Identifier: pathfindersofwes01laut (find matches)
Title: Pathfinders of the West; being the thrilling story of the adventures of the men who discovered the great Northwest
Year: 1904 (1900s)
Authors: Laut, Agnes C. (Agnes Christina), 1871-1936
Subjects: Radisson, Pierre Esprit, ca. 1636-1710 La Vérendrye, Pierre Gautier de Varennes, sieur de, 1685-1749. (from old catalog) Hearne, Samuel, 1745-1792 Mackenzie, Alexander, Sir, 1763-1820 Lewis and Clark Expedition (1804-1806)
Publisher: New York, The Macmillan company London, Macmillan & co., ltd.
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: Sloan Foundation

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, Jolliet, and La Salle had followed the trail thatRadisson had blazed and explored the valley of theMississippi; but like a will-o-the-wisp beckoning everwestward was that undiscovered myth, the WesternSea, thought to lie like a narrow strait betweenAmerica and Japan. The search began in earnest one sweltering afternoonon June 8, 1731, at the little stockaded fort on the banksof the St. Lawrence, where Montreal stands to-day.Fifty grizzled adventurers — wood runners, voyageurs,Indian interpreters — bareheaded, except for thecolored handkerchief binding back the lank hair,dressed in fringed buckskin, and chattering with theexuberant nonchalance of boys out of school, hadfinished gumming the splits of their ninety-footbirch canoes, and now stood in line awaiting the com-ing of their captain, Sieur Pierre Gaultier de Varennesde la Verendrye. The French soldier with his threesons, aged respectively eighteen, seventeen, and sixteen,now essayed to discover the fabled Western Sea, whose
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jf%^W. jj-^^Jg^^ ^^rr*^* ^■^- ^ m Indians and Hunters spurring to the Fight. SEARCH FOR THE WESTERN SEA 195 narrow waters were supposed to be between the val-ley of the Great Forked River and the Empire ofChina. Certainly, if it were worth while for Peter theGreat of Russia to send Vitus Bering coasting thebleak headlands of ice-blocked, misty shores to findthe Western Sea, it would—as one of the Frenchgovernors reported — be nobler than open war forthe little colony of New France to discover this sea ofthe setting sun, The quest was invested with all therainbow tints of la gloire ; but the rainbow hopeswere founded on the practical basis of profits. Lead-ing merchants of Montreal had advanced goods fortrade with the Indians on the way to the Western Sea.Their expectations of profits were probably the sameas the mans who buys a mining share for ten centsand looks for dividends of several thousand per cent.And the fur trade at that time was capable of yieldingsuch profits. Trader

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