Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 6.djvu/59

53 STORY OF LEWIS AND CLARK'S JOURNALS. 53 consideration that each of the two leaders felt for the other; the magnanimity of Lewis, officially the leader, in equally dividing every honor with his friend, and making no move without the latter's consent ; the poetic temper- ament of Lewis, who loved flowers and animals, and in his notes discoursed like a philosopher who enjoyed the exercise of writing ; the rugged character of Clark, who wrote in brief, pointed phrases, and, less educated of the two, spelled phonetically, capitalized chaotically, arid occa- sionally slipped in his grammar all these, and more, are evident on every page, causing the reader deeply to admire the men and to follow them in their often thrilling adventures with the keenest sympathy and anticipation. We shall hereafter know Lewis and Clark as we never knew them before. The Biddle narrative will no doubt continue to live as the brief popular account of an explo- ration fraught with great consequence to American expan- sion ; but at least the student of history will feel that the original records, as the men wrote them on the spot, are by far the more satisfying of the two.