into disorder. Finally
+they were driven back to the bridge, and took up a position there until
+reinforcements arrived. As they retreated John Brown ordered his men
+back to the arsenal. In the lull of the firing nearly all the unarmed
+people who were still in the town fled to the hills.
+
+It was now one o'clock in the afternoon, and the band of raiders could
+have escaped to Loudoun Heights. But their leader wanted to carry the
+guns and ammunition away with him, and to do this he needed the aid
+of the rest of his men. He sent a messenger to one of his followers
+named Kagi, who was stationed with several others on the bank of the
+Shenandoah, with orders for him to hold the place a short time longer.
+The messenger, however, was fired on and wounded before he could reach
+Kagi, and the latter's party was soon attacked by a force of militia,
+and driven into the river. A large flat rock stood up in the river, and
+four of the five raiders reached this. There three of them fell before
+the fire of bullets, and the fourth was taken a prisoner. In similar
+ways the number of John Brown's men was much reduced.
+
+The leader realized the danger of the situation, and decided that
+his best chance of escape lay in using the prisoners he had captured
+as hostages for his band's safe retreat. He moved his men, and the
+more important of the prisoners, to a small brick building called the
+engine-house. There he said to his captives, "Gentlemen, perhaps you
+wonder why I have selected you from the others. It is because I believe
+you to be the most influential; and I have only to say now that you will
+have to share precisely the same fate that your friends extend to my
+men." He ordered the doors and windows barricaded, and port-holes cut in
+the walls.
+
+The engine-house now became the raiders' citadel, and the militia and
+bands of farmers who were arriving at Harper's Ferry released the
+prisoners who were still in the arsenal, and concentrated all their fire
+on the band in the small brick house.
+
+As the sun set the town filled with troops, and it was evident that the
+men in the fort would have to surrender. They kept up their firing,
+however, from the port-holes, and were answered with a rain of bullets
+aimed at the doors and windows. Both sides lost a number of men. Two of
+John Brown's sons had been shot during the day. Finally the leader asked
+if one of his prisoners would volunteer to go out among the citizens and
+induce them to cease firing on the fort, as they were endangering the
+lives of their friends, the other captives. He promised that if they
+would stop firing his men would do the same. One of the prisoners agreed
+to try this, and the firing ceased for a time.
+
+More troops poured into Harper's Ferry, and presently Colonel Robert E.
+Lee arrived with a force of United States marines. Guards were set about
+the engine-house to see that John Brown and his men did not escape. Then
+Colonel Lee sent a flag of truce to the engine-house, and in the name of
+the United States demanded that Brown surrender, advising him to throw
+himself on the clemency of the government. John Brown answered that he
+knew what that meant, and added, "I prefer to die just here." Again in
+the morning Lee sent his aide to the fort. The officer asked, "Are you
+ready to surrender, and trust to the mercy of the government?" Brown
+answered, "No, I prefer to die here." Then the soldiers attacked, not
+with guns this time, but with sledge-hammers, intending to break down
+the doors. This did not succeed, and seizing a long ladder they used
+it as a battering-ram, and finally broke the fastenings of the main
+door. Lieutenant Green pushed his way in, and, jumping on top of the
+engine, looked about for John Brown. Amid a storm of bullets, he saw
+the white-haired leader, and sprang at him, at the same time striking
+at him with his sword. John Brown fell forward, with his head between
+his knees. In a few minutes all of the raiders who were left in the
+engine-house had surrendered to the government troops.
+
+Of the band that had left the farm on Sunday night seven were taken
+prisoners, ten had been killed in the fighting, and six others had
+managed to make their escape. By noon of Tuesday, October 18th, the raid
+was over. John Brown, wounded in half a dozen places, lay on the floor
+of the engine-house; and the governor of Virginia bent over him. "Who
+are you?" asked the governor. The old man answered, "My name is John
+Brown; I have been well known as old John Brown of Kansas. Two of my
+sons were killed here to-day, and I'm dying too. I came here to liberate
+slaves, and was to receive no reward. I have acted from a sense of duty,
+and am content to await my fate; but I think the crowd have treated me
+badly. I am an old man. Yesterday I could have killed whom I chose; but
+I had no desire to kill any person, and would not have killed a man had
+they not tried to kill me and my men. I could have sacked and burned the
+town, but did not; I have treated the persons whom I took as hostages
+kindly, and I appeal to them for the truth of what I say. If I had
+succeeded in running off slaves this time, I could have raised twenty
+times as many men as I have now for a similar expedition. But I have
+failed."
+
+The news of John Brown's raid spread through the country, and the people
+North and South were amazed and bewildered. They had grown used to
+hearing of warfare in the distant borderland of Kansas, but this was
+a battle that had taken place in the very heart of the Union. Men did
+not know what to think of it. John Brown appeared to many of them as a
+monstrous figure, a firebrand who would touch his torch to the tinder
+of slavery, and set the whole nation in a blaze. Newspapers and public
+speakers denounced him. They said he was attacking the foundations of
+the country when he seized the arsenal and freed slaves from their
+lawful owners. Only a handful of men had any good to say for him, and
+that handful were looked upon as madmen by their neighbors. Only a few
+could read the handwriting on the wall, and realize that John Brown was
+merely a year or two in advance of the times.
+
+We who know the story of the Civil War and the abolition of slavery
+think of John Brown as a hero. We forget the outlaw and remember the
+martyr. If he was setting the laws of men at defiance he was also
+following the law that he felt was given him by God. His faith and his
+simplicity have made him a great figure in history. A man who met him
+riding across the plains of Kansas in the days of the border warfare
+drew a vivid picture of him. He said that a tall man on horseback
+stopped and asked him a question. "It was on a late July day, and in its
+hottest hours. I had been idly watching a wagon and one horse toiling
+slowly northward across the prairie, along the emigrant trail that had
+been marked out by free-state men.... John Brown, whose name the young
+and ardent had begun to conjure with and swear by, had been described to
+me. So, as I heard the question, I looked up and met the full, strong
+gaze of a pair of luminous, questioning eyes. Somehow I instinctively
+knew this was John Brown, and with that name I replied.... It was a
+long, rugged-featured face I saw. A tall, sinewy figure, too (he had
+dismounted), five feet eleven, I estimated, with square shoulders,
+narrow flank, sinewy and deep-chested. A frame full of nervous power,
+but not impressing one especially with muscular vigor. The impression
+left by the pose and the figure was that of reserve, endurance, and
+quiet strength. The questioning voice-tones were mellow, magnetic, and
+grave. On the weatherworn face was a stubby, short, gray beard.... This
+figure,--unarmed, poorly clad, with coarse linen trousers tucked into
+high, heavy cowhide boots, with heavy spurs on their heels, a cotton
+shirt opened at the throat, a long torn linen duster, and a bewrayed
+chip straw hat ... made up the outward garb and appearance of John Brown
+when I first met him. In ten minutes his mounted figure disappeared over
+the north horizon."
