[18] The French Canadians are called wah-keitcha—“bad medicine”—by the Indians, who account them treacherous and vindictive, and at the same time less daring than the American hunters.
[19] A substance obtained from a gland in the scrotum of the beaver, and used to attract that animal to the trap.
[20] The Hudson's Bay Company is so called by the American trappers.
[21] A small lake near the head waters of the Yellow Stone, near which are some curious thermal springs of ink-black water.
[22] The Aztecs are supposed to have built this city during their migration to the south; there is little doubt, however, but that the region extending from the Gila to the Great Salt Lake, and embracing the province of New Mexico, was the locality from which they emigrated.
[23] Creoles of St Louis, and French Canadians.
[24] “On the prairie,” is the Indian term for a free gift.
[25] Hide—from cacher.
[26] Carrion.
[27] In Frémont's expedition to California, on a somewhat similar occasion, two mountaineers, one the celebrated Kit Carson, the other a St Louis Frenchman named Godey, and both old trappers, performed a feat surpassing the one described above, inasmuch as they were but two. They charged into an Indian village to rescue some stolen horses, and avenge the slaughter of two New Mexicans who had been butchered by the Indians; both which objects they effected, returning to camp with the lost animals and a couple of propitiatory scalps.