By Degrees He Shaped His Vague Day-Dream Into A Practical
Reality.
Having made himself acquainted with all the requisites
for a trading enterprise beyond the mountains, he determined to
undertake it.
A leave of absence, and a sanction of his
expedition, was obtained from the major general in chief, on his
offering to combine public utility with his private projects, and
to collect statistical information for the War Department
concerning the wild countries and wild tribes he might visit in
the course of his journeyings.
Nothing now was wanting to the darling project of the captain,
but the ways and means. The expedition would require an outfit of
many thousand dollars; a staggering obstacle to a soldier, whose
capital is seldom any thing more than his sword. Full of that
buoyant hope, however, which belongs to the sanguine temperament,
he repaired to New-York, the great focus of American enterprise,
where there are always funds ready for any scheme, however
chimerical or romantic. Here he had the good fortune to meet with
a gentleman of high respectability and influence, who had been
his associate in boyhood, and who cherished a schoolfellow
friendship for him. He took a general interest in the scheme of
the captain; introduced him to commercial men of his
acquaintance, and in a little while an association was formed,
and the necessary funds were raised to carry the proposed measure
into effect. One of the most efficient persons in this
association was Mr. Alfred Seton, who, when quite a youth, had
accompanied one of the expeditions sent out by Mr. Astor to his
commercial establishments on the Columbia, and had distinguished
himself by his activity and courage at one of the interior posts.
Mr. Seton was one of the American youths who were at Astoria at
the time of its surrender to the British, and who manifested such
grief and indignation at seeing the flag of their country hauled
down. The hope of seeing that flag once more planted on the
shores of the Columbia, may have entered into his motives for
engaging in the present enterprise.
Thus backed and provided, Captain Bonneville undertook his
expedition into the Far West, and was soon beyond the Rocky
Mountains. Year after year elapsed without his return. The term
of his leave of absence expired, yet no report was made of him at
head quarters at Washington. He was considered virtually dead or
lost and his name was stricken from the army list.
It was in the autumn of 1835 at the country seat of Mr. John
Jacob Astor, at Hellgate, that I first met with Captain
Bonneville He was then just returned from a residence of upwards
of three years among the mountains, and was on his way to report
himself at head quarters, in the hopes of being reinstated in the
service. From all that I could learn, his wanderings in the
wilderness though they had gratified his curiosity and his love
of adventure had not much benefited his fortunes.
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