The meeting of these two hardened hunters -- one from the mountains and the other fresh from the white man's world, was an event that called for liberal libations, and much genialty.

Being admonished of the urgent need of haste, Sublette left his famous old cow and she was never seen again. Spurred onward, he made the six hundred miles to Pierre's Hole in thirty-two days.

The party picked up the remnant of Gant & Blackwell's trappers at the Laramie, fording the Platte at that point.

WYETH, OF "CAPE COD BAY," AND HIS "DOWN EASTERS'

When William Sublette was coming up the Missouri river in the spring of ;1832, the boat stopped at Independence and took on a party of New Englanders. This party had little to commend it to the mountains except its purpose and the indomitable will of its members. Otherwise they were wholly unfitted for mountain, adventure, by liack of experience, equipment, knowledge of Indians, habits of wild game, or even the use of firearms.

This was Nathaniel J. Wyeth, of Boston and his "down easters." Wyeth learned where Sublette and party were bound, and with the directness and frankness of the New Englander character he told him his purpose and dilemma. Sublette readily agreed that the two parties travel together. On the way across the prairies. Sublette's experienced hunters had taught the New Englanders how to hunt, and much other necessary information of the wilderness, and by this time they were much better equipped for the emergencies of the mountains. Horses had been acquired at the mouth of the Platte, and the party were all well mounted and had plenty to pack their merchandise.