"But let not the reader suppose that the pilgrim of the wilderness could feast his imagination with the romantic beauties of nature, without any drawback from conflicting passions. His situation did not afford him much time for contemplation. He was an exile from the warm clothing and plentiful mansions of society. His homely woodman's dress soon became old and ragged. The cravings of hunger compelled him to sustain from day to day the fatigues of the chase. Often he had to eat his venison, bear's meat, or wild turkey without bread or salt. His situation was not without its dangers. He did not know at what moment his foot might be stung by a serpent, at what moment he might meet with the formidable bear, or on what limb of a tree over his head the murderous panther might be perched, in a squatting attitude, to drop down upon him and tear him in pieces in a moment. "Exiled from society and its comforts, the situation of the first adventurers was perilous in the extreme. The bite of a serpent, a broken limb, a wound of any kind, or a fit of sickness in the wilderness without those accommodations which wounds and sickness require, was a dreadful calamity. The bed of sickness, without medical aid, and above all to be destitute of the kind attention of a mother, sister, wife, or other female friends, was a situation which could not be anticipated by the tenant of the forest, with other sentiments than those of the deepest horror."[D] [Footnote D: Doddridge's Notes.] There are no narratives of more thrilling interest than those which describe the perils and hair-breadth escapes which some of these bold hunters encountered. Immediately after the purchase of Louisiana, an expedition under Lewis and Clark was fitted out, under President Jefferson's administration, to explore the vast, mysterious, undefined realms which the government had purchased. In the month of May, 1804, the expedition, in birch canoes, commenced the ascent of the Missouri river. They knew not whence its source, what its length or the number of its tributaries, through what regions of fertility or barrenness it flowed, or what the character of the nations who might inhabit its banks. Paddling up the rapid current of this flood of waters in their frail boats, the ascent was slow. By the latter part of October they had reached a point fifteen hundred miles above the spot where the Missouri enters the Mississippi. Here they spent the winter with some friendly Indians called the Mandans.