THE EXPLORERS OF THE FAR WEST, 1804-1807 



Far West, the West beyond the Mississippi, 

 1 had been thrust on Jefferson, and given to the 

 nation, by the rapid growth of the Old West, 

 the West that lay between the Alleghanies and the 

 Mississippi. The actual title to the new territory 

 had been acquired by the United States Government, 

 acting for the whole nation. It remained to explore 

 the territory thus newly added to the national do- 

 main. The Government did not yet know exactly 

 what it had acquired, for the land was not only un- 

 mapped but unexplored. Nobody could tell what 

 were the boundary lines which divided it from Brit- 

 ish America on the north and Mexico on the south, 

 for nobody knew much of the country through 

 which these lines ran ; of most of it, indeed, nobody 

 knew anything. On the new maps the country now 

 showed as part of the United States; but the In- 

 dians who alone inhabited it were as little affected 

 by the transfer as was the game they hunted. 



Even the Northwestern portion of the land defi- 

 nitely ceded to the United States by Great Britain in 

 Jay's treaty was still left in actual possession of the 

 Indian tribes, while the few whites who lived among 

 them were traders owing allegiance to the British 



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