William Clark

“ In a despotic country the people sleep. Here every nerve was awake. Discussion, discussion, discussion, made every fireside a school of politics; even boys in buckskin considered the nation's welfare.
Before he was seventeen William Clark was made an ensign and proudly donned the eagle and blue ribbon of the Cincinnati, a society of the soldiers of the Revolution of which Washington himself was president. Educated in the backwoods and by the cabin firelight, young William was already developing the striking bearing and bold unwavering character of his brother. ”

“ This time it was little York, the negro, who, peeping from the slave quarters of old York and Rose, detected the stride of George Rogers Clark out under the mulberry trees.
The long, low, Virginia farmhouse was wrapped in slumber, an almost funeral pall hung over the darkened porch, as John Clark stepped out to grasp the hand of his son.
"Three of my boys in British prisons, we looked for nothing less for you, George. William alone is left."
"Girls do not count, I suppose," laughed the saucy Lucy, peeping out in her night-curls with a candle in her hand. ”

“ It is the custom of all the nations on the Missouri, to offer to every white man food and refreshment when he first enters their tents.
Captain Clarke returned to the boats, where he found the chief of the lower village, who had cut off part of his hair, and disfigured himself in such a manner that we did not recognise him at first, until he explained that he was in mourning for his nephew, who had been killed by the Sioux. He proceeded with us to the village on the island, where we were met by all the inhabitants. ”

“ At daylight, loosely belting their fringed hunting shirts into wallets for carrying bread, a chunk of jerked beef, or tow for the gun, with tomahawk on the right side and scalping knife on the left, each in a leathern case, again they set off under the reddening forest.
Skilled in the lore of woodcraft, watchful of clouds and stars and sun, an intimate student of insect life and own brother to the wily beaver, bear, and buffalo, William Clark was becoming a scientist. ”

“ As his brother had done at the close of the Revolution, so now William Clark sent to the tribes to make peace after the War of 1812.
"No person ought to be lazy to be de bearer of such good news," said old Antoine Le Claire, the interpreter.
Up the rivers and toward the Lakes, runners carried the word of the Red Head Chief, "Come, come to St. Louis!"
To the clay huts of the sable Pawnees of the Platte, to the reed wigwams of the giant Osages, to the painted lodges of the Omahas, and to the bark tents of the Chippewas, went "peace talks" and gifts and invitations. ”

“ Jumping in as the last boat pulled out of Pittsburg, Captain William Linn handed Clark a letter. He broke the seal.
"Ye gods, the very stars are for us! The French have joined America!"
With strange exhilaration the little band felt themselves borne down the swift-rushing waters to the Falls of the Ohio.
Before them blossomed a virgin world. Clark paused while the boats clustered round. "Do you see that high, narrow, rocky island at the head of the rapids? It is safe from the Indian. While the troops erect a stockade and blockhouse, let the families clear a field and plant their corn." ”

“ On July 7, 1700, Clark, and his fellow-pupil, William Croft, were sworn in as gentlemen extraordinary of the Chapel Royal, with the joint reversion of an organist's place, whenever one should fall vacant, a contingency which happened on May 15, 1704, by the death of Francis Piggott, on which Clark and Croft were on May 25 sworn in as joint organists. Clark, having the misfortune to become enamoured of a lady whose position in life rendered his union with her hopeless, fell into a state of despondency, under the influence of which he shot himself. ”

“ Assuming therefore a serious air, he told the chief that he was sorry to find they placed so little confidence in him, but that he pardoned their suspicions because they were ignorant of the character of white men, among whom it was disgraceful to lie or entrap even an enemy by falsehood; that if they continued to think thus meanly of us they might be assured no white men would ever come to supply them with arms and merchandize; that there was at this moment a party of white men waiting to trade with them at the forks of the river ”

