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REPORT
OF
' , V * * •
THE EXPLORING EXPEDITION
TO
THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS
IN THE YEAR 1842,
AND TO
OREGON AND NORTH CALIFORNIA
IN THE YEARS 1843-’44.
BREVET CAPTAIN J. C. FREMONT,
OF THE TOFOGRAPHICAL ENGINEERS,
UNDER THE ORDERS OF COL. J. J. ABERT, CHIEF OF THE TOPOGRAPHICAL BUREAU.
1845.
IN SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES,
March 3, 1845.
Resolved , That the Secretary of War be requested to communicate to the Senate, if it be pre- pared, and if not, to the Secretary of the Senate during the recess, Brevet Captain Fremont’s report of his late expedition to Oregon, in the years 1843-’44; and that there be printed for the use of the Senate ten thousand extra copies of that report, together with the report of his expedition to the Rocky mountains in 1842, which is hereby directed to be reprinted with the report of the last expedition.
Attest :
ASBURY DICKINS,
Secretary of the Senate, t
NOTICE TO THE READER,
The Senate of the United Stales, and the House of Representatives having each ordered ten thousand copies of the reports of the two ex- ploring expeditions conducted by me, to be printed together, I have deemed it regular and natural to place the report of 1842 first in the order of publication, although heretofore printed ; it being first in the order of time, and first in the progress of actual exploration. The two reports naturally go together, the second being a continuation of the first, and the two constituting parts of a whole, which will require a third expedition, now commencing, to complete. The first terminated at the Rocky moun- tains, and at the two points of greatest interest in that ridge — namely, the South Pass, and Fremont’s Peak; the former being the lowest depression of the mountains, through which the road to Oregon now passes, and the latte* the highest elevation, from the base of which four great rivers take their rise, and flow in opposite directions, toward the rising and the setting sun. The second, after approaching the mountains by a different route, connects with the first expedition at the South Pass, and thence finds the great theatre of its labors west of the Rocky mountains, and between the Oregon river and North California. The third expedition, now com- mencing, will be directed to that section of the Rocky mountains which gives rise to the Arkansas, the Rio Grande del Norte, and the Rio Colorado of California ; and will extend west and southwest of that section, so as to examine the country towards the Pacific ocean, ascertain the lines of communication between the mountains and the ocean in that latitude, and complete the examination of the Great Salt lake and of the interesting re- gion which embosoms it.
The map which illustrated the report of 1842 is now extended to illus- trate the entire expedition of 1843-’44, so that a view of both expeditions will be presented together. This map may have a meager and skeleton appearance to the general eye, but is expected to be more valuable to science on that account, being wholly founded upon positive data and ac- tual operations in the field. About ten thousand miles of actual travel- ling and traversing in the wilderness which lies between the frontiers of Missouri and the shores of the Pacific, almost every camping station being
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the scene of astronomical or barometrical observations, furnish the mate- rials out of which this map has been constructed. Nothing supposititious has been admitted upon it; so that, connecting with Captain Wilkes’s sur- vey of the mouth of the Columbia, and with the authentic surveys of the State of Missouri, it fills up the vast geographical chasm between these two remote points, and presents a connected and accurate view of our con- tinent from the Mississippi river to the Pacific ocean.
To this geographical map, delineating the face of the country over which we travelled, there is added another in profile, showing the eleva- tions, or the rise and fall of the country from the Mississippi to the Pacific. East of the Rocky mountains, two of these profile views are given — one from St. Louis to the South Pass, the other from the mouth of the Great Platte to the same point. The latter is the shortest ; and following, as it does, the regular descent of the river, and being seven hundred miles west of the Mississippi, it may be that the eastern terminus of this line may furnish the point at which the steamboat and the steam car may hereafter meet and exchange cargoes in their magic flight across this continent. These profile views, following the travelling routes, of course follow the lowest and levellest lines, and pass the mountain at the point of its great- est depression ; but to complete the view, and to show the highest points as well as the lowest levels, many lofty peaks are sketched at their proper elevations, towering many thousands of feet above the travelling line.* It may here be excusable to suggest that these profile maps here exhibited are, perhaps, the most extended work of the kind ever constructed, being from St. Louis (according to the route we travelled) near sixteen hundred miles to the South Pass ; from the mouth of the Great Platte to the same Pass, about one thousand more ; and then another sixteen hundred from that Pass to the tide water of the Oregon ; in all, about four thousand miles of profile mapping, founded upon nearly four hundred barometrical positions, with views sketched and facts noted in the field as we went.
In the departments of geological and botanical science, 1 have not ven- tured to advance any opinions on my own imperfect knowledge of those branches, but have submitted all my specimens to the enlightened judg- ment of Dr. Torrey, of New Jersey, and Dr. Hall, of New York, who have kindly classified and arranged all that I was able to submit to them- The botanical observations of Dr. Torrey will be furnished in full here- after, there not being time to complete them now. The remarks of Dr. Hall, on the geological specimens furnished to him, will be found in an appendix to the report; and to his palaeontological skill I am indebted for the discovery of an oolitic formation in the region west of the Rocky
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mountains, which further examination may prove to assimilate the geOiOgy of the New to that of the Old World in a rare particular, which had not before been discovered in either of the two Americas. Unhappily, much of what we had collected was lost by accidents of serious import to ourselves, as well as to our animals and collections. In the gorges and ridges of the Sierra Nevada, of the Alta California, we lost fourteen horses and mules, falling from rocks or precipices into chasms or rivers, bottom- less to us and to them, and one of them loaded with bales of plants col- lected on a line of two thousand miles of travel; and, when almost home, our camp on the banks of the Kansas was deluged by the great flood which, lower down, spread terror and desolation on the borders of the Missouri and Mississippi, and by which great damage was done to our remaining perishable specimens, all wet and saturated with water, and which we had no time to dry. Still, what is saved will be some respect- able contribution to botanical science, thanks to the skill and care of Dr- Torrey ; and both in geology and botany the maps will be of great value, the profile view showing the elevations at which the specimens were found, and the geographical map showing the localities from which they come.
The astronomical observations, taken with good instruments, have been tested, where they were most important, by a three-fold computation : one by Professor Walker, of Philadelphia, whose astronomical reputation is so great; another by Mr. Joseph C. Hubbard, a promising young mathema- * tician from Connecticut ; the third by myself ; so that the correctness of the longitudes and latitudes may well be relied upon.
In sketching the topographical features of the country, a branch of science in which he had been professionally educated, Mr. Charles Preuss had been my assistant in both expeditions; and to his extraordinary skill, supported by the pleasure he felt in the execution of his duties, I am in- debted for the continuous topographical sketches of the regions through which we passed, and which were never interrupted by any extremity of fatigue or privation.
The barometrical and meteorological observations were carefully made with good instruments, and admit of no material error beyond the minute deviations inseparable from such operations.
The third expedition, now commencing, is undertaken with more ample means than the two former ; and, being directed to a region so interesting in itself, and so new to science, can hardly fail to recjuite the enterprise which explores it.
The report, or narrative, of this extended expedition, like the maps which illustrate it, will be strictly confined to what was seen, and to what is necessary to show the face and character of the country, and to add
something to science while fulfilling the instructions of the Government, which chiefly contemplated a military topographical survey. A greater degree of popular interest might have been imparted to it by admitting a greater latitude of detail, but it was deemed best to adhere to the rigorous character of a report , and to present nothing, either in the narrative or in the maps, which was not the result of positive observation.
J. C. FREMONT,
j Brevet Captain Topographical Engineers .
Washington City, March , 1845.
A. REPORT
cn
AN EXPLORATION OF THE COUNTRY
Lying beYween the
MISSOURI RIVER AND THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS,
CN THt LINE or
THE KANSAS AND GREAT TLATTE RIVERS,
28th Congress, 2d Session ,
' [SENATE.]
