In 1740 Verendrye visited Canada, and on Oct. 13th, 1741, he returned to Fort La Reine. He afterward established a fifth post called Fort Dauphin at Lac des Prairies, and a sixth, Fort Bourbon, at the mouth of the Poskoyac r. (i. e., the Saskatchewan). In April, 1742, the Chevalier Verendrye and his brother left Fort La Reine, and by way of the Mandan village, on a southwestward course, are supposed to have reached the Rocky Mountains in January, 1743. The Sieur Verendrye died Dec. 6th, 1749.
[V-12] "As they were wont to be" is a particularly fine rhetorical climax to what our young friend so innocently prides himself on having accomplished. It must have made the most stolid savage of them all smile in his sleeve,—or whatever article of nether apparel he wore,—as there never had been a time in his memory, or in the memories of any of his ancestors as far back as his tribal traditions went in the dim past, when the Sioux and Chippewas were not hereditary foes, who killed and scalped each other with alacrious and comprehensive reciprocity. It is true that in rare sporadic cases, when both sets of red brethren were exhausted in war, or when each found it necessary to let up a little on the other for a chance to hunt in peace for the necessaries of life, temporary truces had been agreed upon. But such spasms were supposed by neither party to last longer than suited the convenience of either; nay, the very councils in which such a peace was patched up sometimes ended in fresh bloodshed on the sacred spot; and the annals of all the Indians of North America might be sifted through and through to discover a more notable case of inveterate, perpetual, and ferocious warfare than is afforded by the hereditary hostility of these two powerful nations. Pike was no doubt sincere and veracious in his representations of the happy results of his peace-making; but his ignorance of the facts in the case must have been complete, or he would have known that such a truce as he effected was sure to be broken as soon as his back was turned—if not sooner. Furthermore, the expediency of interfering with such affairs may reasonably be doubted; for, paradoxical as it may appear, a patched-up peace between tribes whose hostilities are hereditary costs more lives than it saves, and makes more trouble than it prevents. The vigilance of both parties is relaxed, private enterprise replaces public policy, and individual murders multiply rapidly till the normal equilibrium of forces is readjusted by open declaration of the always existent intertribal hostility. War is the necessary and natural state of affairs among savages; it is the main business of their lives, and the principal if not the only means of attaining all that is dearest to their hearts; and it is better for all parties to proceed on that understanding in a straightforward, businesslike way than to bushwhack for surreptitious scalps. Such trophies of prowess must be had in any event and at all hazards; and secret assassinations to secure them represent in the aggregate a higher death-rate than that resulting from pitched battles. Meddling with unmanageable things is never good policy, and interference with intertribal relations of savages is generally inhumane as well as impolitic.
[V-13] The three whose answers to Pike's address are given in this article have already been sufficiently identified: see back, [note7], p. 156, [note10], p. 169, [note13], p. 172. It is amusing to observe the unanimity with which they declined the polite invitation to visit General Wilkinson at St. Louis. Old Sweet's regrets strike me as the most ingenuous. What was the use of his going in person if he sent his pipe? If we send our card to a functionary in acknowledgment of an invitation, is not the etiquette of the occasion accomplished by that civil ceremony? Sucre's suggestion regarding the Sioux of the upper Minnesota r., whose intentions were doubtful, was eminently practical—if they wanted peace, let them so signify in the usual manner. Chef de la Terre seems to have been less resourceful in polite excuses than the other two. He could not go unless Sucre did; but some other day, perhaps, etc. Flat Mouth's remarks were the most astute. His excuse, whether feigned or not, was good; but as to his intention of burying the hatchet so far out of sight that he would let the Sioux strike him even once without digging it up, we may indulge a doubt.
[V-14] This is true in a certain sense. When Pike was on Cass l., at the mouth of Turtle r., Feb. 12th-14th., 1806, he was on a Mississippian water-way of communication with Red r. and so with Hudsonian waters. But this must not be taken to indicate that he ever reached the divide between these waters, still less that he passed to Red r. or Red l. The fact that it has been so taken gives occasion for this note. For the situation at the dates said, see [note8], p. 157.
[V-15] Orig. No. 12, though only entitled, "A speech delivered to the Puants, at the Prairie des Cheins the 20th day of April, 1806," included, besides the speech covered by this heading, various other matters which came up April 21st, in another council with the same Winnebagoes, and furthermore gave a report of a conference with the Sioux, etc. Accordingly, I separate Orig. No. 12 into two articles, making Pike's speech Art. 15, and supplying a new head for Art. 16, to cover the rest of the proceedings at Prairie du Chien.
[V-16] The above paragraph formed no part of the letter to which it is appended, being an explanatory note which Pike added when he was about to print the letter in his book. One reason why the Indians did not get the medals they had been led to expect is evident in the following extract of a letter before me from General Wilkinson to the Secretary of War, dated St. Louis, Dec. 3d, 1805: "The Indians in all directions Clamour for Medals, & it is found policy to present them, but we have not one in the Country, or among the factory Goods—If you send any out let them be addressed to the Superintendant & not the Agent, for many & obvious reasons—the last aims at too much importance & the former may need some."
[V-17] This is the last letter we have from Pike on the subject of the Mississippi voyage. It is, in fact, a letter of transmittal of his official report to the commanding general, and thus a sort of preface or introduction to the whole subject. In two weeks from the date of this communication Pike had started up the Missouri on his second expedition, and of course did nothing further with his Mississippi matters until he had returned from Mexico, the following year. Article 19 therefore completes the batch of miscellaneous documents, chiefly letters, which I have grouped in this chapter of "Correspondence and Conferences." But we have still to deal with four formal articles relating to the Mississippian voyage; these I make the subjects of the following chapters.
[V-18] The reference is here to Captain Meriwether Lewis' Statistical View of the Indian Nations, etc., which formed the second one of five papers accompanying President Jefferson's message to Congress, Feb. 16th, 1806: see L. and C., ed. 1893, p. cviii.
[V-19] Mr. George Anderson, the same who furnished Pike with most of the data he obtained concerning the fur-trade. See [next chapter], on the commerce of the Mississippi.
[VI-1] This article, for which I introduce a new chapter, with a new major head, formed Doc. No. 17 of the orig. ed., pp. 35-40 and a folder, of the Appendix to Pt. 1. The original title of the piece is preserved as a minor head of the chapter, and this will also serve to effect some sort of typographical uniformity with the following five pieces, A, B, C, D, E, which are integral parts of the article, yet were in the orig. ed. separated from the rest of the article under a different heading, in larger type than the main heading itself; moreover, the piece marked C, whose proper position was of course between B and D, was a separate folding blanket-sheet bound to face p. 40, thus coming after E. The construction of this table is such that it can be printed on two pages of the present edition, and be put between D and E.