The Conquest: The True Story of Lewis and Clark

by Eva Emery Dye

"Let her try a trip on the new steamboat," said the Doctor.

So after her picture was painted by Chester Harding in that Spring of 1819, Clark and Julia and the little boys, Meriwether Lewis, William Preston, and George Rogers Hancock, set out for New Orleans in the "new-fangled steamboat."

It was a long and dangerous trip; the river was encumbered with snags; every night they tied up to a tree.

"Travel by night? Couldn't think of it! We'd be aground before morning!" said the Captain.

Around by sea the Governor and his wife sailed by ship to Washington.

"I will join you at the Sweet Springs," said President Monroe to the Governor and his wife in Washington.

"The Sweet Springs cure all my ills," said Dolly Madison at Montpelier.

"She will recover at the Sweet Springs," said Jefferson at Monticello.

But at the Sweet Springs Julia grew so ill they had to carry her on a bed to Fotheringay.

"Miss Judy done come home sick!" The servants wept.