[ H4 ]
REPORT
Washington, March 1, 1843,
To Colonel J. J. Abert,
Chief of the Corps of Topographical Engineers :
Sir : Agreeably to your orders to explore and report upon the country between the frontiers of Missouri and the South Pass in the Rocky moun- tain?, and on the line of the Kansas and Great Platte rivers, I sat out from Washington city on the 2d day of May, 1842, and arrived at St. Louis, by way of New. York, the 22d of May, where the necessary preparations were completed, and the expedition commenced. I proceeded in a steamboat to Chouteau’s landing, about four hundred miles by water from St. Louis, and near the mouth of the Kansas river, whence we proceeded twelve miles to Mr. Cyprian Chouteau’s trading house, where we completed our final arrangements for the expedition.
Bad weather, which interfered with astronomical observations, delayed us several days in the early part of June at this post, which is on the right bank of the Kansas river, about ten miles above the mouth, and six be- yond the western boundary of Missouri. The sky cleared off at length, and we were enabled to determine our position, in longitude 94° 25* 46", and latitude 39° 5' 57". The elevation above the sea is about 700 feet. Our camp, in the mean time, presented an animated and bustling scene. All were busily occupied in completing . the necessary arrangements for our campaign in the wilderness, and profiting by this short delay on the verge of civilization, to provide ourselves with all the little essentials to comfort in the nomadic life we were to lead for the ensuing summer months. Gradually, however, every thing — the materiel of the camp, men, horses, and even mules — settled into its place, and by the 10th we were ready to depart ; but, before we mount our horses, I will give a short de- scription of the party with which I performed this service.
I had collected in the neighborhood of St. Louis twenty-one men, prin- cipally Creole and Canadian voyugeurs , who had become familiar with prairie life in the service of the fur companies in the Indian country. Mr. Charles Preuss, a native of Germany, was my assistant in the topographi- cal part of the survey. L. Maxwell, of Kaskaskia, had been engaged as hunter, and Christopher Carson (more familiarly known, for his exploits in the mountains, as Kit Carson) was our guide. The persons engaged in St. Louis were :
Clement Lambert, J. B. L’Esperance, J. B. Lefevre, Benjamin Potra, Louis Gouin, J. B. Dumes, Basil Lajeunessej Francois Tessier, Benjamin Cadotte, Joseph Clement, Daniel Simonds, Leonard Benoit, Michel Morly, Baptiste Bernier, Honore Ayot, Frangois Latulippe, Frangois Badeau, Louis Menard, Joseph Ruell^ Moise Chardonnais, Auguste Janisse, Ra- phael Proue.
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In addition to these, Henry Brant, son of Col. J. B. Brant, of St. Louis, a young man of nineteen years of age, and Randolph, a lively boy of twelve, son of the Hon. Thomas H. Benton, accompanied me, for the de- velopment of mind and body which such an expedition would give. We were all well armed and mounted, with the exception of eight men, who conducted as many carts, in which were packed our stores, with the bag- gage and instruments, and which were each drawn by two mules. A few loose horses, and four oxen, which had been added to our stock of pro- visions, completed the train. We sat out on the morning of the 10th, which happened to be Friday — a circumstance which our men did not fail to remember and recall during the hardships and vexations of the ensuing journey. Mr. Cyprian Chouteau, to whose kindness, during our stay at his house, we were much indebted, accompanied us several miles on our way, until we met an Indian, whom he had' engaged to conduct us on the first thirty or forty miles, where he was to consign us to the ocean of prairie, which, we were told, stretched without interruption almost to the base of the Rocky mountains.
From the belt of wood which borders the Kansas, in which we had passed several good-looking Indian farms, we suddenly emerged on the prairies, which received us at the outset with some of their striking char- acteristics ; for here and there rode an Indian, and but a few miles distant heavy clouds of smoke were rolling before the fire. In about ten miles we reached the Santa Fe road, along which we continued for a short time, and encamped early on a small stream ; having travelled about eleven miles. During our journey, it was the customary practice to encamp an hour or two before sunset, when the carts were disposed so as to form a sort of barricade around a circle some eighty yards in diameter. The tents were pitched, and the horses hobbled and turned loose to graze ; and but a few minutes elapsed before the cooks of the messes, of which there were four, were busily engaged in preparing the evening meal. At nightfall, the horses, mules, and oxen, were driven in and picketed— that is, secured by a halter, of which one end was tied to a small steel - shod picket) and driven into the ground ; the halter being twenty or thirty feet long, which enabled them to obtain a little food during the night. When we had reached a part of the country where such a precaution be- came necessary, the carts being regularly arranged for defending the camp, guard was mounted at eight o’clock, consisting of three men, who were relieved every two hours ; the morning watch being horse guard for the day. At daybreak, the camp was roused, the animals turned loose to graze, and breakfast generally over between six and seven o’clock, when we resumed our march, making regularly a halt at noon for one or two hours. Such was usually the order of the day, except when accident of country forced a variation; which, however, happened but rarely. Wc travelled the next day along the Santa Fe road, which we left in the af= ternoon, and encamped late in the evening on a small creek, called by the Indians Mishmagwi. Just as we arrived at camp, one of the horses set off at full speed on his return, and was followed by others. Several men were sent in pursuit, and returned with the fugitives about midnight, with the exception of one man, who did not make his appearance until morning. He had lost his way in the darkness of the night, and slept on the prairie. Shortly after midnight it began to rain heavily, and, as our tents were of light and thin cloth, they offered but little obstruction to
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rain , we were all well soaked, and glad when morning came. We had a rainy march on the 12th, but the weather grew fine as the day advanced. We encamped in a remarkably beautiful situation on the Kansas bluffs, which commanded a fine view of the river valley, here from three to four miles wide. The central portion was occupied by a broad belt ot heavy timber, and nearer the hills the prairies were of the richest verdure. One of the oxen was killed here for food.
We reached the ford of the Kansas late in the afternoon of the 14th, where the river was two hundred and thirty yards wide, and commenced immediately preparations for crossing. I had expected to find the river fordable ; but it had been swollen by the late rains, and was sweeping by with an angry current, yellow and turbid as the Missouri. Up to this point, the road we had travelled, was a remarkably fine one, well beaten, and level — the usual road of a prairie country. By our route, the ford was one hundred miles from the mouth of the Kansas river. Several mounted men led the way into the stream, to swim across. The animals were driven in after them, and in a few minutes all had reached the opposite bank in safety, with the exception of the oxen, which swam some dis- tance down the river, and, returning to the right bank, were not got over until the next morning. In the mean time, the carts had been unloaded and dismantled, and an India-rubber boat, which I had brought with me for the survey of the Platte river, placed in the water. The boat was twenty feet long and five broad, and on it were placed the body and wheels of a cart, with the load belonging to it, and three men with paddles.
The velocity of the current, and the inconvenient freight, rendering it difficult to be managed, Basil Lajeunesse, one of our best swimmers, took in his teeth a line attached to the boat, and swam ahead in order to reach a footing as soon as possible, and assist in drawing her over. In this man- ner, six passages had been successfully made, and as many carts with their contents, and a greater portion of the party, deposited on the left bank ; but night was drawing near, and, in our anxiety to have all over before the darkness closed in, I put upon the boat the remaining two carts, with their accompanying load. The mari at the helm was timid on water, and, in his alarm, capsized the boat. Carts, barrels, boxes, and bales, were in a moment floating down the current : but all the men who were on the shore jumped into the water, without stopping to think if they could swim, and almost everything — even heavy articles, such as guns and lead — was recovered.
Two of the men, who could not swim, came nigh being drowned, and all the sugar belonging to one of the messes wasted its swe,ets on the muddy waters; but our heaviest loss was a bag of coffee, which con- tained nearly all our provision. It was a loss which none but a traveller in a strange and inhospitable country can appreciate ; and often afterward, when excessive toil and long marching had overcome us with fatigue and weariness, we remembered and mourned over our loss in the Kansas. Carson and Maxwell had been much in the water yesterday, and both, in consequence, were taken ill. The former continuing so, I remained in camp. A number of Kansas Indians visited us to-day. Going up to one of the groups who were scattered among the trees, I found one sitting on the ground, among some of the men, gravely and fluently speaking French, with as much facility and as little embarrassment as any of my own party, who were nearly all of French origin.
