Cerre, his other leader, had likewise been in expeditions to Santa Fe, in which he had endured much hardship.  He was of the middle size, light complexioned, and though but about twenty-five years of age, was considered an experienced Indian trader.  It was a great object with Captain Bonneville to get to the mountains before the summer heats and summer flies should render the travelling across the prairies distressing; and before the annual assemblages of people connected with the fur trade should have broken up, and dispersed to the hunting grounds.

The two rival associations already mentioned, the American Fur Company and the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, had their several places of rendezvous for the present year at no great distance apart, in Pierre’s Hole, a deep valley in the heart of the mountains, and thither Captain Bonneville intended to shape his course.

It is not easy to do justice to the exulting feelings of the worthy captain at finding himself at the head of a stout band of hunters, trappers, and woodmen; fairly launched on the broad prairies, with his face to the boundless West.  The tamest inhabitant of cities, the veriest spoiled child of civilization, feels his heart dilate and his pulse beat high on finding himself on horseback in the glorious wilderness; what then must be the excitement of one whose imagination had been stimulated by a residence on the frontier, and to whom the wilderness was a region of romance!

His hardy followers partook of his excitement.  Most of them had already experienced the wild freedom of savage life, and looked forward to a renewal of past scenes of adventure and exploit.  Their very appearance and equipment exhibited a piebald mixture, half civilized and half savage.  Many of them looked more like Indians than white men in their garbs and accoutrements, and their very horses were caparisoned in barbaric style, with fantastic trappings.  The outset of a band of adventurers on one of these expeditions is always animated and joyous.  The welkin rang with their shouts and yelps, after the manner of the savages; and with boisterous jokes and light-hearted laughter.  As they passed the straggling hamlets and solitary cabins that fringe the skirts of the frontier, they would startle their inmates by Indian yells and war-whoops, or regale them with grotesque feats of horsemanship, well suited to their half-savage appearance.  Most of these abodes were inhabited by men who had themselves been in similar expeditions; they welcomed the travellers, therefore, as brother trappers, treated them with a hunter’s hospitality, and cheered them with an honest God speed at parting.

And here we would remark a great difference, in point of character and quality, between the two classes of trappers, the “American” and “French,” as they are called in contradistinction.  The latter is meant to designate the French creole of Canada or Louisiana; the former, the trapper of the old American stock, from Kentucky, Tennessee, and others of the western States.  The French trapper is represented as a lighter, softer, more self-indulgent kind of man.  He must have his Indian wife, his lodge, and his petty conveniences.  He is gay and thoughtless, takes little heed of landmarks, depends upon his leaders and companions to think for the common weal, and, if left to himself, is easily perplexed and lost.