+
+But John Brown had seized the government's arsenal, and put arms in the
+hands of negro slaves, and therefore the law must take its course with
+him. Its officers came to him where he lay on the floor of his fort, a
+badly-wounded man, who had fought for fifty-five long hours, who had
+seen two sons and eight of his comrades shot in the battle, and who felt
+that his cause was lost.
+
+When men who owned slaves asked the reason for his raid, he answered,
+"You are guilty of a great wrong against God and humanity and it would
+be perfectly right for any one to interfere with you so far as to free
+those you wilfully and wickedly hold in bondage.... I pity the poor
+in bondage that have none to help them. That is why I am here; not to
+gratify any personal animosity, revenge, or vindictive spirit."
+
+A number of Virginians had been killed in the fight, and it was
+difficult to secure a fair trial for the raiders. The state did its best
+to hold the scales of justice even. The formal trial began on October
+27, 1859. Friends from the North came to his aid, and a Massachusetts
+lawyer acted as his counsel. John Brown heard the charges against him
+lying on a straw pallet, and four days later he heard the jury declare
+him guilty of treason. December 2, 1859, the sentence of the court was
+carried out, and John Brown was hanged as a traitor. His last written
+words were, "I, John Brown, am quite certain that the crimes of this
+guilty land will never be purged away but with blood. I had, as I now
+think vainly, flattered myself that without very much bloodshed it might
+be done."
+
+Every great cause in history has its martyrs, and John Brown was one of
+those who were sacrificed in the battle for human freedom. Statesmen
+had tried for years to argue away the wrongs that began when the first
+African bondsmen were brought to the American colonies. Statesmen,
+however, cannot change the views of men and women as to what is right
+and wrong, and all the arguments in the world could not convince such
+men as John Brown and his friends that one man had a right to the
+possession of a fellow-creature. He struck his blow wildly, but its echo
+rang in the ears of the North, and never ceased until the Civil War was
+ended, and slavery wiped off the continent. The great negro orator,
+Frederick Douglass, said twenty-two years later at Harper's Ferry, "If
+John Brown did not end the war that ended slavery, he did, at least,
+begin the war that ended slavery. If we look over the dates, places, and
+men for which this honor is claimed, we shall find that not Carolina,
+but Virginia, not Fort Sumter, but Harper's Ferry and the arsenal,
+not Major Anderson, but John Brown began the war that ended American
+slavery, and made this a free republic.... When John Brown stretched
+forth his arm the sky was cleared,--the armed hosts of freedom stood
+face to face over the chasm of a broken Union, and the clash of arms was
+at hand."
+
+In the spring of 1861 the Boston Light Infantry went to Fort Warren in
+Boston Harbor to drill. They formed a quartette to sing patriotic songs,
+and some one wrote the verses that are known as "John Brown's Body,"
+and set them to the music of an old camp-meeting tune. Regiment after
+regiment heard the song and carried it with them into camp and battle.
+So the spirit of the simple crusader went marching on through the war,
+and his name was linked forever with the cause of freedom.
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+AN ARCTIC EXPLORER
+
+
+When Columbus sailed from Palos in 1492 he hoped to find a shorter
+route to Cathay or China than any that was then known, and the great
+explorers who followed after him had the same hope of such a discovery
+in their minds. When men learned that instead of finding a short route
+to China they had come upon two great continents that shared the Western
+Ocean, they turned their thoughts to discovering what was known as
+the Northwest Passage. They hoped to find a way by which ships might
+sail from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean north of America. The
+great English explorers in particular were eager to find such an ocean
+route, and this search was the real beginning of the fur-trading around
+Hudson's Bay, the cod-fishing of Newfoundland, and the whale-fishing of
+Baffin Bay.
+
+One sea-captain after another sailed across the Atlantic, and strove to
+find the passage through the Arctic regions; but the world of snow and
+ice defeated each of them. Some went back to report that there was no
+Northwest Passage, and others were lost among the ice-floes and never
+returned. Then in 1845 England decided to send a great expedition to
+make another attempt, and put at the head of it Sir John Franklin, a
+brave captain who had fought with Nelson and knew the sea in all its
+variety. He sailed from England May 26, 1845, taking one hundred and
+twenty-nine men in the two ships _Erebus_ and _Terror_. He carried
+enough provisions to last him for three years. On July 26, 1845,
+Franklin's two vessels were seen by the captain of a whaler, moored to
+an iceberg in Baffin Bay. They were waiting for an opening in the middle
+of an ice-pack, through which they might sail across the bay and enter
+Lancaster Sound. They were never seen again, and the question of what
+had happened to Sir John Franklin's party became one of the mysteries of
+the age.
+
+More than twenty ships, with crews of nearly two thousand officers and
+men, at a cost of many millions of dollars, sought for Sir John Franklin
+in the years between 1847 and 1853. One heroic explorer after another
+sailed into the Arctic, crossed the ice-floes, and searched for some
+trace of the missing men. But none could be found, and one after another
+the explorers came back, their only report being that the ice had
+swallowed all traces of the English captain and his vessels. At length
+the last of the expeditions sent out by the English Government returned,
+and the world decided that the mystery would never be solved. But brave
+Lady Franklin, the wife of Sir John, urged still other men to seek for
+news, and at last explorers found that all of Franklin's expedition had
+perished in their search for the Northwest Passage.
+
+Arctic explorers usually leave records telling the story of their
+discoveries at different points along the road they follow. For a long
+time after the fate of Franklin's party was known, men tried to find
+records he might have left in cairns, or piles of stones through the
+Arctic regions. Whale vessels sometimes brought news of such records,
+but most of them proved to be idle yarns told by the whalers to surprise
+their friends at home. One of these stories was that all the missing
+records of Sir John Franklin were to be found in a cairn which was built
+near Repulse Bay. This story was told so often that people came to
+believe it was true, and some young Americans set out to make a search
+of King William Land and try to find the cairn. The party sailed on the
+whaler _Eothen_, and five men landed at Repulse Bay. The leader was
+Lieutenant Frederick Schwatka, of the United States Army. He had three
+friends with him named Gilder, Klutschak, and Melms, and with them was
+an Eskimo, who was known as Joe.
