urr, at that time Vice-President of the United States; but in
his diary, written in frankness by himself for himself, he put down
the following:

I have never seen Colonel Burr till he became a member of
the Senate. His conduct very soon inspired me with distrust.
I habitually cautioned Mr. Madison against trusting him too
much. I saw that under General W. and Mr. Adams, where a
great military appointment or a diplomatic one was to be
made, he came post to Philadelphia to show himself, and in
fact he was always in the market if they wanted him. He was
indeed told by Dayton in 1800 that he might be Secretary at
War, but this bid was too late. His election as
Vice-President was then foreseen. With these impressions of
Colonel Burr, there never has been any intimacy between us,
and but little association.

A certain plan of this same Colonel Burr's now went forward in such
fashion as involved the loyalty of Meriwether Lewis, the man to whom,
of all others of his acquaintance, Thomas Jefferson gave first place
in trust and confidence and friendship--the young man who but now was
making his unostentatious departure on the great adventure that they
two had planned.

His garb ill cared-for, his hair unkempt, his face a trifle haggard,
working on into the day whose dawn he had seen arise, the tall, gaunt
old man set aside first one minor matter, then another, leaving them
all exactly finished. At last he wrote down, for later forwarding, the
last item of his own knowledge regarding the new country into which he
had sent his young friend.

I have received word from Paris that Mr. Broughton, one of
the companions of Captain Vancouver, went up the Columbia
River one hundred miles in December, 1792. He stopped at a
point he named Vancouver. Here the river Columbia is still a
quarter of a mile wide. From this point Mount Hood is seen
about twenty leagues distant, which is probably a dependency
of the Stony Mountains. Accept my affectionate salutations.

This was the last word Meriwether Lewis received from his chief. As
the latter finished it, he sat looking out of the window toward that
West which meant so much to him.

He did not at first note the interruption of his reverie. Long ago he
had made public his announcement that the time of Thomas Jefferson
belonged to the public, and that he might be seen at any time by any
man. He