An intelligent officer,
with ten or twelve chosen men, fit for the enterprise and willing to
undertake it, taken from our posts where they may be spared without
inconvenience, might explore the whole line, even to the Western
Ocean, have conferences with the natives on the subject of commercial
intercourse, get admission among them for our traders as others are
admitted, agree on convenient deposits for an interchange of articles,
and return with the information acquired in the course of two summers.
Their arms and accouterments, some instruments of observation, and light
and cheap presents for the Indians would be all the apparatus they could
carry, and with an expectation of a soldier's portion of land on their
return would constitute the whole expense. Their pay would be going on
whether here or there. While other civilized nations have encountered
great expense to enlarge the boundaries of knowledge by undertaking
voyages of discovery, and for other literary purposes, in various parts
and directions, our nation seems to owe to the same object, as well
as to its own interests, to explore this the only line of easy
communication across the continent, and so directly traversing our own
part of it. The interests of commerce place the principal object within
the constitutional powers and care of Congress, and that it should
incidentally advance the geographical knowledge of our own continent
can not but be an additional gratification.
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