No wonder the land was excited at the report of Lewis and Clark. All at once the unknown mysterious West stood revealed as the home of natural resources. Their travels became the Robinson Crusoe of many a boy who lived to see for himself the marvels of that trans-Mississippi.
Sergeant Gass received his pay in gold and went home to Wellsburg, West Virginia, to find his old father smoking still beside the fire. With the help of a Scotch schoolmaster Patrick published his book the next year, immortalising the name of the gallant Irish Sergeant. Then he "inlisted" again, and fought the Creeks, and in 1812 lost an eye at Lundy's Lane. Presently he married the daughter of a Judge, and lived to become a great student in his old age, and an authority on Indians and early times.
John Ordway went home to New Hampshire and married, and returned to live on his farm near New Madrid.
William Bratton tarried for a time in Kentucky, served in the War of 1812 under Harrison, and was at Tippecanoe and the Thames. He married and lived at Terre Haute, Indiana, and is buried at Waynetown.
George Gibson settled at St. Louis, and lived and died there. Nathaniel Pryor and William Werner became Indian agents under William Clark; Pryor died in 1831 among the Osages. George Drouillard went into the fur trade and was killed by the Blackfeet at the Three Forks of the Missouri. John Coalter, after adventures that will be related, settled at the town of Daniel Boone, married a squaw and died there. John Potts was killed by the Blackfeet on the river Jefferson. Sacajawea and Charboneau lived for many years among the Mandans, and their descendants are found in Dakota to this day.
Of the voyageurs who went as far as the Mandan town, Lajaunnesse accompanied Fremont across the mountains; and two others, Francis Rivet and Philip Degie, were the earliest settlers of Oregon, where they lived to a great old age, proud of the fact that they had "belonged to Lewis and Clark."
Book III
THE RED HEAD CHIEF
I
THE SHADOW OF NAPOLEON
"Thank God for the safety of our country!" ejaculated Jefferson, in one of his long talks with Lewis regarding the upheaval across the sea.
In 1802 Napoleon had been declared Consul for life; May 18, 1804, four days after Lewis and Clark started, he had been saluted Emperor of France. Then came Jena. When Lewis and Clark reached the Mandan towns, Napoleon was entering Berlin with the Prussian monarchy at his feet.