t river and crossed the continent, it
went with traders and voyageurs as guides and interpreters. Indeed,
Jefferson first conceived the idea of such an expedition[55] from
contact with Ledyard, who was organizing a fur trading company in
France, and it was proposed to Congress as a means of fostering our
western Indian trade.[56] The first immigrant train to California was
incited by the representations of an Indian trader who had visited the
region, and it was guided by trappers.[57]

St. Louis was the center of the fur trade of the far West, and Senator
Benton was intimate with leading traders like Chouteau.[58] He urged the
occupation of the Oregon country, where in 1810 an establishment had for
a time been made by the celebrated John Jacob Astor; and he fostered
legislation opening the road to the southwestern Mexican settlements
long in use by the traders. The expedition of his son-in-law Fremont was
made with French voyageurs, and guided to the passes by traders who had
used them before.[59] Benton was also one of the stoutest of the early
advocates of a Pacific railway.

But the Northwest[60] was particularly the home of the fur trade, and
having seen that this traffic was not an isolated or unimportant matter,
we may now proceed to study it in detail with Wisconsin as the field of
investigation.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 41: Charter of 1606.]

[Footnote 42: Ramsay, Tennessee, 63.]

[Footnote 43: On the Southwestern Indians see Adair, American Indians.]

[Footnote 44: Ramsay, 75.]

[Footnote 45: Spottswood's Letters, Virginia Hist. Colls., N.S., I.,
67.]

[Footnote 46: Byrd Manuscripts, I., 180. The reader will find a
convenient map for the southern region in Roosevelt, Winning of the
West, I.]

[Footnote 47: Spottswood's Letters, I., 40; II., 149, 150.]

[Footnote 48: Ramsay, 64. Note the bearing of this route on the Holston
settlement.]

[Footnote 49: Georgia Historical Collections, I., 180; II., 123-7.]

[Footnote 50: Spottswood. II., 331, for example.]

[Footnote 51: Ramsay, 65.]

[Footnote 52: Boone, Life and Adventures.]

[Footnote 53: Observations on the North American Land Co., pp. xv., 144,
London, 1796.]

[Footnote 54: Margry, VI.]

[Footnote 55: Allen, Lewis and Clarke Expedition, I., ix.; _vide post_,
pp. 70-71.]

[Footnote 56: _Vide post_, p. 71.]

[Footnote 57: _Century Magazine_, XLI., 759.]

[Footnote 58: Jessie Benton Fremont in _Century Magazine_, XLI., 766-7.]

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