+
+The young Americans set up a winter camp on Chesterfield Inlet, and
+tried to live as much like the native Eskimos as possible. During the
+winter they met many natives on their hunting-trips, and the latter soon
+convinced them that they were on a wild-goose chase, and that the story
+of the cairn was probably only a sailor's yarn. Lieutenant Schwatka,
+however, was not the sort of man to return home without some results
+from his trip, and so he made up his mind to go into the country where
+Franklin's party had perished, hoping that he might find some record
+which would throw light on the earlier explorer's travels.
+
+The Eskimos were a race largely unknown to civilized men. White men
+had seen much more of the native American Indians who lived in more
+temperate climates. These young Americans found a great deal to interest
+them during the winter among these strange people of the far North.
+Hunting was their chief pursuit, and the Americans found that they spent
+much of their time indoors playing a game called _Nu-glew-tar_, which
+sharpened their quickness of eye and sureness of aim. It was a simple
+sport; a small piece of bone, pierced with a row of small holes, was
+hung from the roof of the hut by a rope of walrus hide, and a heavy
+weight was fastened to the end of the bone to keep it from swinging. The
+Eskimo players were each armed with a small sharp-pointed stick, and
+each in turn would thrust his stick at the bone, trying to pierce one of
+the holes. The prize was won by the player who pierced the bone and held
+it fast with his stick.
+
+As soon as spring opened Lieutenant Schwatka started out, leaving his
+winter camp in April, 1879, and crossing in as straight a line as
+possible to Montreal Island, near the mouth of the Black River. He took
+with him twelve Eskimos, men, women, and children, and dogs to pull the
+sledges. They carried food for one month only, intending to hunt during
+the summer. Every night the Eskimos built snow huts, or igloos, in which
+the party camped. As they went on they met men of another Arctic tribe,
+the Ook-joo-liks, who wore shoes and gloves made of musk-ox skin, which
+was covered with hair several inches long, and made the wearers look
+more like bears than like men. One of these natives said that he had
+seen a ship that had sunk off Adelaide Peninsula, and that he and his
+friends had obtained such articles as spoons, knives, and plates from
+the ship. Lieutenant Schwatka thought the ship was probably either the
+_Erebus_ or the _Terror_. Later his party found an old woman who said
+that when she had been on the southeast coast of King William Land not
+many years before she had seen ten white men dragging a sledge with a
+boat on it. Five of the white men put up a tent on the shore and five
+stayed with the boat. Some men of the woman's tribe had killed seals and
+given them to the white men; then the white men had left, and neither
+she nor any of her tribe had seen them again. Asking questions of the
+Eskimos he met, Lieutenant Schwatka and his comrades gradually pieced
+together the story of what had happened to Franklin and his men. But the
+American was not content with what he had learned in this way, and he
+determined to cross Simpson Strait to King William Land, and search for
+records there during the summer. This meant that he would have to spend
+the summer on this bare and desolate island, as there would be no chance
+to cross the strait until the cold weather of autumn should form new ice
+for a bridge.
+
+The Eskimos did everything they could to persuade him not to cross
+to the island. They told him that in 1848 more than one hundred men
+had perished of starvation there, and added that no one could find
+sufficient food to keep them through the summer. Yet the fearless
+soldier and his friends insisted on making the attempt, and some of the
+Eskimos were daring enough to go with them.
+
+It seemed doubtful whether they could even get across the strait. Every
+few steps some man would sink into the ice-pack up to his waist and his
+legs would dangle in slush without finding bottom. The sledges would
+sink so that the dogs, floundering and scrambling, could not pull them.
+The men had to push the dog-teams along, and after the first day's
+travel they were all so exhausted that they had to rest the whole of
+the next day before they could start on again. Finally they reached the
+opposite shore of the strait, and, while the natives built igloos and
+hunted, the Americans searched for records of Franklin's party. They
+found enough traces to prove that the men who had sought the Northwest
+Passage had spent some time on this desolate strip of land.
+
+More than once they were in danger of starvation. In the spring the
+Eskimos hunted wild ducks, which they found in remote stretches of
+water. Their way of hunting was to steal up on a flock of the birds,
+and, as soon as the ducks took alarm, to rush toward the largest bunch
+of them. The hunter then threw his spear, made with three barbs of
+different lengths, and caught the duck on the sharp central prong. The
+long wooden shaft of the spear would keep the duck floating on the water
+until the hunter could seize it. But as summer drew on, and the ducks
+migrated, food grew very scarce. Once or twice they discovered bears,
+which they shot, and when there was nothing else to eat they lived on a
+small black berry that the Eskimos called _parawong_, which proved very
+sustaining.
+
+As the white men tramped day after day over the icy hillocks their
+footwear wore out, and often walking became a torment. In telling of
+their march Gilder said, "We were either wading through the hillside
+torrents or lakes, which, frozen on the bottom, made the footing
+exceedingly treacherous, or else with sealskin boots, soft by constant
+wetting, painfully plodding over sharp stones set firmly in the ground
+with the edges pointed up. Sometimes as a new method of injury, stepping
+and slipping on flat stones, the unwary foot slid into a crevice that
+seemingly wrenched it from the body."
+
+When they had nothing else to eat the white men lived on the same
+food as the native hunters. This was generally a tallow made from the
+reindeer, and eaten with strips of reindeer meat. A dish of this, mixed
+with seal-oil, was said to look like ice-cream and took the place of
+that dessert with the Eskimos. Lieutenant Schwatka said, however, that
+instead of tasting like ice-cream it reminded him more of locust,
+sawdust and wild-honey.
+
+As autumn drew on they made ready to cross back to the mainland; but it
+took some time for the ice to form on the strait. Gilder said of their
+camp life: "We eat quantities of reindeer tallow with our meat, probably
+about half of our daily food. Breakfast is eaten raw and frozen, but we
+generally have a warm meal in the evening. Fuel is hard to obtain and
+now consists of a vine-like moss called _ik-shoot-ik_. Reindeer tallow
+is used for a light. A small, flat stone serves for a candlestick, on
+which a lump of tallow is placed close to a piece of fibrous moss called
+_mun-ne_, which is used for a wick. The melting tallow runs down upon
+the stone and is immediately absorbed by the moss. This makes a cheerful
+and pleasant light, but is most exasperating to a hungry man as it
+smells exactly like frying meat. Eating such quantities of tallow is a
+great benefit in this climate, and we can easily see the effects of it
+in the comfort with which we meet the cold."
