The uncharitable were apt
to surmise that he had, in the interim, been well used up in a
buffalo hunt; but those accustomed to Indian morality in the matter of
horseflesh, considered it a singular evidence of honesty that he should
be brought back at all.
Being convinced, therefore, from these, and other circumstances, that
his people were encamped in the neighborhood of a tribe as honest as
they were valiant, and satisfied that they would pass their winter
unmolested, Captain Bonneville prepared for a reconnoitring expedition
of great extent and peril. This was, to penetrate to the Hudson's
Bay establishments on the banks of the Columbia, and to make himself
acquainted with the country and the Indian tribes; it being one part of
his scheme to establish a trading post somewhere on the lower part of
the river, so as to participate in the trade lost to the United States
by the capture of Astoria. This expedition would, of course, take him
through the Snake River country, and across the Blue Mountains, the
scenes of so much hardship and disaster to Hunt and Crooks, and their
Astorian bands, who first explored it, and he would have to pass through
it in the same frightful season, the depth of winter.
The idea of risk and hardship, however, only served to stimulate the
adventurous spirit of the captain. He chose three companions for his
journey, put up a small stock of necessaries in the most portable form,
and selected five horses and mules for themselves and their baggage.
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