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Pike Explores the Arkansas Valley: Spaniards

Pike replied, "There are few of us here, but there are many of us where I come from. The Spaniards are many here, but few at home. We bring friendship and peace. You had best listen to us, and not to the Spaniards."

But the savages would not attend his councils, and looked on with sour faces when Pike raised the American flag in their villages. They probably thought he was trying to amuse them by some sort of game, but they refused to be amused.

After leaving the Pawnee villages, Pike's party continued its westward journey, going up the Arkansas River, looking for its source. Toward the beginning of winter they reached the Spanish Peaks, where the river, growing smaller all the time, finally was lost among the hills. They were now in the land that afterwards became Colorado.

Before them lay a lofty peak, which Pike determined to climb, that he might get a better view of the country. Day after day he struggled through the tangled brush, over gullies, and up the steep sides of the mountain. Every night brought him and his men nearer the top. Amid many difficulties, he reached a great altitude, and at last, on the very summit, saw the wonderful plains and prairies of Colorado spread before him.

The high point was afterwards named "Pike's Peak," in honor of the intrepid explorer. To-day, a railway track is laid to the top of the same mountain, and in summer many visitors take, in perfect comfort, the same wonderful climb that Pike and his men took with such hardship.

Winter now set in. The rivers began to freeze, the snow fell and covered the trails, the wood became too wet to burn, and Pike and his men endured untold misery. Trying to find his way back to the head waters of the Red River, he missed his way, and the party wandered like lost men through the hills, without shelter and often without food. Men with less courage and strength would have perished in the terrible hardships they endured.