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On all sides was heard the strange language of his own people, wild, and harmonizing well with their appearance. I listened to him for some time with feelings of strange curiosity and interest. He was now appa- rently^thirty-five years of age *, and, on inquiry, I learned that he had been at St. Louis when a boy, and there had learned the French language. From one of the Indian women 1 obtained a fine cow and calf in exchange for a yoke of oxen. Several of them brought us vegetables, pumpkins, onions, beans, and lettuce. One of them brought butter, and from a half- breed near the river I had the good fortune to obtain some twenty or thirty pounds of coffee. The dense timber in which we had encamped interfered with astronomical observations, and our wet and damaged stores required exposure to the sun. Accordingly, the tents were struck early the next morning, and, leaving camp at six o’clock, we moved about seven miles up the river, to a handsome, open prairie, some twenty feet above the water, where the fine grass afforded a luxurious repast to our horses.
During the day We occupied ourselves in making astronomical observa- tions, in order to lay down the country to this place ; it being our custom to keep up our map regularly in the field, which we found attended with many advantages. The men were kept busy in drying the provisions, painting the cart covers, and otherwise completing our equipage, until the afternoon, when powder Was distributed to them, and they spent some hours in' firing at a mark. We were now fairly in the Indian country, and it began to be time to prepare for the chances of the wilderness.
Friday , June 17. — The weather yesterday had not permitted us to make the observations I was desirous to obtain here, and I therefore did not move to-day. The people continued their target firing. In the steep bank of the river here, were nests of innumerable swallows, into one of which a large prairie snake had got about half his body, and was occupied in eating the young birds. The old ones were flying about in great distress, darting at him, and vainly endeavoring to drive him off. A shot wound- ed him, and, being killed, he was cut open, and eighteen young swallows were found in his body. A sudden storm, that burst upon us in the after - noon', cleared away in a brilliant sunset, followed by a clear night, which enabled us to determine our position in longitude 95° 38' 05", and in lati- tude 39° 06' 40".
A party of emigrants to the Columbia river, under the eharge of Dr. White, an agent of the Government in Oregon Territory, were about three weeks in advance of us. They consisted of men, women, and children. There were sixty-four men, and sixteen or seventeen families. They had a considerable number of cattle, and were transporting their household furniture in large heavy wagons. I understood that there had been much sickness among them, and that they had lost several children. One of the party, who had lost his child, and whose wife was very ill, had left them about one hundred miles hence on the prairies; and as a hunter, who had accompanied them, visited our camp this evening, we availed ourselves of his return to the States to write to our friends.
The morning of the 18th was very unpleasant. A fine rain was falling, with cold wind from the north, and mists made the river hills look dark and gloomy. We left our camp at seven, journeying along the foot of the hills which border the Kansas valley, generally about three miles wide, and extremely rich. We halted for dinner, after a march of about thir-
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teen miles, on the banks of on6 of the many little tributaries to the Kan- sas, which look like trenches in the prairie, and are usually well timbered. After crossing this stream, I rode off some miles to the left, attracted by the appearance of a cluster of huts near the mouth of the Vermilliqn. It was a large but deserted Kansas village, scattered in an open wood, along the margin of the stream, on a spot chosen with the customary Indian fondness for beauty of scenery. The Pawnees had attacked it in the early spring. Some of the houses were burnt, and others blackened with smoke, and weeds were already getting possession of the cleared places. Riding up the Vermillion river, I reached the ford in time to meet the carts, and, crossing, encamped on its western side. The weather continued cool, the thermometer being this evening as low as 49°; but the night was sufficiently clear for astronomical observations, which placed us in longitude 96° 04’ 07", and latitude 39° 15' 19". At sunset, the barometer was at 28.845, thermometer 64°.
We breakfasted the next morning at half past five, and left our encamp- ment early. The morning was cool, the thermometer being at 45°. Quit- ting the river bottom, the road ran along the uplands, over a rolling country, generally in view of the Kansas, from eight to twelve miles distant. Many large boulders, of a very compact sandstone, of various shades of red, some of them four or five tons in weight, were scattered along the hills; and many beautiful plants in flower, among which the amorpha canescens was a characteristic, enlivened the green of the prairie. At the heads of the ravines I remarked, occasionally, thickets of salix longifolia , the most common willow of the country. We travelled nineteen miles, and pitched our tents at evening on the head waters of a small creek, now nearly dry, but having in its bed several fine springs. The barometer indicated a considerable rise in the country — here about fourteen hundred feet above the sea — and the increased elevation appeared already to have some slight influence upon the vegetation. The night was cold, with a heavy dew; the thermometer at 10 p. m. standing at 46°, barometer 28.483. Our position was in longitude 96° 14' 49", and latitude 39° 30' 40".
The morning of the 20th was fine, with a southerly breeze and a bright sky ; and at 7 o’clock we were on the march. The country to-day was rather more broken, rising still, and covered every where with fragments of siliceous limestone, particularly on the summits, where they were small and thickly strewed as pebbles on the shore of the sea. In these exposed situations grew but few plants; though, whenever the soil was good and protected from the winds, in the creek bottoms and ravines, and on the slopes, they flourished abundantly; among them the amorpha , still re- taining its characteristic place. We crossed, at 10 a. m., the Big Vermillion which has a rich bottom of about one mile in breadth, one-third of which is occupied by timber. Making our usual halt at noon, after a day’s march-of twenty four miles, we reached the Big Blue, and encamped on the uplands of the western side, near a small creek, where was a fine large spring of very cold water. This is a clear and handsome stream, about one hundred and twenty feet wide, running, with a rapid current through a well-timbered valley. To-day antelope were seen running over the hills, and at evening Carson brought us a fine deer. Longitude of the camp 96° 32' 35", latitude 39° 45' 08". Thermometer at sunset 75°. A pleasant southerly breeze and fine morning had given place to a gale, with indications of bad weather; when, after a march of ten miles.
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we halted to noon on a small creek, where the water stood in deep pools. In the bank of the creek limestone made its appearance in a stratum about one foot thick. In the afternoon, the people seemed to suffer for want of water. The road led along a high dry ridge; dark lines of timber indicated the heads of streams in the plains below ; but there was no water near, and the day was very oppressive, with a hot wind, and the thermometer at 90°. Along our route the ‘amorpha has been in very abundant but va- riable bloom — in some places bending beneath the weight of purple clus- ters ; in others without a flower. It seems to love best the sunny slopes, with a dark soil and southern exposure. Every where the rose is met with, and reminds us of cultivated gardens and civilization. It is scat- tered over the prairies in small bouquets, and, when glittering in the dews and waving in the pleasant breeze of the early morning, is the most beau- tiful of the prairie flowers. The arternisia, absinthe, or prairie sage, as it is variously called, “is increasing in size, and glitters like silver, as the southern breeze turns up its leaves to the sun. All these plants have their insect inhabitants, variously colored ; taking generally the hue of the flower on which they live. The arternisia has its small fly accompany- ing it through every change of elevation and latitude; and wherever I have seen the asclepias tuberosa , I have always remarked, too, on the dower a large butterfly, so nearly resembling it in color as to be distin- guishable at a little distance only by the motion of its wings. Travelling on the fresh traces of the Oregon emigrants relieves a little the loneliness of the road ; and to-night, after a march of twenty-two miles, we halted on a small creek, which had been one of their encampments. As we ad- vance westward, the soil appears to be getting more sandy, and the sur- face rock, an erratic deposite of sand and gravel, rests here on a bed of coarse yellow and gray and very friable sandstone. Evening closed over with rain and its usual attendant, hordes of musquitoes, with which we were annoyed for the first time.