“ All the wampum and feathers are painted red. Our war-pipes and hatchets are red. Even the tobacco is red for war."
"My mind and heart are upon that river," said Cornplanter, an Indian chief, pointing to the Ohio. "May that water ever continue to be the boundary between the Americans and the Indians."
Commissioned by Washington First Lieutenant of the Fourth Sub-Legion, on the first of September, 1792, William Clark crossed the Ohio and spent the winter at Legionville where Wayne was collecting and drilling his army. ”

“ The mosquitoes, gnats, and prickly pear, our three persecutors, still continue with [320] us, and joined with the labour of working the canoes have fatigued us all excessively. Captain Clarke continued along the Indian road which led him up a creek. About ten o'clock he saw at the distance of six miles a horse feeding in the plains. He went towards him, but the animal was so wild that he could not get within several hundred paces of him: he then turned obliquely to the river where he killed a deer and dined, having passed in this valley five handsome streams, only one of which had any timber ”

“ Clark’s first experience with the Kid was on June 3, 1887, two days after his shooting of Al Sieber. At the time, Clark was living at his ranch, the Oak Grove, in the Galiura mountains, about twelve miles east of the San Pedro river, but was absent, his two partners, John Scanlan and William Diehl, being at home. ”

“ More and more frequently the old cavalier retired to his rustic arbour in the garden.
"I must hunt up father, he will take cold," William would say; and there on a moonlight night, on his knees in prayer, the old man would be found, among the cedars and honeysuckles of Mulberry Hill.
"Why do you dislike old John Clark," some one asked of a neighbour when the venerable man lay on his death-bed.
"What? I dislike old John Clark? I revere and venerate him. His piety and virtues may have been a reproach, but I reverence and honour old John Clark." ”

“ It was the middle of February, 1807, before captain Lewis, with his companion captain Clarke, reached the city of Washington, where congress was then in session. That body granted to the two chiefs and their followers the donation of lands which they had been encouraged to expect in reward of their toil and dangers. Captain Lewis was soon after appointed governor of Louisiana, and captain Clarke a general of its militia, and agent of the United States for Indian affairs in that department. ”

“ Major William Croghan stood with him on the wharf at Pittsburg, burning, longing to go, but honour forbade,—he was out on parole from Charleston.
Peeping, spying, gliding, Indians down the Ohio would have attacked but for fear of Clark's cannon. The "rear guard of the Continental army" little knew the young Virginian, the terror of his name. For him, Canada staid at home to guard Detroit when she might have wrested Yorktown.
With shouts of thanksgiving Louisville greeted Clark and his four hundred; the war had come up to their very doors. Never had the Indians so hammered away at the border. ”

“ Clark passed the river with the two interpreters, the indian woman and nine men in order to trade with the natives for their horses, for which purpose he took with him a good part of our stock of merchandize. I remained in camp; sent out the hunters very early in the morning, and set Sergts. Gass and Pryor with some others at work to make a parsel of packsaddles. twelve horses will be sufficient to transport our baggage and some pounded fish which we intend taking with us as a reserved store for the rocky mountains. ”

“ As an acute thinker, an eloquent and splendid speaker, possessing rare intellectual gifts, fine education with large culture, a moral nature full of sympathy and benevolence for all mankind, Peter H. Clark [Pg 523] justly stands in the foremost rank of the noted men of his race. Although not an old man, Mr. Clark has, for the past quarter of a century, taken a prominent part in all of the great conventions called to consider the condition, and the best means for the moral, social, and political elevation of the colored population of the United States. ”

“ Clark therefore deturmined to continue his rout down the river even as far as the River bullet unless he should find a plenty of game nearer—The men transported their baggage on a couple of small wooden Slays drawn by themselves, and took with them 3 pack horses which we had agreed should be returned with a load of meat to fort mandane as soon as they could procure it. no buffaloe have made their appearance in our neighbourhood for some weeks; and I am informed that our Indian neighbours-suffer extreemly at this moment for the article of flesh. ”

