THE OLD PARTNERS TAKE LEAVE.



  -Meek was packed back to camp, along with the furs,
where he soon recovered.  Sublette arrived from  St.
Louis with fourteen wagons loaded with merchandise, and
two hundred additional men for the service. Jackson also
arrived from the Snake country with plenty of beaver,
and the business of the yearly rendezvous began. Then
the scenes previously described were re-enacted. Beaver,
the currency of the mountains, was plenty that year, and
goods were high accordingly. A thousand dollars a day
was not too much for some of the most reckless to spend
on their squaws, horses, alcohol, and themselves. For
"alcohol~ "was the beverage of the mountaineers. Liquors
could not be furnished to the men in that country. Pure
alcohol was what they "got tight on;" and a desperate
tight it was, to be sure!
  An important change took place in the affairs of the
Rocky Mountain Company at this rendezvous. The three
partners, Smith, Sublette, and Jackson, sold out to a new
firm, consisting of Milton Sublette, James Bridger, Fitz-
patrick, Frapp, and Jervais; the new company retaining
the same name and style as the old.
  The old partners left for St. Louis, with a company of
seventy men, to convoy the furs. Two of them never re-
turned to the Rocky Mountains; one of them, Smith, be-
ing killed the following year, as will hereafter be related;
and Jackson remaining in St. Louis, where, like a true
mountain-man, he dissipated his large and hard-earned.
fortune in a few years. Captain Sublette, however, con-
tinued to mak-e his annual trips to and from the mountains
for a number of years; and until the consolidation of an-
other wealthy company with the Rocky Mountain Com-
pany, continued to furnish goods to the latter, at a profit
on St. Louis prices; his capital and experience enabling
him to keep the new firm under his control to a large
degree.



89