+
+As soon as the ice on the strait was frozen hard enough the reindeer
+crossed it, and by the middle of October King William Land was
+practically deserted. Then the Americans and Eskimos started back to the
+mainland. Winter had now come, and the weather was intensely cold, often
+ninety degrees below freezing. In December the traveling grew worse, and
+food became so scarce that they had to stop day after day for hunting.
+In January a blizzard struck their camp and lasted thirteen days; then
+wolves prowled about them at night, and once actually killed four of
+their dogs. "A sealskin full of blubber," said Gilder, "would have saved
+many of our dogs; but we had none to spare for them, as we were reduced
+to the point when we had to save it exclusively for lighting the igloos
+at night. We could not use it to warm our igloos or to cook with. Our
+meat had to be eaten cold--that is, frozen so solid that it had to be
+sawed and then broken into convenient-sized lumps, which when first put
+into the mouth were like stones. Sometimes, however, the snow was beaten
+off the moss on the hillsides and enough was gathered to cook a meal."
+
+When they were almost on the point of starvation a walrus was killed,
+and supplied them with food to last until they got back to the nearest
+Eskimo village. From the coast they took ship to the United States. The
+records they brought with them practically completed the account of what
+had happened to Sir John Franklin's ill-fated expedition. And almost
+equally important were the new details they brought in regard to Eskimo
+life, and the proof they gave that men of the temperate zone could pass
+a year in the frozen land of the far north if they would live as the
+natives did, and adapt themselves to the rigors of that climate.
+
+
+
+
+XIII
+
+THE STORY OF ALASKA
+
+
+In the far northwestern corner of North America is a land that has had
+few stirring scenes in its history. It is an enormous tract, close to
+the Arctic Sea, and far from the busy cities of the United States.
+Not until long after the English, French, and Spanish discoverers had
+explored the country in the Temperate Zone did any European find Alaska.
+Even when it was found it seemed to offer little but ice-fields and
+desolate prairies, leading to wild mountain ranges that did not tempt
+men to settle. Seal hunters came and went, but generally left the native
+Indians in peace. Most of these hunters came from Siberia, for the
+Russians were the first owners of this land.
+
+An officer in the Russian Navy named Vitus Bering found the strait
+that is called by his name in 1728. Some years later he was sent into
+the Arctic Sea again by the Empress Anne of Russia to try to find the
+wonderful country that Vasco de Gama had sought. He sailed in summer,
+and after weathering heavy storms finally reached Kayak Island on St.
+Elias Day, July 17, 1741, and named the great mountain peak in honor
+of that saint. More storms followed, and soon afterward the brave
+sailor was shipwrecked and drowned off the Comandorski Islands. His crew
+managed to get back to Siberia, having lived on the meat of the seals
+they were able to shoot. Russian traders saw the sealskins they brought
+home, and sent out expeditions to obtain more furs. Some returned richly
+laden, but others were lost in storms and never heard from. There was
+so much danger in the hunting that it was not until 1783 that Russian
+merchants actually established trading-posts in Alaska. Then a rich
+merchant of Siberia named Gregory Shelikoff built a post on Kadiak
+Island, and took into partnership with him a Russian named Alexander
+Baranof. Baranof built a fort on an island named for him, some three
+miles north of the present city of Sitka. The two men formed the Russian
+American Fur Company, and Baranof became its manager in America.
+
+One day a seal hunter came to Baranof at his fortress, and took from
+his pocket a handful of nuggets and scales of gold. He held them out
+to the Russian, and said that he knew where many more like them were
+to be found. "Ivan," said Baranof, "I forbid you to seek for any more.
+You must not say a word about this, or there will be trouble. If the
+Americans or the English know that there is gold in these mountains we
+will be ruined. They will rush in here by the thousands, and crowd us to
+the wall." Baranof was a fur merchant, and did not want to see miners
+flocking to his land, as his company was growing rich from the seals
+and fur-trading with the natives.
+
+Little by little, however, the news leaked out that the northwestern
+country had rich minerals, and soon the King of Spain began to covet
+some of that wealth for himself. The Spaniards claimed that they owned
+all of the country that had not yet been mapped out, and they sent
+an exploring party, under Perez, to make charts of the northwest.
+Perez sailed along the coast, and finding two capes, named them Santa
+Margarita and Santa Magdalena, but beyond that he did little to help the
+cause of Spain. Some years later exploring parties were sent out from
+Mexico, but they found that the wild ice-covered country was already
+claimed by the Russians, and that the Czar had no intention of giving it
+up. Other nations, therefore, soon ceased to claim it, and the Russian
+hunters and traders were allowed to enjoy the country in peace.
+
+Alexander Baranof made a great success of the trade in skins, but the
+men who took his place were not equal to him. The company began to lose
+money, and the Czar of Russia decided that the country was too far away
+from his capital to be properly looked after. The United States finally
+made an offer to buy the great territory from the Czar, although the
+government at Washington was not very anxious to make the purchase.
+The tract, large as it was, did not seem to promise much, and it was
+almost as far from Washington as it was from St. Petersburg. The Czar
+was quite willing to sell, however, and so the United States bought the
+country from him in 1867, paying him $7,200,000 for it.
+
+On a fine October afternoon in 1867 Sitka Bay saw the Stars and Stripes
+flying from three United States war-ships, while the Russian Eagle waved
+from the flagstaffs and houses in the small town. On the shore soldiers
+of the two nations were drawn up in front of the old castle, and
+officers stood waiting at the foot of the flagpole on the parade ground.
+Then a gun was fired from one of the United States war-ships, and
+instantly the Russian batteries returned the salute. A Russian officer
+lowered his country's flag from the parade ground pole, and an American
+pulled the Stars and Stripes to the peak. Guns boomed and regimental
+bands played, and then the Russian troops saluted and left the fortress,
+and the territory became part of the United States.
+
+Up to that time the country had been known as Russian America, but now
+a new name had to be found. Some suggested American Siberia, and others
+the Zero Islands; but an American statesman, Charles Sumner, urged the
+name of Alaska, a native word meaning "the Great Land," and this was the
+name that was finally adopted.
