This was too much for Senator John Quincy Adams, who wrote a parody ridiculing Jefferson as a “philosopher” and a man absurdly credulous. Adams wrote about what Lewis did not find: mammoth or mammoth bones, Welsh Indians, salt mountain. As far as Adams was concerned, Lewis was extravagant in his storytelling: What marvels on the way he found He’ll tell you, if inclin’d, sir— But what really set Adams off was Barlow’s proposal to rename the Columbia: Let old Columbus be once more Degraded from his glory; And not a river by his name Remember him in story— For what is old Discovery Compar’d to
...more
