ere?" they demanded. "The Missouri has always
belonged to the British traders."

The face of Meriwether Lewis flushed with anger.

"We are about the business of our government," he said. "It is our
purpose to discover the West beyond here, all of it. It is our own
country that we are discovering. We have bought it and paid for it,
and will hold it. We carry the news of the great purchase to the
natives."

"Purchase? What purchase?" demanded McCracken.

And then the face of Lewis lightened, for he knew that they had outrun
all the news of the world!

"The Louisiana Purchase--the purchase of all this Western country from
the Mississippi to the Pacific, across the Stony Mountains. We bought
it from Napoleon, who had it from Spain. We are the wedge to split the
British from the South--the Missouri is our own pathway into our own
country. That is our business here!"

"You must go back!" said the hot-headed Irishman. "I shall tell my
factor, Chaboillez, at Fort Assiniboine. We want no more traders here.
This is our country!"

"We do not come to trade," said Meriwether Lewis. "We play a larger
game. I know that the men of the Northwest Company have found the
Arctic Ocean--you are welcome to it until we want it--we do not want
it now. I know you have found the Pacific somewhere above the
Columbia--we do not want what we have not bought or found for
ourselves, and you are welcome to that. But when you ask us to turn
back on our own trail, it is a different matter. We are on our own
soil now, and we will not turn for any order in the world but that of
the President of the United States!"

McCracken, irritated, turned away from the talk.

"It is a fine fairy tale they tell us!" said he to his fellows.

Drouillard came a moment later to his chief.

"Those men she'll take her dog-team for Assiniboine now--maybe so one
hundred and fifty miles that way. He'll told his factor now, on the
Assiniboine post."

Lewis smiled.

"Tell him to take this letter to his factor, Drouillard," said he. "It
is a passport given me by Mr. Thompson, representing Mr. Merry, of the
British Legation at Washington. I have fifty other passports, better
ones, each good at a hundred yards. If Mr. Chaboillez wishes to find
us, he can do so. If we have gone, let him come after us in the
spring."

"My faith," said Jussaume, the Frenchman, "you come a long way!
Why you want to go more farther West? But, listen, _Monsieur
Capitaine_--the Englishm