Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 74.djvu/55

Rh neu-Wied, a small principality of Rhenish Prussia. He was from boyhood of a studious inclination, and early became interested in the natural sciences. In spite of this he was in the Prussian army at the battle of Jena, and was among those captured by the enemy. He returned to his studies at the end of this war, but was among the victorious army which entered Paris in 1813. In this service he earned the iron cross of Chalons and a major-generalship. During all of this time he had been planning a scientific expedition to Brazil in order to satisfy a keen desire to add to the world's knowledge, imparted to him by the celebrated Professor Johann Friederich Blmnenbach, of whom he was a favorite pupil. Early in 1815 he started for Brazil. He was joined in South America by two other German scholars, and the trio spent two years studying the flora, fauna and native races of this country. His resulting publications gave him a high rank among the scientists of the period, and his "Reise nach Brasilien in den Jahren 1815 bis 1817" was soon translated into the French, English and Dutch languages.

In 1833 Prince Maximilian started on a second enterprise—a trip to the trans-Mississippi region. He arrived in Boston on the fourth of July. He brought with him a very capable artist, for the express purpose of obtaining portraits of famous Indians. He made more or less brief visits to Boston, New York and Philadelphia, and then went to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and thence through the coal region, reaching Pittsburg in the autumn. The journey was then continued overland to Wheeling, where they embarked for the voyage down the Ohio River. They turned aside for the purpose of visiting New Harmony, Indiana, where then was located the best library of American and natural history west of the Atlantic seaboard. Here the winter was spent studying and preparing for the journey on the Missouri River. On March 16, 1833, the journey was resumed and they arrived in St. Louis before the fur-trading expeditions had left on their annual trip to the northwest. Following the advice of several St. Louis men, the journey was made by boat up the Missouri River, instead of by land, as was at first planned. On April 10 the journey was commenced, and by the twenty-second they had reached Fort Leavenworth. The expedition was continued to Fort McKenzie, on a branch of the Yellowstone River, among the Blackfeet Indians, where they remained for two months. The return trip was begun on September 14, and the succeeding winter was spent at Fort Clark, near the present town of Bismarck, North Dakota. The next spring Prince Maximilian returned to St Louis and journeyed eastward by way of the Ohio canal and Lake Erie to New York, where he embarked for the Old World on July 16, 1834. Upon returning from the upper Missouri country the collections which had been made were left behind to be sent down the river in another steamer which was soon to follow the one carrying the party. A fire broke out on this steamer and