Even the earth gave up its treasure, and they found the first of the famous petrifactions of the trans-Missouri region in the back-bone of a fish forty-five feet long, in a perfect state.
| A Blackfoot Tepee. |
Game gradually grew plentiful as they ascended the river. Buffalo was not seen till the Big Sioux was reached, but later fifteen herds and three bands of elk were visible at one time, and near Mandan large flocks of goats were seen crossing from their summer grazing grounds to find west of the Missouri winter shelter in the hilly regions. As they passed the Indians drove large flocks of migrating goats into the river, where even boys killed the helpless animals by scores with sticks. Indeed, the Missouri then appears to have been a hunter’s paradise, for there are mentioned among the regular game antelope, bear, beaver, buffalo, badger, deer, elk, goats, and porcupine. Three thousand antelope were seen at one time, and of this animal Lewis accurately remarks: “The antelope possesses most wonderful swiftness, the acuteness of their sight distinguishes the most distant danger, the delicate sensibility of their smell defeats the precautions of concealment, and when alarmed their rapid career seems more like the flight of birds than the movements of an earthly being.”
The river furnished abundant supply of cat and buffalo fish, and feathered game, such as plover, grouse, geese, turkeys, ducks, and pelican, also abounded; among the vegetable products are enumerated several kinds of grapes, currants and plums, wild apples, billberries, cherries, gooseberries, mulberries, raspberries, acorns, and hazel-nuts.
As regards the voyage thus far, it was true that the sail could rarely be used, that the labor of propelling the boats by oar or pole was most laborious, and that the shallows gave great trouble; but the Indians, save a single threatening occasion, were most friendly, and the only death, that of Sergeant Floyd, was from acute disease. Indeed, the journey had been most attractive and free from special hazard, and when rapidly advancing winter obliged them to go into permanent quarters, on October 27th, it seemed rather a long hunting excursion than a dangerous voyage of discovery.
Their winter quarters, called Fort Mandan, were on the eastern side of the Missouri, sixteen hundred miles from St. Louis, and in latitude 47° 22´ N., a short distance above the present city of Bismarck. The buildings were wooden huts, which joined and formed two sides of a triangle, while the third side was of pickets. As the huts opened inward, they had a stockaded place easy of defence.
On his arrival at Fort Mandan, Lewis found a Mr. McCracken, of the Hudson Bay Company, engaged in trading for horses and buffalo robes. During the winter ten or twelve different traders of this company visited Mandan, and although one bore a letter from the chief factor, Mr. Charles Chabouilles, offering any service in his power, yet it was evident to Lewis that these traders were cultivating sentiments unfriendly to Americans among the Indians, and Chaboneau, the interpreter was tampered with; but the prompt and judicious action of Lewis resulted in apologies and promises to refrain from such conduct in future. Laroche, one of the Hudson Bay traders, desired to go west with the expedition, but it was thought best to decline the offer. At this time the nearest English trading-post was at the forks of the Assiniboin, about one hundred and fifty miles distant by the way of Mouse River.
The stay at Fort Mandan was marked by two sad experiences for the Indians encamped near the post: an autumnal prairie fire which burned two Indians to death, and an attack of the Sioux, wherein one Mandan was killed and two wounded. A Frenchman, Jesseaume, living with the Indians, served as interpreter, and they learned much of the Mandans, Rickarees, and Minnetarees. The Rickarees appeared in a very sensible light by refusing spirits, with the remark that they did not use it, and were surprised that their father should present to them a liquor which would make them fools. The sensibilities of these Indians in their peculiar way appeared in a chief who cried bitterly at seeing a court-martial sentence of flogging carried out on a soldier. The chief acknowledged the necessity of exemplary punishment, and said that for the same offence he had killed his braves, but that he never whipped any one, not even children.
The Mandans, through intervention, made peace with the Rickarees, and restored traps and furs which they had taken from French hunters. During the entire winter these Indian tribes were most friendly, and their stores of corn, obtained by the expeditionary force by trade or purchase, were of material benefit to the party. The negro was a constant source of wonder to the crowds of Indians who visited them. The one-eyed great chief of the Minnetarees said that some foolish young men had told him there was a person quite black. When York, the negro, appeared, the one-eyed savage, much surprised, examined the negro closely, and spitting on a finger rubbed the skin in order to wash off the paint, and it was not until the negro showed his curly hair that the Indian could be persuaded he was not a painted white man.
Game, though at some distance, was abundant, and seventy head of large animals were obtained in a hunt of ten days. With regard to the Indians Lewis says: “A camp of Mandans caught within two days one hundred goats a short distance below us. Their mode of hunting them is to form a large strong pen or fold, from which a fence is made of bushes gradually widening on each side; the animals are surrounded by the hunters and gently driven toward this pen, in which they imperceptibly find themselves enclosed, and are then at the mercy of the hunters.