Falls of St. Anthony
The eight Frenchmen now accompanied the Sioux back to Mille Lacs and were treated with great honor. Then they started east and, in due time, reached the Jesuit missions at Green Bay. And here we take leave of Father Hennepin.[4]
[1] Hennepin's language in the passages which have been quoted is given as it appears in an old English translation.
[2] Jonathan Carver, who journeyed up the river in 1766, was the earliest traveler who made mention of ancient monuments in this region. He says that a few miles below Lake Pepin his attention was attracted by an elevation which had the appearance of an intrenchment. He had served in the recent war between Great Britain and France and had an eye to such matters. He says, "Notwithstanding it was now covered with grass, I could plainly discern that it had once been a breast-work of about four feet in height, extending the best part of a mile and sufficiently capacious to cover five thousand men." It was semi-circular in form, and its wings rested on the river, which covered the rear. His surmise that it was built for the purpose of defence is undoubtedly correct. He wonders how such a work could exist in a country inhabited by "untutored Indians" who had no military knowledge beyond drawing a bow. Since his time we have gained far more knowledge of the aborigines, and it is ascertained beyond reasonable question that, at one period, they reared extensive earth-works, probably for the permanent protection of their villages.
[3] Jonathan Carver, who visited the Falls about a hundred years after Hennepin, and from whose works the accompanying illustration is taken, writes thus: "At a little distance below the falls stands a small island, of about an acre and a half, on which grow a great number of oak-trees, every branch of which, able to support the weight, was full of eagles' nests." These birds, he says, resort to this place in so great numbers because of its security, "their retreat being guarded by the Rapids, which the Indians never attempt to pass," and because of the abundant supply of food furnished by fish and animals "dashed to pieces by the falls and driven on the adjacent shore."
About thirty mites below the Falls, he says, he visited a remarkable cave, called by the Indians Wakon-teebe, that is, the Dwelling of the Great Spirit. Within it he found "many Indian hieroglyphicks which appeared very ancient." Near it was a burying-place of the Sioux.
[4] Hennepin relates that at the Falls of St. Anthony two of the men, to the great indignation of Du Lhut when he learned of it, stole two buffalo-robes which were hung on trees as offerings to the Great Spirit. Striking natural objects seem to have been regarded by the Indians as special manifestations of divinity. It is an interesting confirmation, that Jonathan Carver relates that, at the same place, a young warrior who accompanied him threw into the stream his pipe, his tobacco, his bracelets, his neck ornaments, in short, everything of value about him, all the while smiting his breast and crying aloud to the Great Spirit for his blessing.
Chapter XVI
THE VÉRENDRYES DISCOVER THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS
Vérendrye's Experience as a Fur-trader.—As a Soldier.—He returns to the Forests.—His Plan for reaching the Pacific.—Tremendous Difficulties in his Way.—He reaches the Mandans.—His Sons discover the Rocky Mountains.—Alexander Mackenzie follows the Mackenzie River to the Arctic Ocean.—He achieves a Passage over the Mountains to the Pacific.—Note on Mandan Indians.—Mah-to-toh-pa's Vengeance.—Singular Dwellings of the Mandans.—Their Bloody Ordeal.—Skin-boats.—Catlin's Fanciful Theory.
We have seen how the dream of a short route to China and the Indies inspired a long line of adventurous explorers. At the first it was hoped that the Mississippi afforded such a passage. When it was known beyond all doubt that the Great River flows into the Gulf, not the "Western Sea," longing eyes were turned toward the western part of the continent, in the hope that some stream would be found flowing into the Pacific which would carry the keels of commerce Indiaward. The huge barrier of the Rocky Mountains was not known, and it was only in the effort to reach the Pacific by water that they were discovered.
So important was the desired route considered that, in 1720, the French King sent out the noted historian of New France, Father Charlevoix, to explore westward and discover a way to the Pacific. He recommended two plans, either to follow the Missouri River to its head-waters or to push a chain of trading-posts gradually westward until the continent should be crossed. The former plan was the one actually carried out, eighty-three years later, by the famous Lewis and Clark expedition, which crossed the Rockies and followed the Columbia River to the ocean. The second plan was the easier and less expensive, and it was the earlier to be tried. Still several years elapsed before the effort was made.
The hardy adventurer was Pierre Gaultier de Varennes de la Vérendrye, son of the Governor of Three Rivers. Early experience as a fur-trader taught him to know the Indians and the hard life of the northern forests. Then came the war of the Spanish Succession, and, a loyal French subject, he left his fur-trade, hastened to Europe, asked to serve the King, and was given a commission as a lieutenant. The famous field of Malplaquet came near to witnessing the end of his career. He lay on it for dead, gashed with the sabre and pierced with bullets. Still he recovered, returned to New France, and plunged again into the woods as a trader.
