Had I been in funds, I should have preferred a horse for the up-river trip. As it was, I was glad of the opportunity to make the passage by boat with my friend the captain, and in so doing, to earn a pocketful of wages. It is not, however, a I should advise to be undertaken by one who lacks the strength and experience necessary for poling and cordelling.
At times, to be sure, we were able to relieve our by an occasional resort to the sails, when the wind chanced to be fair. But in the very nature of the case, this aid could never be more than temporary, since the of the river were bound, sooner or later, to make a headwind of what had been a fair breeze.
So, for the most part, our voyage all the way from Natchez to St. Louis meant one continuous round, from morning till night, of setting our poles at the boat's , each in his turn, and tramping to the stern along the side gangways, or walking-boards,—there to raise our poles and return to the prow, to repeat the proceeding. I can say that keelboat poling is a splendid method of developing the muscles of the back and lower limbs, provided the man who attempts it begins with a sufficient stock of strength and endurance to carry him over the first week.
This does not mean that I enjoyed the trip. by my Winter in Washington, the first few days out of Natchez were as trying to me as to the regular members of the crew after their carousals and excesses in New Orleans and Natchez. Our boat, which had come down with a of lead from the mines about St. Louis, was returning with a of the cheap calicos and the coarse broadcloth called strouding, which form the basis of the Indian in the fur trade; and cloth in bolts, closely stowed, is not the lightest of .
But, once we had worked ourselves into condition, we shoved our craft upstream from daylight till nightfall at an average speed of over three miles an hour. Whenever the bank and channel permitted, we eased our at the poles by passing a towline and cordelling the boat, while our captain, one of the best on the river, was ever alert to sail with every favorable breeze.
If I did not enjoy the voyage, I nevertheless had cause to feel thankful for the hard work which held my thoughts in check and sent me to my at night so outspent that I slept as soundly as any man aboard. A man treading the walking-boards, bowed over his pole, may brood on his troubles for a week or two, but none could do so longer unless his system were full of . For the constant, vigorous exercise in the open air is bound to send the good red blood coursing through every of the body, until even the most clouded brain must throw off its .
Once free from the melancholy which had oppressed me the first few days, I gave most of my thought to the problem of how I should fulfil my to cross the barrier that was so soon to lie between my lady and myself. My main hope lay in the possibility of obtaining Pike's permission to join his expedition as a volunteer. But he was so strict in his to the most requirements of his position as an officer, that there was grave reason to doubt whether he would accept my services without an order from the General.
There were other plans to be considered, one of which was that I should throw in my fortunes with Señor Liza and his creole fellows. The idea was distasteful, yet, reflecting on what little I had learned of the plans of Colonel Burr and his friends, I was not so sure but that Liza's party were quite as loyal. At the least, I could see no harm in aiding Liza to carry a trading expedition into Santa Fe. So far as my own plans were concerned, the venture would promise more at the other end than if I joined Pike's party. If I reached that other end, I should be going among the people of New Spain in company with persons of their own blood.
There remained the most desperate plan of all. I could set out alone, and trust to my unaided craft and single rifle to carry me safe across the hundreds of miles of desert and the snowy mountains of which Alisanda had spoken. I had travelled the traces and the trackless forests too often alone to have any fear of wild beasts. But there was the of being able to kill enough meat to keep from starving in the Western wilds, and on the other hand the certainty of encountering bands of the little-known Pawnees and Ietans.
Rather than not go at all, I was resolved to attempt this desperate venture. But my plan was to seek first to attach myself to my friend's party, and, failing that, to open with Liza.
After a brief stop at Kaskaskia, that century-old trading post of the French, we undertook the last run to St. Louis with much spirit. The greater part of the crew were eager to reach St. Louis in time for the celebration of Independence Day. In this we were disappointed, being so set back by headwinds that we did not tie up to the home until the evening of the sixth of July.
My first relieved me of my fear that Lieutenant Pike had already started. He was waiting with his party, fourteen or fifteen miles upstream, at the Cantonment Fontaine, established the previous year by General Wilkinson. I had already learned at Kaskaskia that the General had passed us in his far down the river, and had arrived in St. Louis several days before us. To this was now added the news that he had gone on up to Belle Fontaine.
Such an opportunity to meet the General and my friend together was not to be lost. I made my plans over-night in St. Louis, stored my chest, provided myself with a new hunter's suit, and obtained letters of recommendation to the General from two gentlemen of influence.
Dawn found me at the convenient river front which gives St. Louis such an advantage over the other up-river settlements of twice its size and age. The rock bank not only prevents the incutting of the current, but, owing to its lowness, gives easy access to and from the water, unlike the high upon which most of the settlements have been located.
Looking about for an up-river party, I was so fortunate as to fall in with Mr. Daniel Boone, who with his son-in-law, Flanders Calloway, had come down from La Charette with a bateau-load of furs. Seeing me in hunting dress, the old gentleman showed the keenest interest in my intentions, and upon learning that my purpose was to reach Belle Fontaine, invited me aboard their bateau.
On the way upstream he made me sit beside him in the stern-sheets, and his look betrayed such an eagerness over my plans that I could not resist them to him. It was sad to see the youthful fire flash and sparkle in his bright old eyes, only to dull and fade to the grayness of forced resignation.
"My days are past, John," he said, in his quiet, almost gentle voice. "You have heard me tell of the trip I took with your father through the Choctaw nation; but I'm now past my threescore years and ten, lad. Take off the ten, and I'd be with you on this traceless quest to the Spanish country. It's hard to be tied down to a fifty miles or so of free range. But my old bones and call for rest after their wanderings. I reckon, though, I've done a man's share in my time. Not that I make any boast of it; only I feel that I was an instrument in God's to open the wilderness to our people. I feel it none the less that there were all those others before me. Captain Morgan founded New Madrid in sixty-six—"
"But that was under Spanish rule," I exclaimed. "Yours was the first of the advanced American settlements in Kentucky. If only I may have a share in a like tracing of our great Western plains!"
He gave me a shrewd glance. "You fear they won't let you go with the expedition. Why not follow their trace, and join their party in the Pawnee country? This young lieutenant is your friend, you say. He will be sure to take you into camp."
Simple as was this , it had not occurred to me in all my scheming. Yet it was so practicable that I at once assured Mr. Boone I would, if need were, carry out the suggestion. A few minutes later he landed me at Belle Fontaine, and we parted with a warm handshake. Though deprived by litigation of the bulk of his Spanish grant on the Femme Osage, as he had been in the early nineties of his Kentucky lands, Mr. Boone one of the most even-tempered and kindliest men I know.
Upon reaching the cantonment, my first intention had been to seek out General Wilkinson. But within a few paces I caught sight of a company of the Second on parade, and one glance was enough to tell me that the officer in command was my friend Lieutenant Pike. Though I could see only his trim back, there was no mistaking the odd manner in which he stood with his head so to the right that the tip of his chapeau touched his shoulder.
Before many minutes he dismissed the company, and turning about, saw me waiting within a dozen paces. In another moment he was grasping my hand, his blue eyes beaming and his fair cheeks flushing like a girl's beneath their sunburn.
"Good fortune, John!" he cried. "I feared you had gone on down to settle in New Orleans. The General of meeting you in Natchez."
"Did he tell you the cause of that meeting—and the outcome?"
"Surely you cannot blame him!"
"No, no, Montgomery!—since it was you who had me!"
"Yet you must have had your heart set upon leading the expedition."
"It was ............