[33] The Musselshell, a principal southern tributary of the Missouri, rises east of the Big Belt Mountains, and flows east and north-east, parallel to the Yellowstone; it thence makes an abrupt turn northward into the Missouri. Lewis and Clark give its Indian name as "Mah-tush-ahzhah."—Ed.
CHAPTER XVIII
VOYAGE FROM MUSCLESHELL RIVER TO FORT MC KENZIE, FROM JULY 28TH TO AUGUST 9TH
Grouse Creek—Teapot Creek—Meeting with some Persons belonging to the Company—The Skeleton of the Bear—Chase of the Prairie Dogs—Little Rocky Mountain Range—Elk Island, and successful Chase there—The Mauvaises Terres, a Continuation of the Blackhills—Elk Fawn and other Rapids—The Bighorn and Chase—Thompson's Creek, the West Boundary of the Mauvaises Terres—Judith River—Meeting with the Gros Ventres des Prairies on Bighorn River—Observations on these Indians—The remarkable Country about the Stone Walls—Citadel Rock—Stonewall Creek—First Sight of the Rocky Mountains—Bear's-paw Mountain—Maria River—Arrival and Reception at Fort Mc Kenzie.
We did not make any long stay at Muscleshell River, for after our hunters, who had made an excursion into the neighbouring wood and prairies, returned, at noon, with a buffalo and an elk, we proceeded on our voyage. Dechamp brought some impressions of shells, which abound on these banks of the Missouri. Beyond a prairie where the hills, which were seventy or eighty feet high, came close to the river, we found Mr. Bodmer and Dreidoppel employed in collecting most interesting impressions of shells, and very beautiful baculites,[34] of the latter of which there were large, very fine, opalescent specimens. The edge of the bank, which was scarcely two feet broad, was covered with these fragments, which fall from the higher part of the rocky wall. The prairie now alternated with woods of tall poplars, and these trees, probably, do not form, in any part of the globe, such fine and lofty forests as they do here. Impressions of shells and baculites were collected on the bank, the last of which, a painter, who lately travelled on the Missouri, has stated to be petrified serpents.
{227} On the following morning, the 29th of July, the river was rather turbid, and there must have been heavy rain higher up. Nothing particular occurred on this day. At six in the morning of the 30th, we came to a stream which is, doubtless, the Grouse Creek of Lewis and Clarke.[35] There were a couple of islands, which we took to be Lewis and Clarke's Pot Islands, and a stream near them, for their Teapot Creek, a name which, like many others given by these travellers, amused us much.[36] We could not help observing that such names are not well chosen, especially as it would not be difficult to find better ones, even by merely retaining the generally harmonious Indian names.
Toward seven o'clock in the evening, as we were sailing by the eminences which resembled the lower mountains of Switzerland, we were much surprised to see a boat, with three men, which soon afterwards came alongside our vessel. It had on board, Doucette, the Blackfoot interpreter, and two engagés, from Fort Mc Kenzie, who had been sent to meet us; they had left the fort three days before, where they told us there were 150 tents of the Piekanns, or Blackfoot Indians; the remainder of this tribe were scattered about Maria River. They likewise said that the Fall Indians, or Gros Ventres des Prairies,[37] had encamped on Bighorn River, to wait for us: that those Indians, however, had not at this moment any articles for trade, but hoped to receive some presents. This was no pleasant information for Mr. Mitchell, as he was not just then in a condition to make many presents, and, besides, did not much trust those Indians. Not far from the place where we now were, Doucette had shot a large bear, which was left on the bank of the Missouri, a piece of news which was very agreeable to me, and of which I resolved to take advantage.
