438 THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 



" Well, Ba'tisto, I am to figure about in this part of the world a few weeks longer, 

 and then I shall descend the Missouri from the mouth of Yellowstone, to Saint Louis; 

 aud I should like exceedingly to employ just such a man as you are as a voyageur with 

 niG. I will give you good wages and pay all your expenses ; what say you? " 



" Avec tout mon cour, monsieur, remercie, remercie." 



"It's a bargain, then, Ba'tiste ; I will see you at the mouth of Yellowstone." 



" Qui, monsieur, in de Yel Stone; bon soir, bon soir, monsieur." 



"But stop, Ba'tiste, you told me those were Crows encamped yonder." 



" Oui, monsieur, oui, des Corbeaux." 



" And I suppose you are their interpreter ? 



"Non, monsieur." 



"But you speak the Crow language ? " 



"Oui, monsieur." 



"Well, then, turn about ; I am going to pay them a visit, and you can render me 

 a service." 



" Bien, monsieur, aliens." — Pages 59-66, vol. 1, Catlin's Eight Years. 



With the Mandans. 1832. 



If Mr. Catlin had visited no other Indian tribe than the Mandans, 

 his notes on and paintings of these Indians would alone preserve his 

 memory. He devoted more time and labor to the Mandans than to any 

 other North American Indian tribe. 



His attention was attracted to them by conversations with G-eu. Will- 

 iam Clark, at Saint Louis, whose recollections of them went back to the 

 winter of 1804-'05, when Lewis and Clark's expedition quartered with 

 them.* That year Fort Clark was built at the pr incipal or lower Man- 

 dan village — afterwards occupied by the American Fur Company — and 

 in which James Kipp, the company's agent, resided from 1822 to 1835, 

 and where Mr. Catlin was Mr. Kipp's guest in 1832. 



In the notes and pictures of the Mandans, their people, games, and 



* Lewis and Clakk's Expedition. — Mr. Jefferson, while at Paris as American minister in 1787, met 

 John Ledyard, who came to France to attempt a business arrangement in the fur trade on the north- 

 west coast of America. Failing in this, Mr. Jefferson proposed to him a land expedition through North 

 Europe to Kamtschatka and to the Pacific. Bussia gave consent, and Ledyard at once set out and 

 went into winter quarters 200 miles from Kamtschatka. Here he was stopped by the Russians and 

 compelled, under arrest, to return. In 1792 Mr. Jefferson proposed a subscription by the American 

 Philosophical Society to engage a person to go to the northwest coast by land. Capt. Meriwether 

 Lewis, then stationed at Charlottesville, Va., was engaged for this purpose. M. Michaux, a French bot- 

 anist, was to be his fellow explorer. They proceeded as far as Kentucky, when a message from the 

 French minister at Washington recalled M. Michaux, and the journey here terminated. On the 18th 

 of January, 1803, prior to the Louisiana purchase. President Jefferson, in a confidential message to 

 Congress (the act for establishing trading houses among the Indi ans being about to expire by limita- 

 tion), recommended that the act be continued and extended to posts among the Indians on the Missis- 

 sippi River, and that a party of explorers be sent up the Missouri River to its source, then to cross the 

 Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. This was approved, an appropriation made, and Captain 

 Lewis, at his own request, was detailed to command the expedition. First Lieut. (Capt.) William 

 Clark, brother of General George Rogers Clark, was afterwards detailed with him. It was an expe- 

 dition of discovery and inquiry. Its instructions were to notice and detail the geography and char- 

 acter of the country, to enter into negotiations with the Indians for commerce, and to describe their 

 habits, characteristics, and history. 



The party consisted of Meriwether Lewis, captain, TJ. S. A., First Regiment Infantry (formerly Mr. 

 Jefierson's secretary) ; William Clark, first lieutenant, XI. S. A. ; John Ordway, Nathaniel Prior, and 

 Patrick Gass, sergeants, U. S. A. ; Charles Floyd, William Bratton, John Colter, John CoUins, Pier 

 Cruzatte, Robert Frazier, Joseph Fields, George Gibson, Silas Goodrich, Hugh Hall, Richard Wor- 

 flngton, Thomas P. Howard, Peter Wiser, John Bapti&te Le Page, Francis Labuiche, Hugh M'Keal 

 John Potts, John Shields, George Shannon, John B. Thompson, WUUam Werner, Alexander WiUard, 