+
+It took many years to explore the western part of the United States, and
+men who were in search of wealth in mines and forests did not have to
+go as far as Alaska to find it. That bleak country was separated from
+the United States by a long, stormy sea voyage on the Pacific, or a
+tedious and difficult overland journey through Canada. Alaska might have
+remained for years as little known as while Russia owned it had it not
+been for a small party of men who set out to explore the Yukon and the
+Klondike Rivers.
+
+On June 16, 1897, a small ship called the _Excelsior_ sailed into San
+Francisco Harbor, and half an hour after she had landed at her wharf the
+news was spreading far and wide that gold had been discovered in large
+quantities on the Klondike. Some of the men had gone out years before;
+some only a few months earlier, but they all brought back fortunes.
+Not one had left with less than $5,000 in gold, gathered in nuggets or
+flakes, in tin cans, canvas bags, wooden boxes, or wrapped up in paper.
+The cry of such sudden wealth was heard by many adventurers, and the old
+days of 'Forty-Nine in California began over again when the wild rush
+started north to the Klondike.
+
+On June 17th another ship, the _Portland_, arrived at Seattle, with
+sixty more miners and $800,000 in gold. This was the largest find of the
+precious mineral that had been made anywhere in the world, and Seattle
+followed the example of San Francisco in going gold-crazy. Immediately
+hundreds of people took passage on the outward bound steamers, and
+hundreds more were turned away because of lack of room. Ships set out
+from all the seaports along the Pacific coast of the United States, and
+from the Canadian ports of Victoria and Vancouver. As in the old days
+of 1849 men gave up their business to seek the gold fields, but now they
+had to travel to a wilder and more desolate country than California had
+been.
+
+There were many ways of getting to the Klondike country. Those who
+went by ocean steamer had to transfer to flat-bottomed boats to go up
+the Yukon River. This was the easiest route, but the boats could only
+be used on the Yukon from June until September, and the great rush of
+gold-seekers came later that autumn. A second route was by the Chilkoot
+trail, which had been used for many years by miners going into the
+country of the Yukon. Over this trail horses could be used as far as
+the foot of the great Chilkoot Pass, but from there luggage had to be
+carried by hand. Another trail, much like this one, was the White Pass
+trail, but it led through a less-known country than the Chilkoot, and
+was not so popular. The Canadian government laid out a trail of its
+own, which was called "the Stikeen route," and which ran altogether
+through Canadian territory. Besides these there were innumerable other
+roads through the mountains, and along the rivers; but the farther men
+got from the better known trails the more danger they were in of losing
+their way, or suffering from hunger and hardships.
+
+Towns blossomed along the coast of Alaska almost over night, but they
+were strange looking villages. The ships that landed at Skagway in the
+summer of 1897 found a number of rough frame houses, with three or four
+larger than the rest which hung out hotel signs. The only government
+officer lived in a tent over which flew the flag of the United States.
+The passengers landed their outfits themselves, for labor was scarce,
+and found shelter wherever they could until they might start on the
+trail.
+
+No one seemed to know much about the country they were going through,
+but fortunately most of the men were experienced woodsmen. They loaded
+their baggage on their packhorses, and started out, ready for any sort
+of country they might have to cross. Sometimes the trail lay over
+miry ground, where a false step to the right or left would send the
+horses or men deep into the bog; sometimes it led up steep and rocky
+mountainsides, where a man had to guard his horse's footing as carefully
+as his own; and much of the way was in the bed of an old river, where
+each step brought a splash of mud, and left the travelers at the end
+of the day spattered from head to foot. The journey was harder on the
+horses than on the men. The heavy packs they carried, and the wretched
+footing, caused them to drop along the road from time to time, and then
+the travelers had to make the best shift they could with their luggage.
+Had the men journeyed alone, or in small companies, they would have
+suffered greatly, but the Chilkoot trail was filled with miners who
+were ready to help each other, and to give encouragement to any who
+lagged behind. At Dyea they came to an old Alaskan settlement, an Indian
+trading post, where a number of native tribes lived in their little
+wooden cabins. These men were the Chilkats, the Stikeen Indians, and the
+Chilkoots, short, heavy men, with heads and eyes more like Mongolians
+than like American Indians. Both men and women were accustomed to
+painting their faces jet black or chocolate brown, in order to protect
+their eyes and skin from the glare of the sunlight on the snow. The
+traveler could here get Indians to act as guides, or if he had lost his
+horses might obtain dogs and sleds to carry some of his packs.
+
+Each of the little settlements through which the travelers went boasted
+of a hotel, usually a frame building with two or three large rooms. Each
+day meals were served to three or four hundred hungry travelers at rude
+board tables, and at night the men would spread their blankets on the
+floor and lie down to sleep. But as the trail went farther inland these
+little settlements grew fewer, and the men had to find whatever shelter
+they could. From Dyea they pushed on through the Chilkoot Pass, where
+the cliffs rose high above them. The winds blew cold from the north, and
+the mists kept everything wet. In the Pass some men turned back, finding
+the trip too difficult. Those who went on met with increasing hardships.
+They came to a place called Sheep Camp, where a stream of water and
+rocks from the mountain top had swept down upon a town of tents and
+carried them all away. Stories of similar happenings at other places
+were passed from mouth to mouth along the trail. More men turned back,
+finding such accidents a good excuse, and only the most determined stuck
+to the road.
+
+In time they came to a chain of lakes and rivers. The travelers stopped
+to build rude boats and paddles, and navigated them as best they could.
+The rivers were full of rapids, and it was only by a miracle that the
+little clumsily-built skiffs went dancing over the waters safely, and
+escaped the jutting rocks on either bank. In the rivers there was good
+trout fishing, and in the wild country good hunting, and Indian boys
+brought game to the tents at night. To the trees at each stopping-place
+papers were fastened, telling of the marvelous adventures of the miners
+who had just gone over the trail. As they neared Dawson City they found
+the Yukon River more and more covered with floating ice, and travel by
+boat became harder. After a time the oars, paddles, gunwales, and all
+the baggage in the boats was encrusted with ice, and the boatmen had to
+make their way slowly among the floes. Then they came to a turn in the
+river, and on the bank saw a great number of tents and people. "How far
+is it to Dawson?" the boatman would call. "This is Dawson. If you don't
+look out you'll be carried past," the men on shore answered. Paddles
+were thrust into the ice, and the boat brought to shore. The trip from
+Seattle had so far taken ninety-two days.
