"Tabba bone, tabba bone." Stripping up his sleeve he showed to the amazed woman the first white skin she had ever seen.
"Call your companion," motioned Lewis toward the fleeing woman.
The old dame raised her voice. As fast as she ran away the young woman came running back, almost out of breath. She, too, was loaded with trinkets, and the cheeks of all were painted with vermilion, the Shoshone emblem of peace.
Without fear now she led him toward sixty mounted warriors, who were advancing at a gallop as to battle.
"Tabba bone! tabba bone!" explained the women, introducing the stranger and exhibiting their gifts.
"Ah hi e! Ah hi e!"—"I am much pleased! I am much pleased!" exclaimed the warriors, leaping from their horses and embracing Lewis with great cordiality.
Lewis drew forth his imposing calumet of red pipestone and lighted it. This was a sign language of all tribes.
Putting off their moccasins as if to say, "May I walk the forest barefoot forever if I break this pledge of friendship," they sat down and smoked.
The chief, too, brought out a pipe, of the dense transparent green stone of the Bannock Mountains, highly polished. Another led him to a lodge and presented a piece of salmon,—then Lewis no longer doubted that he was on waters flowing to the Pacific.
Slowly, Clark, ill with chills and fever, had been coming forward, urging the canoes up the difficult and narrowing stream.