Page:The story of geographical discovery.djvu/142

 138 Sacramento valley. The land between California and Alaska was held in joint possession between Great Britain and the States, and was known as the Oregon Territory. Lewis and Clarke had explored the Columbia River, while Vancouver had much earlier examined the island which now bears his name, so that both countries appear to have some rights of discovery to the district. At one time the inhabitants of the States were inclined to claim all the country as far as the Russian boundary 54.40°, and a war-cry arose "54.40° or fight;" but in 1846 the territory was divided by the 49th parallel, and at this date we may say the partition of America was complete, and all that remained to be known of it was the ice-bound northern coast, over which so much heroic enterprise has been displayed.

The history of geographical discovery in America is thus in large measure a history of conquest. Men got to know both coast-line and interior while endeavouring either to trade or to settle where nature was propitious, or the country afforded mineral or vegetable wealth that could be easily transported. Of the coast early knowledge was acquired for geography; but where the continent broadens out either north or south, making the interior inaccessible for trade purposes with the coasts, ignorance remained even down to the nineteenth century. Even to the present day the country south of the valley of the Amazon is perhaps as little known as any portion of the earth's surface, while, as we have seen, it was not till the early years of the nineteenth century that any knowledge was acquired of the huge tract oi country between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains. It was the natural expansion of the