PIKE S EXPEDITION. 3 



Pike, who was ordered to ascend the Arkansas river to its sources, 

 thence to strike across the country to the head of Red river, and 

 descend that stream to Natchitoches. After encountering many priva- 

 tions and intense sufferings in the deep snows of the lofty mountains 

 about the head-waters of the Arkansas, Lieut. Pike arrived finally upon 

 a stream running to the east, which he took to be Red river, but which 

 subsequently proved to be the Rio Grande. Here he was taken by the 

 governor of New Mexico and sent home by way of Chihuahua and San 

 Antonio, thus putting a stop to his explorations. 



General Wilkinson, under whose orders Lieut. Pike was serving at 

 the time, states, in a letter to him after his return, as follows : " The 

 principal object of your expedition up the Arkansas was to discover the 

 true position of the sources of Red river. This was not accomplished." 

 Lieut. Pike, however, from the most accurate information he could 

 obtain, gives the geographical position of the source^ of Red river as 

 in latitude 33° N. and longitude 104° W. Again, in 18i9-'20, Col. 

 Long, of the U. S. Topographical Engineers, on his return from an explo- 

 ration of the Missouri river and the country lying between that stream 

 and the head of the Arkansas, undertook to descend the Red river from 

 its sources. The Colonel, in speaking of this in his interesting report 

 says : " We arrived at a creek having a westerly course, which we 

 took to be a tributary of Red river. Having travelled down its valley 

 about two hundred miles, we fell in with a party of Indians, of the 

 nation of "Kaskias," or "Bad Hearts," who give us to understand that 

 the stream along which we were travelling was Red river. We accord- 

 ingly continued our march down the river several hundred miles further, 

 when, to our no small disappointment, we discovered it was the Cana- 

 dian of the Arkansas, instead of Red river, that we had been exploring. 

 "Our horses being nearly worn out with the fatigue of our long 

 journey, which they had to perform barefooted, and the season being 

 too far advanced to admit of our retracing our steps and going back 

 again in quest of the source of Red river with the possibility of exploring 

 it before the commencement of winter, it was deemed advisable to give 

 over the enterprise for the present and make our way to the settlements 

 on the Arkansas. We were led to the commission of this mistake in 

 consequence of our not having been able to procure a good guide ac- 

 quainted with that part of the country. Our only dependence in this 

 respect was upon Pike's map, which assigns to the head-waters of Red 

 river the apparent locality of those of the Canadian." 



Doctor James, who accompanied Colonel Long, in his journal of the 

 expedition, says : " Several persons have recently arrived at St. Louis, in 