+
+Food was scarce in Dawson, and men were urged to leave as soon as they
+could. Winter was now setting in, and the miners traveled with dog teams
+and sleds to the place where they meant to camp. Little work could be
+done in the winter, and the time was spent in preparing to work the
+gold fields in the early spring. All through the cold weather the men
+talked of the fortunes waiting for them, and when the warm weather came
+they staked out their claims and set to work. Stories of fabulous finds
+spread like wild-fire, and those who were not finding gold rushed to the
+places that were proving rich. That summer many new towns sprang up, and
+in a few weeks the Bonanza and Eldorado mines made their owners rich,
+and all the tributaries of the Klondike River were yielding a golden
+harvest.
+
+When men found land that they thought would prove rich they made haste
+to claim it. Sometimes wild races followed, rivals trying to beat each
+other to the government offices at Dawson in order to claim the land.
+Frequently after such a wild race the claim would amount to nothing,
+while another man, who had picked out some place that no one wanted,
+would find a rich lode and make a fortune from it. Then there would be
+great excitement, for sudden wealth usually went to the miner's head.
+He would go down to Dawson, and spend his money freely, while every
+one in the town would crowd around him to share in his good luck. One
+of the most successful was a Scotchman, Alexander McDonald. At the
+time of the Klondike strike he was employed by a company at the town of
+Forty-Mile. He had a little money and began to buy separate pieces of
+land. He could not afford the rich ground, but managed to purchase more
+than forty claims through the Klondike. At the end of that first season
+his fortune was said to be $5,000,000, and might well have been more, as
+all his claims had not been fully worked. He was called "the King of the
+Klondike," and pointed out to newcomers as an example of what men might
+do in the gold fields.
+
+That was only the beginning of the story of the Alaskan gold fields,
+and each year brought news of other discoveries. But the one season of
+1897 was enough to prove the great value of Alaska, and to show that the
+United States had done well to buy that great territory from the Czar
+of Russia. Yet gold is only a small part of its riches, and even should
+the fields of the Klondike yield no more of the precious mineral, the
+seals, the fur trade, and the cities springing up along its coast are
+worth much more than the $7,000,000 paid for it. It is still a land of
+adventure, one of the few waste places that beckon men to come and find
+what wealth lies hidden within its borders.
+
+
+
+
+XIV
+
+HOW THE "MERRIMAC" WAS SUNK IN SANTIAGO HARBOR
+
+
+In the small hours of the morning of June 3, 1898, the _Merrimac_, a
+vessel that had once been a collier in the United States Navy, slipped
+away from the war-ships of the American fleet that lay off the coast
+of Cuba, and headed toward the harbor of Santiago. The moon was almost
+full, and there was scarcely a cloud in the sky. To the northwest lay
+the _Brooklyn_, her great mass almost white in the reflected light. On
+the northeast the _Texas_ loomed dark and warlike, and farther away lay
+a ring of other ships, dim and ghostly in the distance. Ahead was the
+coast of Cuba, with an outline of mountains rising in a half-circle
+beyond the harbor. Five miles across the water Morro Castle guarded the
+entrance to the harbor, in which lay a fleet of the Spanish Admiral
+Cervera.
+
+To steer directly for Morro Castle would be to keep the _Merrimac_ full
+in the moon's path, and to avoid this she stood to the eastward of the
+course, and stole along at a slow rate of speed. The small crew on
+board, a commander and seven men, were stripped to their underclothes
+and wore life-preservers and revolver-belts. Each man had taken his
+life in his hand when he volunteered for this night's work. They wanted
+to sink the _Merrimac_ at a narrow point in the harbor, and bottle up
+the Spanish fleet beyond it.
+
+As they neared the great looming fortress of the Morro it was impossible
+to keep the ship hidden; the sentries on the castle must see the dark
+object now, and wonder what she intended. The _Merrimac_ gave up its
+oblique course, and steered straight ahead. The order "Full speed!" went
+from Lieutenant Hobson, a naval constructor in command, to the engineer.
+Foam dashed over the bows, and the long shape shot for the harbor
+entrance, regardless of what the enemy might think or do. Soon the Morro
+stood up high above them, the moon clearly revealing the great central
+battery that crowned the fortress top.
+
+The Spanish guns were only five hundred yards away, and yet the enemy
+had given no sign of having seen the _Merrimac_. Then suddenly a light
+flashed from near the water's edge on the left side of the entrance,
+and a roar followed. The _Merrimac_ did not quiver. The shot must have
+fallen astern. Again there was a flash, and this time the crew could
+hear the splash of water as the projectile struck back of them. Through
+their night-glasses they saw a picket boat with rapid-fire guns lying
+close in the shadows of the shore. Her guns had probably been aimed at
+the _Merrimac's_ rudder; but so far they had missed their aim. With a
+rapid-fire gun to reply the _Merrimac_ might have demolished the other
+boat in half a minute, but she had no such equipment. She would have
+to pass within a ship's length of this picket. There was nothing to do
+but pay no heed to her aim at the _Merrimac's_ rudder, and steer for
+the high wall off Morro Castle, where the deep-water channel ran close
+inshore. "A touch of port helm!" was the order. "A touch of port helm,
+sir," came the answer; and the vessel stood toward the wall.
+
+There came a crash from the port side. "The western battery has opened
+on us, sir!" reported the man on the bridge to Hobson. "Very well; pay
+no attention to it," was the answer. The commander knew he must take the
+_Merrimac_ at least another ship's length forward, and wondered if the
+enemy would give him that much grace. A shot crossed the bridge, and
+struck. No one was hurt. They had almost reached the point where they
+were to stop. Another moment or two, and over the engine telegraph went
+the order, "Stop!" The engineer obeyed. The _Merrimac_ slowed off Morro
+rock.
+
+A high rocket shot across the channel entrance. From each side came the
+firing of batteries. Hobson and his men were too busy to heed them. The
+_Merrimac_, still swinging under her own headway, brought her bow within
+thirty feet of the rock before she righted. Another ship's length, and
+she would be at the point where her commander had planned to take her;
+then the stearing-gear stopped working, and she was left at the mercy of
+the current.
+
+The ship must be sunk before the current could carry her out of the
+course. This was done by exploding torpedoes on the outside of the
+vessel. Hobson gave the order, and the first torpedo went off, blowing
+out the collision bulkhead. There was no reply from the second or third
+torpedoes. Hobson crossed the bridge, and shouted, "Fire all torpedoes!"
