Our guide
so long across the continent and back again to the haunts of men: -
"Sunday, September 21st, we proceeded; and as several
settlements have been made during our absence, we were
refreshed with the sight of men and cattle along the banks.
We also passed twelve canoes of Kickapoo Indians, going on
a hunting-excursion. At length, after coming forty-eight miles,
we saluted, with heartfelt satisfaction, the village of
St. Charles, and on landing were treated with the greatest
hospitality and kindness by all the inhabitants of that place.
Their civility detained us till ten o'clock the next morning,
"September 22d, when the rain having ceased, we set out for Coldwater Creek,
about three miles from the mouth of the Missouri, where we found a cantonment
of troops of the United States, with whom we passed the day; and then,
"September 23d, descended to the Mississippi, and round to St. Louis,
where we arrived at twelve o'clock; and having fired a salute,
went on shore and received the heartiest and most hospitable welcome
from the whole village."
The two captains were very busily employed, as soon as they arrived
in St. Louis, with writing letters to their friends and to the officers
of the government who were concerned to know of their safe return
to civilization. Captain Lewis' letter to the President of the
United States, announcing his arrival, was dated Sept. 23, 1806.
President Jefferson's reply was dated October 20 of that year.
In his letter the President expressed his "unspeakable joy"
at the safe return of the expedition. He said that the unknown scenes
in which they had been engaged and the length of time during which no
tidings had been received from them "had begun to be felt awfully."
It may seem strange to modern readers familiar with the means
for rapid travel and communication that no news from the explorers,
later than that which they sent from the Mandan country, was received
in the United States until their return, two years and four months later.
But mail facilities were very scanty in those far-off days,
even in the settled portions of the Mississippi Valley, and few
traders had then penetrated to those portions of the Lower Missouri
that had just been travelled by Lewis and Clark. As we have seen,
white men were regarded with awe and curiosity by the natives
of the regions which the explorers traversed in their long absence.
The first post-office in what is now the great city of St. Louis
was not established until 1808; mails between the Atlantic seaboard
and that "village" required six weeks to pass either way.
The two captains went to Washington early in the year following their
arrival in St. Louis. There is extant a letter from Captain Lewis,
dated at Washington, Feb.