June 22. — We enjoyed at breakfast this morning a luxury, very unusual in this country, in a cup of excellent coffee, with cream from our cow. Being milked at night, cream was thus had in the morning. Our mid-day halt was at Wyeth’s creek, in the bed of which were numerous boulders of dark ferruginous sandstone, mingled with others of the red sandstone, already mentioned. Here a pack of cards, lying loose on the grass, mark- ed an encampment of our Oregon emigrants ; and it was at the close of the day when we made our bivouac in the midst of some well-timbered ravines near the Little Blue, twenty-four miles from our camp of the pre- ceding night. Crossing the next morning a number of handsome creeks, with clear water and sandy beds, we reached, at 10 a. m., a very beautiful wooded stream, about thirty-five feet wide, called Sandy creek, and some- times, as the Ottoes frequently winter there, the Ottoe fork. The country has become very sandy, and the plants less varied and abundant, with the exception of the amorpha , which rivals the grass in quantity, though not so forward as it has been found to the eastward.
At the Big Trees, where we had intended to noon, no water was to be found. The bed of the little creek was perfectly dry, and, on the adjacent sandy bottom, cacti, for the first time, made their appearance. We made here a short delay in search of water; and, after a hard day’s march of twenty-eight miles, encamped, at 5 o’clock, on the Little Blue, where our arrival made a scene of the Arabian desert. As fast as they arrived,
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men and horses rushed into the stream, where they bathed and drank to- gether in common enjoyment. We were now in the range of the Paw- nees, who were accustomed to infest this- part of the country, stealing horses from companies on their way to the mountains, and, when in suffi- . cient force, openly attacking and plundering them, and subjecting them to various kinds of insult. For the first time, therefore, guard was mount- ed to-night. Our route the next morning lay up the valley, which, bor- dered by hills with graceful slopes, looked uncommonly green and beam tiful. The stream was about fifty feet wide, and three or four deep, fringed by cotton wood and willow, with frequent groves of oak tenanted by flocks of turkeys. Game here, too, made its appearance in greater plenty. Elk were irequently seen on the hills, and now and then an an- telope bounded across our path, or a deer broke from the groves. The road in the afternoon was over the upper prairies, several miles from the river, and we encamped at sunset on one of its small tributaries, where an abundance of prele ( equisetum ) afforded fine forage to our tired ani- mals. We had travelled thirty-one miles. A heavy bank of black clouds in the west came on us in a storm between nine and ten, preceded by a violent wind. The rain fell in such torrents that it was difficult to breathe facing the wind, the thunder rolled incessantly, and the whole sky was tremulous with lightning; now and then illuminated by a blinding flash, succeeded by pitchy darkness. Carson had the watch from ten to mid- night, and to him had been assigned our young compagnons de voyage , Messrs. Brant and R. Benton. This was their first night on guard, and such an introduction did not augur very auspiciously of the pleasures of the expedition. Many things conspired to render their situation uncom- fortable ; stories of desperate and bloody Indian fights were rife in the camp ; our position was badly chosen, surrounded on all sides by timbered hollows, and occupying an area of several hundred feet, so that necessa- rily the guards were far apart; and now and then I could hear Randolph, as if relieved by the sound of a voice in the darkness, calling out to the sergeant of the guard, to direct his attention to some imaginary alarm ; but they stood it out, and took their turn regularly afterward.
The next morning we had a specimen of the false alarms to which all parties in these wild regions are subject. Proceeding up the valley, ob- jects were seen on the opposite hills, which disappeared before a glass could be brought to bear upon them. A man, who was a short distance in the rear, came spurring up in great haste, shouting Indians ! Indians! He had been near enough to see and count them, according to his report, and had made out twenty-seven. I immediately halted ; arms were ex- amined and put in order ; the usual preparations made ; and Kit Carson, springing upon one of the hunting horses, crossed the river, and galloped off into the opposite prairies, to obtain some certain intelligence of their movements.
Mounted on a fine horse, without a saddle, and scouring bareheaded over the prairies, Kit was one of the finest pictures of a horseman I have ever seen. A short time enabled him to discover that the Indian war party of twenty-seven consisted of six elk, who had been gazing curiously at our caravan as it passed by, and were now scampering off at full speed. This was our first alarm, and its excitement broke agreeably on the mo- notony of the day. At our noon halt, the men were exercised at a target ; and in the evening we pitched our tents at a Pawnee encampment of last
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July. They had apparently killed buffalo here, as many bones were lying about, and the frames where the hides had been stretched were yet standing. The road of the day had kept the valley, which is sometimes rich and well timbered, though the country is generally sandy. Mingled • with the usual plants, a thistle ( cardans leucographus) had for the last # day or two made its appearance ; and along the river bottom, tradescantia (virginica) and milk plant {asclepias syriaca*) in considerable quantities.
Our march to-day had been twenty-one miles, and the astronomical ob- servations gave us a chronometric longitude of 9S° 22' 12", and latitude 40° 26' 50". We were moving forward at seven in the morning, and in about five miles reached a fork of the Blue, where the road leaves that river, and crosses over to the Platte. No water was to be found on the dividing ridge, and the casks were filled, and the animals here allowed a short repose. The road led across a high and level prairie ridge, where were but few plants, and those principally thistle [car daus leucographus ,) and a kind of dwarf artemisia. Antelope were seen frequently during the morning, which was very stormy. Squalls of rain, with thunder and lightning, were around us in every direction ; and while we were envel- oped in one of them, a flash, which seemed to scorch our eyes as it passed, struck in the prairie within a few hundred feet, sending up a column of dust.
Crossing on the way several Pawnee roads to the Arkansas, we reach- ed, in about twenty-one miles from our halt on the Blue, what is called the coast of the Nebraska, or Platte river. This had seemed in the dis- tance a range of high and broken hills ; but on a nearer approach were found to be elevations of forty to sixty feet, into which the wind had worked the sand. They were covered with the usual fine grasses of the country, and bordered the eastern side of the ridge on a breadth of about two miles. Change of soil and country appeared here to have produced sorhe change in the vegetation. Cacti were numerous, and all the plants of the region appeared to flourish among the warm hills. Among them the amorpha , in full bloom, was remarkable for its large and luxuriant purple 'clusters. From the foot of the coast, a distance of two miles across the level bottom brought us to our encampment on the shore of the river, about twenty miles below the head of Grand island, which lay extended before us, covered with dense and heavy woods. From the mouth of (he Kansas, according to our reckoning, we had travelled three hundred and twenty-eight miles; and the geological formation of the country we had passed over consisted of lime and sandstone, covered by the same erratic deposite of sand and gravel which forms the surface rock of the prairies between the Missouri and Mississippi rivers. Except in some occasional limestone boulders, I had met with no fossils. The elevation of the Platte valley above the sea is here about two thousand feet. The astronomi- cal observations of the night placed us in longitude 98° 45' 49", latitude 40° 41’ 06".
* “ This plant is very odoriferous, and in Canada charms the traveller, especially when passing through woods in the evening. The F rench there eat the tender shoots in the spring, as we do asparagus. The natives make a sugar of the flowers, gathering them in the morning when they are covered with dew, and collect the cotton from the pods to fill their beds. On account of the silki- ness of this cotton, Parkinson calls the plant Virginian silk.” — Loudon's Encyclopedia of Plants.
The Sioux Indians of the Upper Platte eat the young pods of this plant, boiling them with the meat of the buffalo.
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June 27. — The animals were somewhat fatigued by their march of yes- terday, arid, after a short journey of eighteen miles along the river bottom,
I encamped near the head of Grand island, in longitude, by observation, 99° 05' 24", latitude 40° 39' 32". The soil here was light but rich, though in some places rather sandy ; and, with the exception of a scattered fringe along the bank, the timber, consisting principally of poplar, (populus mo - nilifera ,) elm, and hackberry, ( celtis crassifoliu ,) is confined almost en- tirely to the islands.
