In This Chapter Is Presented An Account Of The Brave Work Done By Later Explorers, Until Now The Grand Canyon And The Whole Canyon System Of The Colorado River Is As Well Known As The Course Of Many A Less Dangerous Stream.

Early American Trappers.

Who can know whether any of those daring souls, the trappers of the earliest days of American history, ever penetrated to the depths of these canyons in their expeditions after the pelts of fur-bearing animals? These men were the true pioneers. They ever kept thrusting the frontier line further forward. As civilization, with people, villages, towns, cultivated lands, advanced westward, still further west pushed the trapper. Civilization was a hindrance to his business. The wild animals he sought fled from the presence of many men. Though the Indian had penetrated more or less to all these secluded regions, the Indian has enough of the reserve of outdoor life not to disturb any of the animals. It is the imperious, self-willed, noisy white man who drives away the shy creatures of the wild.

United States Purchases New Territory. In 1815, the small nation known as the United States had become eager to grow, and Jefferson had made his memorable purchase of all the territory north of the Red River, the Arkansas and the forty-second parallel, as far as the British boundary or Canadian line, then still unsettled, and the disputed region of Oregon. Lewis and Clark had made their wonderful expedition, and the world, through the publication of their report, knew a little of the immense territory now acquired.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 266 of 322
Words from 70688 to 70953 of 85893