CHAPTER II. 



INCIDENTS OF COL. FREMONT'S SECOND EXPEDITION. 



FREMONT'S first expedition was but a precursor 

 and an incentive to other and more ambitious ven- 

 tures. He had proved himself to be so admirably 

 adapted to the achievement of the most important 

 results, as an explorer of new and difficult regions, 

 that shortly after his return to Washington he was 

 instructed by Government to connect the explora- 

 tions which he had already made, with the surveys 

 of the Pacific coast and Columbia River, which had 

 been completed by the Expedition of Captain Wilkes 

 to the South Seas. A party of Americans, Cana- 

 dians, and Indians, thirty-nine in number, was now 

 placed under his command. The expedition was 

 well provided with arms and ammunition, with 

 camp-equipage and scientific instruments, and with 

 an abundance of stores. The route chosen by the 

 leader on this occasion was different from that pur- 

 sued on the former: it lay along the valley of the 

 Kansas River, to the head of the Arkansas. By 

 this route the unsolved problem of a new road to 



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