June 28. — We halted to noon at an open reach of the river, which oc- cupies rather more than a fourth of the valley, here only about four miles broad. The camp had been disposed with the usual precaution, the horses grazing at a little distance, attended by the guard, and we were ail sitting quietly at our dinner on the grass, when suddenly we heard the startling cry “ du rnonde /” In an instant, every man’s weapon was in his hand, the horses were driven in, hobbled and picketed, and horsemen were galloping at full speed in the direction of the new comers, screaming and yelling with the wildest excitement. “Get ready, my lads!” said the leader of the approaching party to his men, when our wild-looking horsemen were discovered bearing down upon them ; “nous allons attraper des coups dt baguette.” They proved to be a small party of fourteen, under the charge of a man named John Lee, and, with their baggage and provisions strapped to their backs, were making their way on foot to the frontier. A brief account of their fortunes will give some idea of naviga- tion in the Nebraska. Sixty days since, they had left the mouth of Lar- amie’s fork, some three hundred miles above, in barges laden with the furs of the American Fur Company. They started with the annual flood, and, drawing but nine inches water, hoped to make a speedy and pros- perous voyage to St. Louis ; but, after a lapse of forty days, found them- selves only one hundred and thirty miles from their point of departure. They came down rapidly as far as Scott’s bluffs, where their difficulties began. Sometimes they came upon places where the water was spread over a great extent, and here they toiled from morning until night, en- deavoring to drag their boat through the sands, making only two or three miles in as many days. Sometimes they would enter an arm of the river, where there appeared a fine channel, and, after descending prosperously for eight or ten miles, would come suddenly upon dry sands, and be com- pelled to return, dragging their boat for days against the rapid current • and at otners, they came upon places where the water lay in holes, and, getting out to float oft* their boat, would fall into water up to their necks, and the next moment tumble over against a sandbar. Discouraged, at length, and finding the Platte growing every day more shallow, they dis- charged the principal part of their cargoes one hundred and thirty miles below Fort Laramie, which they secured as well a% possible, and, leaving a few men to guard them, attempted to continue their voyage, laden with some light furs and their personal baggage. After fifteen or twenty days more struggling in the sands, during which they made but one hundred and forty miles, they sunk their barges, made a cache of their remaining furs and property, in trees on the bank, and, packing on his back what each man could carry, had commenced, the day before we encountered them, their journey on foot to St. Louis.
We laughed then at their forlorn and vagabond appearance, and, in our turn, a month or two afterwards, furnished the same occasion for merri- 2
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ment to others. Even thoir stock of tobacco, that sine qua non of a voy-~ ageur, without which the night fire is gloomy, was entirely exhausted. However, we shortened their homeward journey by a small supply from our own provision. They gave us the welcome intelligence that the buf- falo were abundant some two days’ march in advance, and made us a present of some choice pieces, which were a very acceptable change from our salt pork. In the interchange of news, and the renewal of old ac- quaintanceships, we found wherewithal to fill a busy hour ; then we mounted our horses, and they shouldered their packs, and we shook hands and parted. Among them, I had found. ^n old companion on the northern prairie, a hardened and hardly served veteran of the mountains, who had been as much hacked and scarred as an old moustache of Napoleon’s “old guard.” He flourished in the sobriquet of La Tulipe, and his real name I never knew. Finding that he was going to the States only because his company was bound in that direction, and that he was rather more willing to return with me, I took him again into my service. We trav- elled this day but seventeen miles.
At our evening camp, about sunset, three figures were discovered ap- proaching, which our glasses made out to be Indians. They proved to be Cheyennes — two men, and a boy of thirteen. About a month since, they had left their people on the south fork of the river, some three hun- dred miles to the westward, and a party of only four in number had been to the Pawnee villages on a horse-stealing excursion, from which they were returning unsuccessful. They were miserably mounted on wild horses from the Arkansas plains, and had no other weapons than bows and long spears; and had they been discovered by the Pawnees, could not, by any possibility, have escaped. They were mortified by their ill success, and said the Pawnees were cowards, who shut up their horses in their lodges at night. I invited them to supper with me, and Randolph and the young Cheyenne, who had been eyeing each other suspiciously and curiously, soon became intimate friends. After supper, we sat down on the grass, and I placed a sheet of paper between us, on which they traced rudely, but with a certain degree of relative truth, the watercourses of the country which lay between us and their villages, and of which I desired to have some information. Their companions, they told us, had taken a nearer route over the hills ; but they had mounted one of the sum- mits to spy out the country, whence they had caught a glimpse of our party, and, confident of good treatment at the hands of the whites, hastened to join company. Latitude of the camp 40° 39' 51".
We made the next morning sixteen miles. I remarked that the ground was covered in many places with an efflorescence of salt, and the plants were not numerous. In the bottoms was frequently seen tradescantia , and on the dry lenchas were car duns, cactus, and amorpha. A high wind during the morning had increased to a violent gale from the northwest, which made our afternoon ride cold and unpleasant. We had the wel- come sight of two buffaloes on one of the large islands, and encamped at a clump of timber about seven miles from our noon halt, after a day’s march of twenty-two miles.
The air was keen the next morning at sunrise, the thermometer stand- ing at 44°, and it was sufficiently cold to make overcoats very comfortable. A few miles brought us into the midst of the buffalo, swarming in im- mense numbers over the plains, where they had left scarcely a blade of
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grass standing. Mr. Preuss, who was sketching at a little distance in* the rear, had at first noted them as large groves of timber. In the sight of such a mass of life, the traveller feels a strange emotion of grandeur. We had heard from a distance a dull and confused murmuring, and, when we came in view of their dark masses, there was not one among us who did not feel his heart beat quicker. It was the early part of the day, when the herds are feeding; and every where they were in motion. Here and there a huge old bull was rolling in the grass, and clouds of dust rose in the air from various parts of the bands, each the scene of some obstinate fight. Indians and buffalo make the poetry and life of the prairie, and our camp was full of their exhilaration. In place of the quiet monotony of the march, relieved only by the cracking of the whip, .and an “ avance done! enfant de garce !” shouts and songs resounded from every part of the line, and our evening camp was always the com- mencement of a feast, which terminated only with our departure on the following morning. At. any time of the night might be seen pieces of the most delicate and choicest meat, roasting en appolas , on sticks around the fire, and the guard wbre never without company. With pleasant weather and no enemy to fear, an abundance of the most excellent meat, and no scarcity of bread or tobacco, they were enjoying the oasis of a voyageur’s life. Three cows were killed to-day. Kit Carson had shot one, and was continuing the chase in the midst of another herd, when his horse fell headlong, but sprang up and joined the flying band. Though considerably hurt, he had the good fortune to break no bones ; and Maxwell, who was mounted on a fleet hunter, captured the runaway after a hard chase. He was on the point of shooting him, to avoid the loss of his bridle, (a hand- somely mounted Spanish one,) when he found that his horse was able to come up with him. Animals are frequently lost in this way ; and it is necessary to keep close watch over them, -in the vicinity of the buffalo, in the midst of which they scour off to the plains, and are rarely retaken. One of our mules took a sudden freak into his head, and joined a neigh- boring band to-day. As we were not in a condition to lose horses, I sent several men in pursuit, and remained in camp, in the hope of recovering him; but lost the afternoon to no purpose, as we did not see him again. Astronomical observations placed us in longitude 100° 05' 47", latitude 40° 49' 55".
July 1. — Along our road to-day the prairie bottom was more elevated and dry, and the hills which border the right side of the river higher, and more broken and picturesque in the outline. The country, too, was bet- ter timbered. As we were riding quietly along the bank, a grand herd of buffalo, some seven or eight hundred in number, came crowding up from the river, where they had been to drink, and commenced crossing the plain slowly, eating as they went. The wind was favorable ; the coolness of the morning invited to exercise; the ground was apparently good, and the distance across the prairie (two or three miles) gave us a fine opportu- nity to charge them before they could get among the river hills. It was too^fine a prospect for a chase to be lost ; and, halting for a few moments, the hunters were brought up and saddled, and Kit Carson, Maxwell, and I, started together. They were now somewhat less than half a mile dis- tant, and we rode easily along unjtil within about three hundred yards, when a sudden agitation, a wavering in the band, and a galloping to and fro of some which were scattered along the skirts, gave us the intimation
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that we were discovered. We started together at a hand gallop, riding steadily abreast of each other, and here the interest of the chase became so engrossingly intense, that we were sensible to nothing else. We were now closing upon them rapidly, and the front of the mass was already in rapid motion for the hills, and in a few seconds the movement had communicated itself to the whole herd.