+In the roar of the Spanish batteries his voice could hardly be heard.
+
+Meantime the guns on the shores back of the harbor were pouring their
+shot at the black target in the moonlight, and the din was terrific.
+Word came to Hobson that some of the torpedoes could not be fired, as
+their cells had been broken. The order was given to fire the others, and
+the fifth exploded promptly, but the remaining ones had been shattered
+by Spanish fire and were useless. The commander knew that under these
+circumstances it would take some time for the _Merrimac_ to sink.
+
+The important point was to keep the ship in the center of the harbor;
+but the stern-anchor had already been cut away. Hobson watched the bow
+move against the shore-line. There was nothing to do but wait and see
+where the tide would swing them.
+
+The crew now gathered on deck. One of them, Kelly, had been dazed by
+an exploding shell. When he had picked himself up he started down
+the engine-room hatch, but found the water rising. Then he remembered
+the _Merrimac's_ purpose, and tried to reach the torpedo of which he
+had charge. The torpedo was useless, and he headed back to the deck,
+climbing up on all fours. It was a strange sight to see him stealing up,
+and Hobson and some of the others drew their revolvers, thinking for the
+moment that he must be an enemy who had boarded the ship. Fortunately
+they recognized him almost immediately.
+
+The tide was bearing them to the center of the channel when there came
+a blasting noise and shock. A mine had exploded beneath them. "Lads,
+they're helping us!" cried the commander. But the mine did not break the
+deck, and the ship only settled a little lower. For a moment it seemed
+as if the coal might have closed the breach made by the explosion, but
+just as the crew feared that they were to be carried past the point
+chosen for sinking the current from the opposite shore caught them,
+and the _Merrimac_ settled crosswise. It was now only a matter of time
+before she would sink in the harbor.
+
+The crew could now turn their attention to themselves. Hobson said to
+them, "We will remain here, lads, till the moon sets. When it is dark
+we will go down the after-hatch, to the coal, where her stern will
+be left out of water. We will remain inside all day, and to-night at
+ebb-tide try to make our way to the squadron. If the enemy comes on
+board, we will remain quiet until he finds us, and will repel him. If
+he then turns artillery on the place where we are, we will swim out
+to points farther forward." He started toward the bow to reconnoiter,
+but was persuaded not to expose himself to the enemy's fire. One of
+the men discovered a break in the bulwarks that gave a good view, and
+Hobson stood there. The moon was bright, though now low, and the muzzles
+of the Spanish guns were very near them. The crew, however, remained
+safely hidden behind the rail. From all sides came the firing, and
+the Americans, lying full length on the _Merrimac's_ deck, felt the
+continual shock of projectiles striking around them. Some of the crew
+suggested that they should take to the small boat, but the commander
+knew that this would be certain destruction, and ordered them to remain.
+Presently a shot struck the boiler, and a rush of steam came up the deck
+near where they lay. A canteen was passed from hand to hand. Hobson,
+having no pockets, carried some tourniquets around his left arm, and a
+roll of antiseptic lint in his left hand, ready in case any of his crew
+were wounded.
+
+Looking through the hole in the bulwarks the commander saw that the
+_Merrimac_ was again moving. Sunk deep though she was, the tide was
+carrying her on, and might bear her some distance. There seemed to be
+no way in which they could make her sink where she was. Two more mines
+exploded, but missed the ship, and as she floated on it became evident
+that they could not block the channel completely. But shortly the
+_Merrimac_ gave a lurch forward and settled to the port side. Now the
+Spanish _Reina Mercedes_ was near at hand, and the _Pluton_ was coming
+close inboard, but their guns and torpedoes did not hasten the sinking
+of the collier. She plunged again and settled in the channel.
+
+A rush of water came up the gangway, and the crew were thrown against
+the bulwarks, and then into the sea. The life-preservers helped to
+keep them afloat, but when they looked for the life-boat they found
+that it had been carried away. A catamaran was the largest piece of
+floating wreckage, and they swam to this. The firing had now stopped.
+The wreckage began to drift away, and the crew were left swimming about
+the catamaran, apparently unseen by the enemy. The men were ordered to
+cling to this rude craft, their bodies in the water, their heads hidden
+by the boards, and to keep quiet, as Spanish boats were passing close
+to them. All the crew were safe, and Hobson expected that in time some
+Spanish officers would come out to reconnoiter the channel. He knew that
+his men could not swim against the tide to the harbor entrance, and even
+had they been able to do so it would have been too dangerous a risk, as
+the banks were now lined with soldiers, and the water patrolled by small
+boats. Their hope lay in surrendering before they were fired upon.
+
+The moon had now nearly set, and the shadow of the high banks fell
+across the water. Boats rowed by Spanish sailors pulled close to the
+catamaran; but acting under orders from their commander the crew of the
+_Merrimac_ kept well out of sight. The sun rose, and a new day came.
+Soon the crew could see the line of distant mountains, and the steep
+slopes leading to Morro Castle. A Spanish torpedo-destroyer was heading
+up the harbor, and a bugle at one of the batteries could be heard across
+the waters. Still the Americans clung to the catamaran, although their
+teeth were chattering, and they had to work their arms and legs to keep
+warm.
+
+[Illustration: SPANISH BOATS PULLED CLOSE TO THEM]
+
+Presently one of the men said, "A steam-launch is heading for us, sir!"
+The commander looked about, and saw a large launch, the curtains aft
+drawn down, coming from around a point of land straight toward the
+catamaran. As it drew near the launch swerved to the left. When it was
+about thirty yards away Hobson hailed it. The boat instantly stopped
+and began to back, while some riflemen appeared on the deck and took
+position for firing. No shot followed, however. Hobson called out
+again, asking whether there were any officers on the boat, and adding
+that if there were he was ready to surrender himself and his American
+sailors as prisoners of war. The curtain at the stern was lowered, a
+Spanish officer gave an order, and the rifles dropped. The American
+commander swam to the launch, and climbed on board, being helped up by
+the Spanish officer, who turned out later to be no other than Admiral
+Cervera himself. Hobson surrendered for himself and his crew. The launch
+then drew close to the catamaran, and the sailors clinging to it
+were pulled on board. Although the Spaniards knew that the _Merrimac's_
+men had bottled up their war-ships in the harbor, they could not help
+praising their bravery.
