apply the official guillotine, and thereafter pursued him with
uncompromising hostility. Of favoritism in appointments Mr. Gallatin
could not be accused. During his twelve years in the Treasury he
procured places for but two friends; one was given an obscure clerkship
in the department; the other, John Badollet, was made register in the
land office at Vincennes, against whom Gallatin said in the application
for appointment which he reluctantly made, there was but one objection,
"that of being his personal and college friend."

The dispositions for the sale of lands in the western territory, the
extinguishment of titles, and the surveys fell under Mr. Gallatin's
general supervision, and were the objects of his particular care. So
also was the establishment of the authority of the United States in the
Louisiana territory. In the course of these arrangements he was brought
into contact with Mr. Pierre Choteau of St. Louis, who controlled the
Indian trade of a vast territory. The foundation of an intimate
acquaintance was then laid. The influence of this remarkable man over
the Western Indians and the extent of his trading operations with them
was great, and has never since been equaled. About this period Mr. John
Jacob Astor informed the government that he had an opportunity, of which
he intended to take advantage, to purchase one half of the interest of
the Canadian Fur Company, which, notwithstanding the treaty of 1794,
engrossed the trade by way of Michilimackinac with our own Indians.
Before that period this lucrative traffic had been exclusively in
British hands, and the hostility of the Indian tribes rendered any
interference in it by Americans dangerous to life and property, and
their participation since had been merely nominal. Jefferson's cabinet
received the proposal with satisfaction, but, in their strict
interpretation of the Constitution, could find no way of giving any aid
to the scheme beyond the _official_ promise of protection, which it fell
to Mr. Gallatin to draft. Mr. Jefferson wrote to Mr. Astor a letter to
the same effect. Mr. Astor, however, was not deterred from his
enterprise, but, under the charter of the American Fur Company granted
by the State of New York, extended his project to the Indians west of
the Rocky Mountains, and made of it an immense business, employing
several vessels at the mouth of the Columbia River and a large land
party beyond the Rocky Mountains. He finally founded the establi