A crowd of bulls, as usual, brought up the rear, and every now and then some of them faced about, and then dashed on after the band a short distance, and turned and looked again, as if more than half inclined to stand and fight. In a few moments, however, during which we had been quickening our pace, the rout was universal, and we were going over the ground like a hurricane. When at about thirty yards, we gave the usual shout, (the hunter’s pas de charge,) and broke into the herd. We enter- ed on the side, the mass giving way in every direction in their heedless course. Many of the bulls, less active and less fleet than the cows, pay- ing no attention to the ground, and occupied solely with the hunter, were precipitated to the earth with great force, rolling over and over with the violence of the shock, and hardly distinguishable in* the dust. We sepa- rated on entering, each singling out his game.
My horse was a trained hunter, famous in the west under the name of Proveau, and, with his eyes flashing, and the foam flying from his mouth, sprang on after the cow like a tiger. In a few moments he brought me alongside of her, and, rising in the stirrups, I fired at the distance of a yard, the ball entering at the termination of the long hair, and passing near the heart. She fell headlong at the report of the gun, and, checking my horse, I looked around for my companions. At a little distance, Kit was on the ground, engaged in tying his horse to the horns of a cow which he was preparing to cut up. Among the scattered bands, at some distance below, I caught a glimpse of Maxwell ; and while I was looking, a light wreath of white smoke curled away from his gun, from which I was too far to hear the report. Nearer, and between me and the hills, towards which they were directing their course, was the body of the herd, and, giving my horse the rein, we dashed after them. A thick cloud of dust hung upon their rear, which filled my mouth and eyes, and nearly smoth- ered me. In the midst of this I could see nothing, and the buffalo were not distinguishable until within thirty feet. They crowded together more densely still as I came upon them, and rushed along in such a compact body, that I could not obtain an entrance — the horse almost leaping upon them. In a few moments the mass divided to the right and left, the horns clattering with a noise heard above every thing else, and my horse darted into the opening. Five or six bulls charged on us as we dashed along the line, but were left far behind ; and, singling out a cow, I gave her my fire, but struck too high. She gave a tremendous leap, and scoured on swifter than before. I reined up my horse, and the band swept on like a torrent, and left the place quiet and clear. Our chase had led us into dangerous ground. A prairie-dog village, so thickly settled that there were three or four holes in every twenty yards square, occupied the whole bottom for nearly two miles in length. Looking around, I saw only one of the hunters, nearly out of sight, and the long dark line of our caravan crawling along, three or four miles distant. After a march of twenty-four miles, we encamped at nightfall, one mile and a half above the lower end of Brady’s island. The breadth of this arm of the river was eight hun
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dred and eighty yards, and the water nowhere two feet in depth. The island bears the name of a man killed on this spot some years ago. His party had encamped here, three in company, and one of the number went off to hunt, leaving Brady and his companion together. These two had frequently quarrelled, and on the hunter’s return he found Brady dead, and was told that he had shot himself accidentally. He was buried here on the bank; but, as usual, the wolves had torn him out, and some human bones that were lying on the ground we supposed were his: Troops of
wolv.es, that were hanging on the skirts of the buffalo, kept up an uninter- rupted howling during the night, venturing almost into camp. In the morning, they were sitting at a short distance, barking, and impatiently waiting our departure, to fall upon the bones.
July 2. — The morning was cool and smoky. Our road led closer to the hills, which here increased in elevation, presenting an outline of conical peaks three hundred to five hundred feet high. Some timber, apparently pine, grows in the ravines, and streaks of clay or sand whiten their slopes. We crossed during the morning a number of hollows, timbered princi- pally with box elder* (acer negundo ,J poplar, and elm. Brady’s island is well wooded, and all the river along which our road led to-day may, in general, be called tolerably well timbered. We passed near an encamp- ment of the Oregon emigrants, where they appear to have reposed several days. A variety of household articles were scattered about, and they had probably disburdened themselves here of many things not absolutely ne- cessary. I had left the usual road before the mid-day halt, and in the af- ternoon, having sent several men in advance to reconnoitre, marched di- rectly for the mouth of the South fork. On our arrival, the horsemen were sent in and scattered about the river to search the best fording places, and the carts followed immediately. The stream is here divided by an island into two channels. The southern is four hundred and fifty feet wide, having eighteen or twenty inches water in the deepest places. With the exception of a few dry bars, the bed of the river is generally quicksands, in which the carts began to sink rapidly so soon as the mules halted, so that it was necessary to keep them constantly in motion.
The northern channel, two thousand two hundred and fifty feet wide, was somewhat deeper, having frequently three feet water in the numer- ous small channels, with a bed of coarse gravel. The whole breadth of the Nebraska, immediately below the junction, is five thousand three hun- dred and fifty feet. All our fequipage had reached theleft bank safely at 6 o’clock, having to-day mEfde twenty miles. We encampted at the point of land immediately at the junction of the North and South forks. Be- tween the streams is a low rich prairie, extending from their confluence eighteen miles westwardly to the bordering hills, where it is five and a half miles wide. It is covered with a luxuriant growth of grass, and along the banks is a slight and scattered fringe of cottonwood and willow. In the buffalo trails and wallows, I remarked saline efflorescences, to which a rapid evaporation in the great heat of the sun probably contrib- utes, as the soil is entirely unprotected by timber. In the vicinity of these places there was a bluish grass, which the cattle refuse to eat, called by the voyageurs “ herbe salee /’ (salt grass.) The latitude of the junction is 41° 04' 47", and longitude, by chronometer and lunar distances, 100° 49'43". The elevation above the sea is about two thousand seven hundred feet. The hunters came in with a fat cow; and, as we had labored hard, we enjoyed
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well a supper of roasted ribs and boudins , the chef d’ oeuvre of a prairie cook. Mosquitoes thronged about us this evening; but, by 10 o’clock, when the thermometer had fallen to 47°, they had all disappeared.
July 3. — As this was to be a point in our homeward journey, I made a cache (a term used in all this country for what- is hidden in the ground) of a barrel of pork. It was impossible to conceal such a proceeding from the sharp eyes of our Cheyenne companions, and I therefore told them to go and see what it was they were burying. They would otherwise have not failed to return and destroy our cache , in expectation of some rich booty; but pork they dislike, and never eat. We left our camp at 9, con- tinuing up the South fork, the prairie bottom affording us a fair road ; but in the long grass we roused myriads of mosquitoes and flies, from which our horses suffered severely. The day was smoky, with a pleasant breeze from the south, and the plains on the opposite side were covered with buf- falo. Having travelled twenty-five miles, we encamped at 6 in the even- ing; and the men were sent across the river for wood, as there is none here on the left bank. Our fires were partially made of the bow de vache, the dry excrement of the buffalo, which, like that of the camel in the Ara- bian deserts, furnishes to the traveller a very good substitute for wood, burning like turf. Wolves in great numbers surrounded us during the night, crossing and recrossing from the opposite herds to our camp, and howling and trotting about in the river until morning.
