Bancroft Ubraiy 



INTRODUCTION 



When we bought the Louisiana Territory from 

 Napoleon, in 1803, it was not from any pressing 

 need of land, for we still had millions of fertile 

 acres east of the Mississippi. The purchase was 

 made to forestall complications with foreign pow- 

 ers, either with the arch-conqueror himself, whose 

 ambition was supposed to be the mastery of the 

 whole world, or with Great Britain, to which the 

 western country was sure to fall in case France 

 should be defeated. Possession of Louisiana was 

 essential to our free navigation of the Mississippi. 



The vast domain thus added to our boundaries 

 was terra mcogmta. Aside from its strategic 

 importance no one knew what it was good for. 

 So Lewis and Clark were sent out from the fron- 

 tier post of St. Louis to find a route to the Pacific 

 and to report on what the new country was like. 



The only commercial asset that these explorers 

 found which was immediately available was an 

 abundance of fur-bearing animals. Fur may be 

 called the gold of that period, and the news that 

 there was plenty of it in the Rocky Mountains 

 lured many an intrepid spirit of the border. 

 Companies of traders proceeded at once up the 

 Missouri to barter for peltries with the Indians. 



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