naries nor philanthropists,
actuated by high desires, but traders pure and simple, with no thought
but gain, and no scruples about means. They were not different from the
pioneers of trade in all times and all places.

November 6th there was a meeting with an Indian who spoke a few scrappy
words of English; and on the 7th, a day of rain and fog, the men caught
a far glimpse of the Pacific, ... "that ocean, the object of all our
labors, the reward of all our anxieties. This cheering view exhilarated
the spirits of all the party, who were still more delighted on hearing
the distant roar of the breakers." The following day, as the boats
proceeded upon the waters of the inlet, the waves ran so high that
several of the men were made sea-sick.

After eighteen months of unparalleled perseverance, the westward
journey was done.

CHAPTER IX

WINTER ON THE COAST

They had reached the coast in the dismal rainy season, when all the
life of the region was at the lowest ebb of the year, and when comfort
was hardly to be found. The extreme bitterness of Eastern winters was
wanting; but the bracing tonic effect of honest cold was also denied
them. Through many months they were to suffer from an uninterrupted
downpour of rain, driven before the raw sea-winds, which drenched their
ardor and made work of any sort painful.

For a long time they were unable to make further progress, because of
the persistent storms. Their canoes had not been designed for service
in tempestuous open water; so they were compelled to camp where luck
left them, having no shelter from the weather, sodden through and
through, hungry, cold, many of them ill with a low fever bred by
exposure, and only sustained by the knowledge that they were at last
upon the Pacific shore. The neighboring Indians were practically
amphibious; no stress of weather could hold them in check. They swarmed
about the camp at all times, stealing, begging, worrying the worn
spirits of the men into tatters. Here, for the first time since leaving
St. Louis, it became necessary to abandon conciliatory friendliness,
and to offset the native insolence with sternness. There were no
fights, for the Indians were too low-born to possess fighting courage;
but the necessity for constant alertness was even more trying than open
conflict.

For a fortnight the men were engaged in getting acquainted with their
surroundings. The hunters made long trips over the hills and along the
coast,