532 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE. 



by some of the early French or Spanish expeditions along the Missouri River; 

 Some say it is Fort Orleans, construrted about 1720 by Captain De Bourgmont, 

 who afterward, about 1725, assigned the command to his sergeant, Du Bois, who 

 was made a captain. The history of this fort is somewhat romantic, owing to the 

 marriage of DuBois to a princess of the tribe with whom the Spaniards were 

 allied, and his subsequent massacre, with that of his entire command, not one 

 being left to tell the sad story or the causes which lead to the tragedy. But the 

 same history which tells this tragic tale contains facts which render it highly im- 

 probable that the earthworks at the Pinnacles could have been Fort Orleans. 

 The expedition, according to the historic account, was undertaken in 1720 and 

 only consisted of thirty men, and two officers. Five years after, the command 

 was assigned to Captain Du Bois with no greater force at his disposal. The Span- 

 iards were at peace with the neighboring tribes, and their ultimate destruction 

 was not by an outside foe, but by the people with whom they were living on the 

 most intimate terms. The fort is said to have been a stockade and was burned 

 to the ground. The stockade was the most usual mode of defense against In- 

 dians of that day. There is no appearance of a stockade having existed about 

 this old work at the Pinnacles. • Thirty men would be wholly inadequate to the 

 defense of more than 2,200 feet of intrenchments, and such a work was unneces- 

 sary for their Indian allies, as they were all friendly with the neighboring tribes. 

 The trees in the intrenchments, which have grown up since the work was con- 

 structed, are certainly older than the date given for the Fort Orleans expedition. 

 There is no water nearer than a quarter of a mile of the intrenchments, and, on the- 

 narrow ridge upon which they are constructed, water could not have been procur- 

 ed by digging under from one hundred to two hundred feet, and it is not hkely that 

 thirty men would undertake so extensive a work where the nearest water supply 

 was more than a quarter of a mile distant, especially when there were numerous 

 other places in the neighborhood more available for the defense of a small force. 

 "The tradition attempted to be associated with the work is still more roman- 

 tic, and, if true, is stranger than fiction, and would unfold a chapter of heroic: 

 struggle unparalleled in the world's history. The tradition runs in this wise :. 

 That when Francisco Pizarro invaded Peru in 1531 a party of the native Peru- 

 vians, consisting of three hundred men, to save their church treasure and conse- 

 crated vessels from the sacrilegious hand of the Spaniard, took them under their 

 care and proceeded north with their sacred trust. And after many encounters 

 with the wild tribes along the line of march, and after many months of privation 

 and hard travel, they finally reached a great river, which is claimed to have been 

 the Missouri. Here they halted, but were surrounded by wild and hostile tribes.. 

 They erected a fort as a defense against their enemies, in which, it is said, they 

 buried the vast treasure in their charge, and after a few years of painful struggle 

 against their inferior but more numerous foe, were exterminated by their enemies. 

 This tradition is based upon the story of a Portuguese and his buffalo robe. It 

 is said that many years ago, when St. Louis was but little more than a village, a 

 Portuguese, having in his possession a buffalo robe with historic picture writing. 