This morning, the 31st of July, being very fine, I set out early, with Messrs. Mitchell and Bodmer, Doucette, Dreidoppel, and the two brothers Beauchamp, all armed with rifles, or guns, to look for the bear, which had been killed the day before. The engagés carried ropes and hatchets. In the thick underwood and high grass of the forest, we first killed a rattlesnake, and, after proceeding a good half league, reached the bank of the river, where we found the bear still untouched. He was feeding on a buffalo cow, drowned in the river, when Doucette shot him through the heart, on which he ran up the bank, which was about ten feet high, and fell dead at the top. After taking his measure, the skin was stripped off, and the flesh cut from the bones, to prepare the skeleton. The bones having been partly cleaned, were tied together, and drawn up, by a rope, into a tree, intending to take them on our return, after they had been a little more cleaned by the birds of prey and insects. As soon as this work was finished, we followed the vessel, which, meantime, had got considerably the start of us; yet, in the prairie beyond the wood, we stopped at a large, so called, village of the prairie dogs, to kill some of these animals. They sat in parties of two or three on the flat little eminences of their burrows, uttered their cry, which is not a bark, but a shrill squeak, and vanished. Making as little noise as possible, we sat {228} down near the burrows, and succeeded in killing six of these pretty animals, which are not so shy here as at other places, and we often got within thirty paces of them. Laden with our booty, and with the plants we had collected, we proceeded by the paths trodden by the buffaloes and elks through the thick willow copses, along the river, and were just in sight of the keel-boat, when, taking advantage of a favourable wind, it hoisted its sail, and left us no alternative but to follow it as quickly as we could, for three or four hours. Our fatiguing way led through a rough prairie, covered with hard grasses, with the epinette de prairie, helianthus, and prickly cactus, through thick skirts of the forest, with a thorny undergrowth of roses, gooseberries, and burrs, where the fatigued and heated hunters refreshed themselves with the wild berries. We then had to climb over rough sand-stone hills, sometimes obliged to slide down, and at length reached the Missouri. On a wooded point of land, on the river side, we met with several of our hunters, but the whole booty of our fatiguing day's work consisted of a wild goose, an owl, and six prairie dogs. We had waded through many muddy, half-dry streams, and seen, in the blue distance, the range of the Little Rocky Mountains, about thirty miles off.[38] After our return to the vessel, a herd of buffalo cows afforded another opportunity for a chase, and our hunters killed two of them and a bull, which furnished us with some meat. On the 1st of August, early, Mr. Mitchell sent two engagés to Fort Mc Kenzie, to give notice of our coming.[39] We landed them on the south bank, laden with their arms and beds. We lay to at the wooded island, called, by Lewis and Clarke, Tea Island, in the channel on the north bank. As some elks had been seen, the hunters were landed on the island, and in a short time we heard firing in all directions, and in half an hour they had killed four elks, an elk fawn, and a young deer. On account of the number of animals found on this island, we agreed to change the foolish name of Tea Island to Elk Island.[40] Mr. Mitchell, who had often travelled this way, always found the island full of elks, and once, of buffaloes. On this day he brought from it a large eagle and a rattlesnake; and Mr. Bodmer had taken, in the neighbouring prairie, a large Coluber eximus, above four feet in length.
Near Lewis and Clarke's Bighorn Island, we again saw most singular summits on the hills. Entire rows of extraordinary forms joined each other,[41] and in the lateral valleys we had interesting glimpses of this remarkable scenery, as we were now approaching the most interesting part of the Mauvaises Terres. I have already described these mountains when speaking of the White Castles, but here they begin to be more continuous, with rough tops, isolated pillars, bearing flat slabs, or balls, resembling mountain-castles, fortresses, and the like, and they are more steep and naked at every step. Often one may plainly perceive hills or mountains that have evidently sunk into the marshy valley. Many strata inclined at an angle of 30° to 60°, and others perfectly horizontal. The course of the Missouri among these mountains is pretty straight, only narrow plains or prairies, covered with artemisia and the prickly bushes of the {229} pulpy thorn, lie on its banks before the mountains, which frequently come very near to the river, with large blocks of sand-stone at their foot, between which fragments of selenite are always seen. It were to be wished that the geologist and the painter might devote a considerable time to examine this part of the country, step by step; they would furnish a work of highest interest. In many places the loose pieces had slipped down so as to form buttresses; in other parts the mountains were spotted with groups of pines. We here collected several plants, and Mr. Bodmer made a sketch of the mountain tops.[42] The pretty striped squirrel, which lives in small round holes in the clay walls, was here frequently seen, and I conjecture that, if these mountains were closely examined, several species of this animal would be found. The country was so interesting that we waited with impatience for the morning of the 2nd of August, when a bright warm sunshine illumined the singular eminences which surrounded us. Several sketches were taken of them, but very few in proportion to their number, for large folio volumes might be filled with such representations. We saw several islands, among which was doubtless Lewis and Clarke's Good Punch Island, a name which is unworthy of being transmitted to posterity.[43] It is, in fact, difficult to find all the islands mentioned by those travellers, as many of them have certainly been since destroyed, and others arisen in their room. At seven o'clock in the morning the thermometer was at 80°, and we came to a rapid, which we passed by the aid of the towing-rope and the poles. At a bend of the river we thought we saw the ruins of an old castle, and then reached the mouth of Lewis and Clarke's Windsor or Winchers Creek,[44] where those travellers say they had the first sight of the Rocky Mountains, which, however, was certainly only the Little Rocky Mountain range. At this creek, the real pass of the Mauvaises Terres begins. The Missouri, while passing between these mountains, does not receive any lateral stream whatever, and few animals inhabit these heights, except great numbers of mountain sheep.