The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1893-12-26

nc Lhhtn ny u
glance backward-not forward.
In his very young manhood Fremont was
in training for the life of an explorer. He
was an assistant to the government engi-
neers who reconnoitered the Cherokee
country of Tennessee and the Carolinas in
anticipation of war and became at home in
wilScountres among border men and saw
ages, He saw the untutored Indian in
bloody trays endure slashing and stabbng
from keen knife blades with the stoicism
of schoolboys in SNOWFALL battles What
was wasted valor for them would be glori-
Gus courage when displayed by white men
for noble purpose. His outdoor life and
exercise Injured his body to exposure, while
his application to technical problems fitted
;. him to be a leader.
al % years of age he had ridden in a
Charge on buffalo herd and fought
mounted with enraged bulls in the crush
of frantic, trampliug horned beasts AT that
age, in his earliest expeditions, he would Sc
lect three or four men of his company and
travel ahead among savages, taking the
hardest route on the theory that possible
disaster should be shared by the fewest
number When at Fort Laramie in his first
expedition. in 1872, friendly Indians warned
him not to set out across the hostile lands
between the Platte and the Rockies.
Their predictions, though well meant and
apparently well founded, were ignored, and
the expedition numbering but 26 men went
ahead, meeting no hostiles but nearly per-
ishing from starvation. The grasshoppers
had stripped the country of forage and the
buffalo had fled to other pastures. When
the party reached Wind River mountains
both men and animals were exhausted by
hardshps and want of food But Fremont
was unwilling to rest satisfied with a hasty
glance over the region which gives birth to
the four great rivers of the west--the Col
,erado, Columbia, Missouri and Platte
The men subsisted wholly upon dried
buffalo meat cooked in tallow. Hostile
Blackfeet roamed the hills and guarded
the passes. a palisade and breastwork
was built in "A dense grove, and the men
most in need OF rest We're left there, while
the leader and fourteen of the hardest, in
Guiding Carson, the doughty guide, toiled
up the mountain sleeps. The lofty peaks
were deceptive, aud the bold travellers
found the way barred by lakes which com
PEELED them to make wide detours huge
powders barricaded the mountain slopes
and deep and impossible chasms yawnel
before them.
One by one the men and mules gave out
and were left to rest and make their way
back to camp. Five men only assembled the
peak, clambering over frozen snow-al-
though it was August-shod in moccasns
so thin that the toes could he used in max
ing firm foothold. On the 18th of the
month Fremont and four companions
hoisted the stars and stripes on the highest
peak of Wind River mountains, 3,575 feet
above their main camp, 2, 80 feet above the
lakes at the base of the range and 1880
feet above the sea.
Numerous adventures followed and the
party returned by the way of Fort Laramie
to st. Louis, and Fremont was ordered to
cross the Rockies and explore as far as the
Pacific With 80 men, he started in May,
1913. followed the emigrant trail across the
Kansas, keeping south of Fort Laramie to
the Platte and Sweetwater through the
South pass. The northern end of the Great
Salt Lake was explored from the Bear
liver, and the party was reduced to 2S
tpiclled men who set out for the Columbia
Srhey We're well equipped and carried along
"a mountain howitzer which kept in awe
the warlke Arupahoes Cheyennes and
Shoshones. The different tribes demanded
tribute and massacres were averted only
by shrewdness or bold tactics
At one of the crossings of the Columbia
the scouts reported the ford covered by a
village of Indians encamped on the bank.