expedition.[17]

[Footnote 17: Thirty Years View, vol. ii. chap. 134.]

"'The government deserves credit for the zeal with which it has
pursued geographical discovery.' Such is the remark which a leading
paper made upon the discoveries of Fremont, on his return from his
second expedition to the great West; and such is the remark which
all writers will make upon all his discoveries who write history
from public documents and outside views. With all such writers the
expeditions of Fremont will be credited to the zeal of the government
for the promotion of science, as if the government under which he
acted had conceived and planned these expeditions, as Mr. Jefferson
did that of Lewis and Clark, and then selected this young officer
to carry into effect the instructions delivered to him. How far such
history would be true in relation to the first expedition, which
terminated in the Rocky Mountains, has been seen in the account which
has been given of the origin of that undertaking, and which leaves the
government innocent of its conception; and, therefore, not entitled to
the credit of its authorship, but only to the merit of permitting it.
In the second, and greater expedition, from which great political as
well as scientific results have flowed, their merit is still less;
for, while equally innocent of its conception, they were not equally
passive to its performance--countermanding the expedition after it had
begun--and lavishing censure upon the adventurous young explorer for
his manner of undertaking it. The fact was, that his first expedition
barely finished, Mr. Fremont sought and obtained orders for a second
one, and was on the frontier of Missouri with his command when orders
arrived at St. Louis to stop him, on the ground that he had made
a military equipment which the peaceful nature of his geographical