July 4. — The morning was very smoky, the ‘sun shining dimly and red, as in a thick fog. The camp was roused with a salute at daybreak, and from our scanty store a portion of what our Indian friends called the “red fire water” served out to the men. While we were at breakfast, a buffala calf broke through the camp, followed by a couple of wolves. In its fright, it had probably mistaken us for a band of buffalo. The wolves were obliged to make a circuit around the camp, so that the calf got a lit- tle the start, and strained every nerve to reach a large herd at the foot of the hills, about two miles distant ; but first one, and then another, and another wolf joined in the chase, until his pursuers amounted to twenty or thirty, and they ran him down before he could reach his friends. There were a few bulls near the place, and one of them attacked the wolves, and tried to rescue him ; but was driven off immediately, and the little animal fell an easy prey, half devoured before he was dead. We watched the chase with the interest always felt for the Aveak ; and had there been a saddled horse at hand, he would have fared better. Leaving camp, our road soon approached the hills, in which strata of a marl like that of the Chimney rock, hereafter described, make their appearance, It is probably of this rock that the hills on the right bank of the Platte, a little below the junction, are composed, and which are worked by the winds and rains into sharp peaks and cones, giving them, in contrast to the sur- rounding level region, something of a picturesque appearance. We crossed this morning numerous beds of the small creeks which, in the time of rains and melting snow, pour down from the ridge, bringing down with them always great quantities of sand and gravel, Avhich have gradu- ally raised their beds four to ten feet above the level of the prairie, which they cross, making each one of them a minia'ture Po. Raised in this way above the surrounding prairie, without any bank, the long yellow and winding line of their beds resembles a causeway from the hills to the river. Many spots on the prairie are yellow with sunflower, ( helianthus .)
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As we were riding slowly along this afternoon, clouds of dust in the ravines, among the hills to the right, suddenly attracted our attention, and in a few minutes column after column of buffalo came galloping down, making directly to the river. By the time the leading herds had reached the water, the prairie was darkened with the dense masses. Immediately • before us, when the bands first came down into the valley, stretched an unbroken line, the head of which was lost among the river hills on th^ opposite side ; and still they poured down from the ridge on our right. From hill to hill, the prairie bottom was certainly not less than two miles wide ; and, allowing the animals to be ten feet apart, and only ten in a line, there were already eleven thousand in view. Some idea may thus be formed of their number when they had occupied the whole plain. In a short time they surrounded us on every side ; extending for several miles in the rear, and forward as far as the eye could reach ; leaving around us, as we advanced, an open space of only two or three hundred yards. This movement of the buffalo indicated to us the presence of Indians on the North fork.
I halted earlier than usual, about forty miles from the junction, and all hands were soon busily engaged in preparing a feast to celebrate the day. The kindness of our friends at St. Louis had provided us with a large supply of excellent preserves and rich fruit cake ; and when these were added to a maccaroni soup, and variously prepared dishes of the choicest buffalo meat, crowned with a cup of coffee, and enjoyed with prairie ap- petite, we felt, as we sat in barbaric luxury around our smoking supper on the grass, a greater sensation of enjoyment than the Roman epicure at his perfumed feast. But most of all it seemed to please our Indian friends, who, in the unrestrained enjoyment of the moment, demanded to know if our “ medicine days came often.” No restraint was exercised at the hos- pitable board, and, to the great delight of his elders, our young Indian lad made himself extremely drunk.
Our encampment was within a few miles of the place where the road crosses to the North fork, and various reasons led me to divide my party at this point. The North fork was the principal object of my survey; but I was desirous to ascend the South branch, with a view of obtaining some astronomical positions, and determining the mouths of its tributaries as far as St. Vrain’s fort, estimated to be some two hundred miles further up the river, and near to Long’s peak. There 1 hoped to obtain some mules, which I found would be necessary to relieve my horses. In a military point of view, I was desirous to form some opinion of the country relative to the establishment of posts on a line connecting the settlements with the South pass of the Rocky mountains, by way of the Arkansas and the South and Laramie forks of the Platte. Crossing the country northwest- wardly from St. Vrain’s fort, to the American company’s fort at the mouth of Laramie* would give me some acquaintance with the affluents which head in the mountains between the two ; I therefore determined to set out the next morning, accompanied by Mr. Preuss and four men, Maxwell, Bernier, Ayot, and Basil Lajeunesse. Our Cheyennes, whose village lay up this river, also decided to accompany us. The party I left in charge of Clement Lambert, with orders to cross to the North fork; and at some convenient place, near to the Coulee des Frenes , make a cache of every • thing not absolutely necessary to the further progress of our expedition. From this point, using the most guarded precaution in his march through
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the country, he was to proceed to the American company’s fort at the mouth of Laramie’s fork, and await my arrival, which would be prior to the 16th, as on that and the following night would occur some occultations which I was desirous to obtain at that place.
July 5. — Before breakfast, all was ready. *We had one led horse in ad- dition to those we rode, and a pack mule, destined to carry our instruments, provisions, and baggage ; the last two articles not being of very great weight. The instruments consisted of a sextant, artificial horizon, & c., a barometer, spy glass, and compass. The chronometer I of course kept on my person. 1 had ordered the cook to put up for us some flour, coffee, and sugar, and our rifles were to furnish the rest. One blanket, in addition to his saddle and saddle blanket, furnished the materials for each man’s bed, and every one was provided with a change of linen. All were armed with rifles or double barrelled guns; and, in addition to these, Maxwell and myself were furnished with excellent pistols. Thus accoutred, we took a parting breakfast with our friends, and set forth.
Our journey the first day afforded nothing of any interest. We shot a buffalo toward sunset, and, having obtained some meat for our evening meal, encamped where a little timber afforded us the means of making a fire. Having disposed our meat on roasting sticks, we proceeded to un- pack our bales in search of coffee and sugar, and flour for bread. With the exception of a little parched coffee, unground, we found nothing. Our cook had neglected to put it up, or it had been somehow forgotten. Tired and hungry, with tough bull meat without salt, (for we had not been able to kill a cow,) and a little bitter coffee, we sat down in silence to our mis- erable fare, a very disconsolate party ; for yesterday’s feast was yet fresh in our memories, and this was our first brush with misfortune. Each man took his blanket, and laid himself down silently ; for the worst part of these mishaps is, that they make people ill-humored. To-day we had travelled about thirty-six miles.
July 6. — Finding that our present excursion would be attended with considerable hardship, and unwilling to expose more persons than neces- sary, I determined to send Mr. Preuss back to the party. His horse, too, appeared in no condition to support the journey ; and accordingly, after breakfast, he took the road across the hills, attended by one of my most trusty men, Bernier. The ridge between the rivers is here about fifteen miles broad, and I expected he would probably strike the fork near their evening camp. At all events, he would not fail to find their trail, and re- join them the next day.
We continued our journey, seven in number, including the three Chey- ennes. Our general course was southwest, up the valley of the river, which was sandy, bordered on the northern side of the valley by a low ridge ; and on the south, after seven or eight miles, the river hills became higher. Six miles from our resting place we crossed the bed of a consid- erable stream, now entirely dry — a bed of sand. In a grove of willows, near the mouth, were the remains of a considerable fort, constructed of trunks of large trees. It was apparently very old, and had probably been the scene of some hostile encounter among the roving tribes. Its soli- tude formed an impressive contrast to the picture which our imaginations involuntarily drew of the busy scene which had been enacted here. The timber appeared to have been much more extensive formerly than now. There were but few trees, a kind of long-leaved willow, standing ; and
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numerous trunks of large trees were scattered about on the ground. In many similar places I had occasion to remark an apparent progressive de- cay in the timber. Ten miles farther we reached the mouth of Lodge Pole creek, a clear and handsome stream, running through a broad valley. In its course through the bottom it has a uniform breadth of twenty-two feet, and six inches in depth. A few willows on the banks strike pleas- antly on the eye, by their greenness, in the midst of the hot and barren sands.