+
+The Spanish launch took them to the _Reina Mercedes_. There the men were
+given dry clothes and food. Although all were scratched and bruised only
+one was wounded, and his wound, though painful, was not serious. The
+American officer was invited to join the Spaniards at breakfast, and
+was treated with as much courtesy as if he had been an honored guest.
+Afterward Hobson wrote a note to Admiral Sampson, who was in command
+of the American fleet. The note read: "Sir: I have the honor to report
+that the _Merrimac_ is sunk in the channel. No loss, only bruises. We
+are prisoners of war, being well cared for." He asked that this should
+be sent under a flag of truce. Later in the day the Americans were
+taken from the war-ship in a launch, and carried across the harbor to
+Morro Castle. This course brought them within a short distance of where
+the _Merrimac_ had sunk, and as Hobson noted the position he concluded
+that the plan had only partly succeeded, and that the channel was not
+completely blocked.
+
+Landing at a small wharf the Americans were marched up a steep hill that
+led to the Morro from the rear. The fortress stood out like one of the
+mediæval castles of Europe, commanding a wide view of sea and shore.
+The road brought them to the bridge that crossed the moat. They marched
+under the portcullis, and entered a vaulted passage. The American
+officer was shown into the guard-room, while the crew were led on. A
+few minutes later Admiral Cervera came into the guard-room, and held
+out his hand to Hobson. The admiral said that he would have liked to
+send the American's note under a flag of truce to his fleet, but that
+this had been refused by the general in command. He added, however, that
+some word should be sent to inform their friends of the safe escape of
+the _Merrimac's_ men. Hobson was then led to a cell in the tower of
+the castle. As the jailer stopped to unlock the door Hobson had a view
+of the sea, and made out the line of the American battle-ships moving
+in two columns. He was told to enter the cell, which was a bare and
+ill-looking place, but a few minutes later a Spanish captain arrived
+with apologies, saying that he hoped soon to provide the Americans with
+better quarters.
+
+A little later furniture was brought to the cell, and food, cigars,
+cigarettes, and a bottle of brandy provided for the American officer. In
+fact he and his men fared as well as the Spanish officers and soldiers
+themselves. The governor of the fortress sent a note to ask what he
+could do to improve Hobson's comfort. Officers of all ranks called to
+shake hands with him, and express their admiration for his courage.
+That first night in the castle, after the sentries had made their
+rounds, Hobson climbed up on his cot-bed and looked through a small
+window at the top of the cell. The full moon showed a steep slope from
+the fortress to the water, then the wide sweep of the harbor, with a
+picket-boat on duty as it had been the night before, and beyond the
+boat the great Spanish war-ships, and still farther off the batteries
+of Socapa. It was hard to believe that only twenty-four hours before
+the center of that quiet moonlit water had been ablaze with fire aimed
+at the small collier Hobson had commanded. As he studied the situation
+he decided that the _Merrimac_ probably blocked the channel. The enemy
+would hesitate a long time before they would try to take their fleet
+past the sunken vessel, and that delay would give Admiral Sampson time
+to gather his ships. Even if the channel were not entirely blocked
+the Spanish ships could only leave the harbor in single line and with
+the most skilful steering. Therefore he concluded that his perilous
+expedition had been successful.
+
+Next morning a Spanish officer brought him news that a flag of truce had
+been carried to Admiral Sampson with word of the crew's escape, and that
+the messengers had been given a box for Hobson, and bags of clothes,
+some money, and other articles for him and his crew. The men now dressed
+again in the uniform of American marines, were treated as prisoners of
+war, and lived almost as comfortably as their captors.
+
+While Hobson was having his coffee on the morning of June 6th, he heard
+the whiz and crash of an exploding shell, then another, and another, and
+knew that a general bombardment of the fortress had begun. He hastily
+examined the cell to see what protection it would offer from bricks and
+mortar falling from the walls and roof. At the first shot the sentry on
+guard had bolted the door and left. The American pulled the table and
+wash-stand in front of the door, and stood the galvanized iron box that
+had been sent him against the end of the table; this he thought would
+catch splinters and stones which would probably be more dangerous than
+actual shells. He lay down under the protection of this cover. He knew
+that the gunners of the American fleet were good shots, and figured that
+they could easily demolish all that part of the Morro in which his cell
+was situated. One shell after another against the walls of the fortress
+made the whole structure tremble, and it seemed as if part of the walls
+would be blown away. Fortunately, however, the firing soon turned in
+another direction, and Hobson could come from his shelter, and, standing
+on his cot-bed, look through the window at the battle. Several times
+he took shelter again under the table, and several times returned to
+watch the cannonade. The shells screamed through the air; plowed through
+shrubs and earthworks; knocked bricks and mortar from the Morro, and set
+fire to some of the Spanish ships. But no serious damage was done, and
+the bombardment ended in a stand-off between the two sides.
+
+The American officer had no desire to pass through such a cannonade
+again, and he wrote to the Spanish governor to ask that his crew and
+himself be transferred to safer quarters. Next day an officer arrived
+with orders to take all the prisoners to the city of Santiago. So
+after a four days' stay in Morro Castle the little party set out on an
+inland march, guarded by some thirty Spanish soldiers. It was not far
+to Santiago, and there the Americans were housed in the regular army
+barracks. These quarters were much better than those in the fortress,
+and the British Consul secured many comforts and delicacies for the
+Americans.
+
+The men of the _Merrimac_ stayed in Santiago during the siege of that
+city. On July 5th arrangements were made to exchange Hobson and his
+men. In the afternoon they were blindfolded and guided out of the city.
+Half a mile or more beyond the entrenchments they were told that they
+might remove the handkerchiefs, and found themselves facing their own
+troops on a distant ridge. Soon they were being welcomed by their own
+men, who told them of the recent victories won by fleet and army. Not
+long afterward they reached their ships, and were received on board the
+_New York_ by the officers and men who had watched them set out on their
+dangerous mission on that moonlight night of June 3d. They gave a royal
+welcome to the small crew who had brought the collier into the very
+heart of the Spanish lines and sunk her, taking their chances of escape.
+They were the heroes of a desperate adventure, from which every man
+returned unharmed.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+Transcriber's Notes:
+
+
+Simple typographical errors were corrected.
+
+Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant
+preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.
+
+Accent marks on Japanese words have not been changed.
+
+[=o] represents the letter "o" with macron accent mark. [)u] represents
+the letter "u" with breve accent mark.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Historic Adventures, by Rupert S. Holland
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 42398 ***