Page:A Brief History of South Dakota.djvu/61

Rh made a winter camp. Toward spring he returned to St. Louis to recruit more men, and again entered into negotiations with Dorion, who agreed to accompany him into the wilderness. Learning of this, Lisa got out a warrant for Dorion's arrest on the whisky debt, but Dorion escaped into the brush and, after traveling a long and circuitous route, joined Hunt far up the river. Hunt went with all haste to his camp, quickly made ready for the voyage, and finally, on the 27th of April, 1811, set off up the river in four boats, one of which was of large size and mounted two swivels and a howitzer. He was aware when he left St. Louis that Lisa was about ready to embark for the head waters of the Missouri, and he had every reason to believe that Lisa was now in close pursuit.

Hunt's party got along prosperously and reached the mouth of the Big Sioux River on the 15th of May. On the 23d they had reached the sharp bend in the Missouri between the site of Springfield and Bon Homme Island, when they were overtaken by a messenger from Lisa, who informed them that Lisa had passed their winter encampment nineteen days after they had left, and that he was then at the Omaha village opposite the mouth of the Big Sioux; that he had a large boat manned with twenty oarsmen, and that he had set out to overtake the Astorians at any cost. The messenger said that the Teton Sioux were hostile, being excited by the religious craze inspired by the teaching of the Shawnee Prophet, which had reached all of the tribes in the Mississippi and Missouri valleys, and that Lisa wished to join his expedition with the Astorians for mutual protection while passing through the