tribe. We have never been to
the sea ourselves.' 'Do not be surprised,' he continued, 'to see so
many Indians camped round us. Word has been sent in all directions to
our people to join us here. In a few days we shall march against the
Snakes; and if you will come with us, we will take you to the high
mountains that are near the sea. From their summits you will be able
to look upon it.' The brothers La Verendrye were overjoyed to hear
such encouraging news, and agreed that one of them should accompany the
Bow Indians on their expedition against the Snakes. It seemed almost
too good to be true that they might be actually within reach of the
sea, the goal towards which they and their father had been struggling
for so many years. In fact, it proved too good to be true. Whether
they had misunderstood the chief, or whether he was merely speaking
from hearsay, certainly the view was far from correct that the
mountains which they were approaching lay near the sea. These
mountains, not far off, were the Rocky Mountains. Even if the
explorers should succeed in reaching and in crossing them at {81} this
point, there would still be hundreds of miles of mountain forest and
plain to traverse before their eyes could rest on the waters of the
Pacific ocean. Pierre and his brother never knew this, however, for
they were not destined to see the western side of the mountains.

The great war party of the Bows, consisting of more than two thousand
fighting men, with their families, started out towards the Snake
country in December, the comparatively mild December of the
south-western plains. The scene must have been singularly animated as
this horde of Indians, with their wives and children, their horses and
dogs, and the innumerable odds and ends that made up their camp
equipage, moved slowly across the plains. Francois was too full of his
own affairs to describe the odd appearance of this native army in the
journal which he wrote of the expedition, but fortunately the historian
Francis Parkman lived for some time among these tribes of the western
plains, and he has given us a good idea of what such an Indian army
must have looked like on the march. 'The spectacle,' he says, 'was
such as men still young have seen in these western lands, but which no
man will see again. The vast plain {82} swarmed with the moving
multitude. The tribes of the Missouri and the Yellowstone had by this
time abundance of horses, the best of wh