Page:The Conquest.djvu/316

 West, a king of the fur trade, first rival and then partner of John Jacob Astor.

No wonder the home-coming of Lewis and Clark was the signal for enterprises such as this country had never yet seen. They had penetrated a realm whose monarch was the grizzly bear, whose queen was the beaver, whose armies were Indian tribes and the buffalo.

Gallic love of gaiety and amusement found in this return ample opportunity for the indulgence of hospitable dancing and feasting. Every door was open. Every house, from Chouteau's down, had its guest out of the gallant thirty-one.

Hero-worship was at its height. Hero-worship is characteristic of youthful, progressive peoples. Whole nations strive to emulate ideals. The moment that ceases, ossification begins.

Here the ideals were Lewis and Clark. They had been west; their men had been west. They, who had traced the Missouri to its cradle in the mountains, who had smoked the calumet with remotest tribes, who had carried the flag to the distant Pacific, became the lions of St. Louis.

Such spontaneous welcome made a delightful impression upon the hearts of the young Captains, and they felt a strong inclination to make the city their permanent home.

The galleries of the little inns of St. Louis were filled with Frenchmen, smoking and telling stories all day long. Nothing hurried, nothing worried them; the rise of the river, the return of a brigade, alone broke the long summer day of content.

But here was something new.

Even York, addicted to romance, told Munchausen tales of thrilling incidents that never failed of an appreciative audience. Trappers, flat-boatmen, frontiersmen, and Frenchmen loved to spin long yarns at the Green Tree Inn, but York could outdo them all. He had been to the ocean, had seen the great whale and sturgeon that put all inland fish stories far into the shade.

Petrie, Auguste Chouteau's old negro, who cam