Being placed in command of the French outpost on Lake Nipigon, where he also carried on a brisk trade, he heard many a tale from Indians who came with furs. One of these stories fired his imagination. It was of a great river flowing westward out of a lake into water in which there was a tide. Then the Indian drew a rough map on birch bark, a copy of which is still in existence. Could this be the long-desired route to the Pacific? He hoped it and was resolved to ascertain the truth. But first he must get leave and an outfit. Having made the long and dangerous journey in his birch-bark canoe, that is, gone from Lake Nipigon into Lake Superior, traversed the entire length of the lakes, and then descended the St. Lawrence to Quebec, he laid before the French governor, Beauharnais, his plan for reaching the Pacific by the net-work of lakes and rivers north and west of Lake Superior. The Governor approved, but Vérendrye, applying to the King for men and means, got nothing but a grant of the monopoly of the fur-trade north and west of Lake Superior. He must raise the money himself. With difficulty and at exorbitant rates of interest, he obtained advances from Quebec merchants and set out, June 8, 1731, with his three sons and a nephew, LaJemeraye. At the close of the season he built his first fort, St. Pierre, on Rainy River. The next year he established his second fort, St. Charles, on the southwest shore of the Lake of the Woods.
Terribly embarrassed by lack of money, he returned to Quebec and represented his deplorable situation. The Governor reported it to the King, but could get no more from him than the renewal of the fur-trade monopoly. Undaunted, Vérendrye persisted, though obliged to suspend exploration and devote himself for a while to trading, in order to secure money. There was enough to dishearten a man of less than heroic stuff. In 1736, his eldest son, with a Jesuit priest and twenty others, was surprised and massacred by the Sioux on an island in the Lake of the Woods. Also he was harassed by creditors and compelled repeatedly to make the long and tedious journey to Montreal. In spite of all these mishaps, he pushed his posts gradually westward and by 1738 he had established six, viz., St. Pierre, on Rainy Lake; St. Charles, on the Lake of the Woods; Maurepas at the mouth of the Winnipeg River; Bourbon on the east shore of Lake Winnipeg; La Reine on Assiniboine River; and Dauphin on Lake Manitoba.
In 1738 he made a bold push for the Pacific, with fifty persons, French and Indians. After many devious wanderings, seeking a band that could conduct him to the Western Ocean, he reached the Mandans, on the upper Missouri, the singularly interesting people among whom Lewis and Clark spent the winter sixty-six years later. But, having been robbed of the presents which he had provided, he was unable to get a guide to lead him further and was obliged to return. The journey was made in midwinter and was full of frightful hardships.
His eldest surviving son, Pierre de la Vérendrye, full of his father's spirit, devoted himself to the same quest. He had with him his brother and two other men. They started from Fort La Reine, reached the Mandans, and pushed on to the West. All through the summer, autumn, and early winter they toiled on, going hither and yon, beguiled by the usual fairy-tales of tribesmen. At last, on New Year's day, 1743, two hundred and fifty years after the Discovery, doubtless first of all white men, they saw the Rocky Mountains from the east. This probably was the Big Horn Range, one hundred and twenty miles east of the Yellowstone Park. Finding this tremendous obstacle across their path to the Pacific, they turned back. On July 12 they reached La Prairie, to the great joy of their father, who had given them up for lost.
A later Governor of Canada not only ignored the heroic services of the Vérendryes, but seized their goods, turned over their posts to another, and reduced them to poverty.
It was a long time before their work was taken up, and it remained for a man of another race to accomplish what they had so bravely striven for. Alexander Mackenzie, a Scotch Highlander by birth, was an energetic young agent of the Montreal Company in the Athabasca region. He determined to undertake certain explorations. In June, 1789, he set out from Fort Chippewyan, on the south shore of Lake Athabasca, with four birch canoes and a party of white men and several Indians, including a guide and interpreter. Going down Snake River, the explorers reached Great Slave Lake, then entered a heretofore unknown river, the one which now bears the name of its discoverer, and followed it until, on July 12, they sighted the Arctic Ocean, filled with ice-floes, with spouting whales between.
In October, 1792, he set out, determined this time to reach the Pacific Ocean. He left Fort Chippewyan, skirted the lake to Slave River, then ascended its southwest tributary, Peace River. He wintered on this stream in a trading-house which he had sent an advance party to build, employed in hunting and trading. In May, having sent back a large cargo of furs to Fort Chippewyan, he started up the river with a party of seven white men and two Indians. The voyagers traveled in a birch canoe twenty-five feet long, "but so light that two men could carry her on a good road three or four miles without resting." "In this slender vessel," he says, "we shipped provisions, goods for presents, arms, ammunition, and baggage, to the weight of thirty thousand pounds, and an equipage of ten people."
The difficulties and dangers were tremendous. Paddling and pushing and poling up the rocky bed of a swift stream abounding in rapids, they made slow progress. More than once the canoe was broken. Portages were often necessary. Again and again the crew, exhausted and their clothing in tatters, sullenly insisted that there was no choice but to turn back. But Mackenzie was a man of indomitable courage and all the persistency of the Scotch race. He had already shown this quality by taking the long journey and voyage from the wilds of Athabasca to London, in order to study the use of astronomical instruments, so that he might be qualified to make scientific observations. Now he would not hear of turning back.
So the discouraged party, animated by Mackenzie, pushed on, climbed over the dividing mountains, and came upon the head-waters of a stream flowing westward, the one now called Fraser River. After following it for several days, they struck off through dense forests, sometimes on dizzy trails over snow-clad mountains, until they reached a rapid river. On this they embarked in two canoes with several natives, and thus reached the ocean—the Pacific!
Vérendrye's dream was realized at last. The continent had been spanned from East to West.
Twelve years later the same thing was done within the territory of the United States by Lewis and Clark, at the head of an expedition sent out by President Jefferson. They spent the winter among the Mandan Indians, the interesting people with whom the Vérendryes had come in contact. A note is added in which some information is given about them.