GEORGE CATLIN. 339 



and illustrations of primitive looks and customs, to set them 

 up " in a gallery, unique and imperishable, for the use and 

 benefit of future ages." He was never even comfortably off 

 in money matters, says his biographer, Mrs. Clara Catlin 

 Clarke, " relying for his livelihood upon his brush or his 

 pen. He lived poor and died the same. He received no 

 pecuniary aid, governmental or individual, in the prosecution 

 of his work." He accomplished it with remarkable thorough- 

 ness. 



He followed this work for forty-two years from 1829 to 

 xgyi and during that time travelled through the wildernesses 

 of North and South America, and visited Europe, making his 

 name known everywhere. During eight years, from 1829 till 

 1838, he lived among the Indians, traders, trappers, and hunt- 

 ers of the West. 



In 1830 and 1831 he accompanied Governor Clark, Superin- 

 tendent of Indian Affairs, to treaties held with the Winneba- 

 goes and Menomonees, the Shawnees and Sacs and Foxes, and 

 in these interviews began the series of his Indian paintings. 

 In 1831 he visited, with Governor Clark, the Kansas, and re- 

 turned to St. Louis. In 1832 he painted the portraits of Black 

 Hawk and his warriors, prisoners of war. In the same year, on 

 his second journey, he ascended the Missouri, by steamer, to 

 Fort Union, mouth of the Yellowstone, and returned to St. 

 Louis in a canoe with two men, steering his frail craft the 

 whole distance of two thousand miles with his own paddle, 

 visiting and painting ten tribes. Of these tribes the most 

 important were the Mandans, to whom he devoted more time 

 and labour than any other in North America. The red pipe- 

 stone is now classified at the Smithsonian Institution as Catlinite, 

 being considered his discovery. While on the way to gather 

 specimens in 1832 he stopped at the point where Chicago now 

 stands, and made a sketch of Fort Dearborn, then one of 

 the few landmarks. The sketch is still extant. In 1833 he 

 ascended the Platte to Fort Laramie, visiting villages of the 

 Pawnees, Omahas, and Otoes, and seeing many Arapahoes and 

 Cheyennes, and rode to the shores of the Great Salt Lake, 

 while the Mormons were yet building their temple at Nauvoo. 

 In 1834 he accompanied a regiment of mounted dragoons to 

 the Comanches and other Southwestern tribes, making an ex- 

 tensive journey and seeing many Indians of various tribes; 