“ To do justice to Professor Clark's personal characteristics-his charm of manner, his keen, refined sense of humour, his lovable disposition, and his generosity of heart-were impossible. He was a gentleman of the courtly old school, whom it was a delight to meet, and with whom it was an inspiration and education to converse.
By the accession of such a man to its ranks, The Royal Society obtained the support of a skilled lecturer and one whose interests were ever in the highest planes of literature and life. ”

“ C. is their favorite phisician and has already received many applications. in our present situation I think it pardonable to continue this deseption for they will not give us any provision without compensation in merchandize and our stock is now reduced to a mere handfull. we take care to give them no article which can possibly oinjure them. we foud our Chopunnish guide at this lodge with his family. the indians brought us Capt. Clark's horse from the oposite side of the river and delivered him to us while here. ”

“ Clark set out early. found the river shoally, rapid shallow, and extreemly difficult. the men in the water almost all day. they are geting weak soar and much fortiegued; they complained of the fortiegue to which the navigation subjected them and wished to go by land Capt. C. engouraged them and passifyed them. one of the canoes was very near overseting in a rapid today. they proceeded but slowly. at noon they had a thunderstorm which continued about half an hour. their hunters killed 3 deer and a fawn. they encamped in a smoth plain near a few cottonwood trees on the Lard. ”

“ The work by which he is best known is the Cambridge Shakespeare (1863–1866) , containing a collation of early editions and selected emendations, edited by him at first with John Glover and afterwards with W. Aldis Wright. Gazpacho (1853) gives an account of his tour in Spain; his visits to Italy at the time of Garibaldi’s insurrection, and to Poland during the insurrection of 1863, are described in Vacation Tourists, ed. F. Galton, i. and iii.
H. A. J. Munro in Journal of Philology (viii. 1879) describes Clark as “the most accomplished and versatile man he ever met” ”

“ As a preacher and a public lecturer Professor Clark was very highly esteemed, and his many engagements in these capacities served to make Trinity College favourably known far and near. His sermons were models of forceful argument, logical presentation, and perfect diction, as well as being full of spiritual power. In his class room work and on the public platform he showed not only brilliancy but remarkable versatility, as he did also in his literary productions, which embrace Theology, History and Literature. ”

“ These antiquarian vagaries were not in themselves of any harm, but unfortunately Clark advocated them with an energy worthy of a better cause, and thus through him two utterly unfounded ideas were very generally accepted as true. Much more useful were Clark's endeavours to obtain for the singing men and choristers of cathedrals the ancient privileges of which in course of time they had been deprived. In 1841 he returned once more to the subject of John Bull, and issued a prospectus for the publication of all the extant works of the Elizabethan composer. ”

“ Clark by institutions of learning, are the degrees of Doctor of Civil Law, conferred by Trinity College, Toronto: Doctor of Divinity, conferred by Queen's University, Kingston: and Doctor of Laws conferred by Hobart College, Geneva; his appointment by the University of Michigan to be Baldwin lecturer in 1887, and Slocum lecturer in 1889; his appointment as Honorary Professor of Hobart College, Geneva, in 1888; his election in 1891 as Fellow of The Royal Society of Canada and in 1900 as President of the Society. ”

“ Three considerable bodies of men led into the heart of their country by General Clark between the years 1779 and 1786convinced them that their union with the Miamis could not afford them the safety and protection which was no doubt the object of it and several conferences were held between General Clark and his officers and their chiefs which resulted in the establishment of peace between them and the United States. ”

“ Clark observed the remains of five other large houses which appeared to have been sunk in the ground several feet and built after the method of those of the Elutes nation at the great narrows of the columbia with whom these people claim affinity. their language is the same with the Elutes, tho in their habits, dress manners &c they differ but little from the Quathlahpohtles and others in this neighborhood. they make use of some words common to their neighbours but the air of their language is entirely different. they are much better formed and their men larger than the nations below. ”