The amorpha was frequent among the ravines, but the sunflower ( hell - anthus) was the characteristic ; and flowers of deep warm colors seem most to love the sandy soil. The impression of the country travelled over to- day was one of dry and barren sands. We turned in towards the river at noon, and gave our horses two hours for food and rest. I had no other thermometer than the one attached to the barometer, which stood at 89°, the height of the column in the barometer being 26.235 at meridian. The sky was clear, with a high wind from the south. At 2, we continued our journey ; the wind had moderated, and it became almost unendurably hot, and our animals suffered severely. In the course of the afternoon, the wind rose suddenly, and blew bard from the southwest, with thunder and light- ning, and squalls of rain ; these were blown against us with violence by the wind ; and, halting, we turned our backs to the storm until it blew over. Antelope were tolerably frequent, with a large gray hare ; but the former were shy, and the latter hardly worth the delay of stopping to shoot them ; so, as the evening drew near, we again had recourse to an old bull, and encamped at sunset on an island in the Platte.
We ate our meat with a good relish this evening, for we were all in fine health, and had ridden nearly all of a long summer’s day, with a burning sun reflected from the sands. My companions slept rolled up in their blankets, and the Indians lay in the grass near the fire ; but my sleeping place generally had an air of more pretension. Our rifles were tied to- gether near the muzzle, the butts resting on the ground, and a knife laid on the rope, to cut away in case of an alarm. Over this, which made a kind of frame, was thrown a large India rubber cloth, which we used to cover our packs. This made a tent sufficiently large to receive about half of my bed, and was a place of shelter for my instruments ; and as I was careful always to put this part against the wifld, I could lie here with a sensation of satisfied enjoyment, and hear the wind blow, and the rain patter close to my head, and know that I should be at least half dry. Cer- tainly, I never slept more soundly. The barometer at sunset was 26.010, thermometer 81°, and cloudy; but a gale from the west sprang up with the setting sun, and in a few minutes swept away every cloud from the sky. The evening was very fine, and I remained up to take some astro- nomical observations, which made our position in latitude 40° 51' 17", and longitude 103° 07' 00".
July 7. — At our camp this morning, at 6 o’clock, the barometer was at 26.183, thermometer 69°, and clear, with a light wind from the southwest. The past night had been squally, with high winds, and occasionally a few drops of rain. Our cooking did not occupy much time, and we left camp early. Nothing of interest occurred during the morning. The same dreary barrenness, except that a .hard marly clay had replaced the sandy soil. Buffalo absolutely covered the plain on both sides the river, and whenever we ascended the hills, scattered herds gave life to the view
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in every direction. A small drove of wild horses made their appearance on the low river bottoms, a mile or two to the left, and 1 sent off one of the In- dians (who seemed very eager to catch one) on my led horse, a spirited and fleet animal. The savage manoeuvred a little to get the wind of the horses, in which he succeeded — approaching within g. hundred yards without be- ing discovered. The chase for a few minutes was animated and interest- ing. My hunter easily overtook and passed the hindmost of the wild drove, which the Indian did not attempt to lasso ; all his efforts being directed to the capture of the leader. But the strength of the horse, weakened by the insufficient nourishment of grass, failed in a race, and all the drove escaped. We halted at noon on the bank of the river, the barometer at that time be- ing 26.192, and the thermometer 103°, with a light air from the south, and clear weather.
In the course of the afternoon, dust rising among the hills at a particular place, attracted our attention; and, riding up, we found a band of eighteen or twenty buffalo bulls engaged in a desperate fight. Though butting and goring were bestowed liberally, and without distinction, yet their efforts were evidently directed against one — a huge gaunt old bull, very lean, while his adversaries were all fat and in good prder. He appeared very weak, and had already received some wounds, and, while we were look- ing on, was several times knocked down and badly hurt, and a very few moments would have put an end to him. Of course, we took the side of the weaker party, and attacked the herd ; but they were so blind with rage, that they fought on, utterly regardless of our presence, although on foot and on horseback we were firing in open view within twenty yards of them. But this did not last long. In a very few seconds, we created a commotion among them. One or two, which were knocked over by the balls, jumped up and ran off into the hills; and they began to retreat slowly along a broad ravine to the river, fighting furiously as they went. By the time they had reached the bottom, we had pretty well dispersed them, and the old bull hobbled off, to lie down somewhere. One of his en- emies remained on the ground where we had first fired upon them, and we stopped there for a short time to cut from him some meat for our supper. We bad neglected to secure our horses, thinking it an unnecessary precau- v tion in their fatigued condition ; but our mule took it into his head to start, and away he went, followed at full speed by the pack horse, with all the baggage and instruments on his back. They were recovered and brought back, after a chase of a mile. Fortunately, every thing was well secured, so that nothing, not even the barometer, was in the least injured.
The sun was getting low, and some narrow lines of timber four or five miles distant promised us a pleasant camp, where, with plenty of wood for fire, and comfortable shelter, and rich grass for our animals, we should find clear cool springs, instead of the warm water of the Platte. On our arrival, we found the bed of a stream fifty to one hundred feet wide, sunk some thirty feet below the level of tile prairie, with perpendicular banks, bordered by a fringe of green cottonwood, but not a drop of water. There were several small forks to the stream, all in the same condition. With the exception of the Platte bottom, the country seemed to be of a clay form- ation, dry, and perfectly devoid of any moisture, and baked hard by the sun. Turning off towards the river, we .reached the bank imabout a mile, and were delighted to find an old tree, with thick foliage and spreading branches, where we encamped. At sunset, the barometer was at 25.950,
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thermometer 81°, with a strong wind from S. 20° E;, and the sky partially covered with heavy masses of cloud, which settled a little towards the horizon by 10 o’clock, leaving it sufficiently clear for astronomical ob- servations, which placed us in latitude 40° 33' 26", and longitude 103° 30' 37". ,
July S. — The morning was very pleasant. The breeze was fresh from S. 50° E. with few clouds; the barometer at 6 o’clock standing at 25.970, and the thermometer at 70°. Since leaving the forks, our route had passed over a country alternately clay and sand, each presenting the same naked waste. On leaving camp this morning, we struck again a sandy region, in which the vegetation appeared somewhat more vigorous than that which we had observed for the last few days; and on the opposite side of the river were some tolerably large groves of timber.
Journeying along, we came suddenly upon a place where the ground was covered with horses’ tracks, which had been made since the rain, and indicated the immediate presence of Indians in our neighborhood. The buffalo, too, which the day before had been so numerous, were nowhere in sight — another sure indication that there were people near. Riding on, we discovered the carcass of a buffalo recently killed — perhaps the day before. We scanned the horizon carefully with the glass, but no living object was to be seen. For the next mile or two, the ground was dotted with buffalo carcasses, which showed that the Indians had made a surround here, and were in considerable force. We went on quickly and cautiously, keeping the river bottom, and carefully avoiding the hills ; but we met with no interruption, and began to grow careless again. We had already lost one of our horses, and here Basil’s mule showed symptoms of giving out, and finally refused to advance, being what the Canadians call restL He there- fore dismounted, and drove her along before him ; but this was a very slow way of travelling. We had inadvertently got about half a mile in advance, but our Cheyennes, who were generally a mile or two in the rear, remained with him. There were some dark-looking objects among the hills, about two miles to the left, here low and undulating, which we had seen for a little time, and supposed to be buffalo coming in to water ; but, happening to look behind, Maxwell saw the Cheyennes whipping up furiously, and another glance at the dark objects showed them at once to be Indians coming up at speed.
Had we been well mounted, and disencumbered of instruments, we might have set them at defiance ; but as it was, we were fairly caught. It was too late to rejoin our friends, and we endeavored to gain a clump of timber about half a mile ahead ; but the instruments and the tired state of our horses did not allow us to go faster than a steady canter, and they were gaining on us fast. At first, they did not appear to be more than fifteen or twenty in number, but group after group darted into view at the top of the hills, until all the little eminences seemed in motion, and, in a few minutes from the time they were first discovered, two or three hun- dred, naked to the breech cloth, were sweeping across the prairie. In a few hundred yards we discovered that the timber we were endeavoring to make was on the opposite side of the river; and before we could reach the bank, down came the Indians upon us.
I am inclined to think that in a few seconds more the leading man, and perhaps some of his companions, would have rolled in the dust; for we had jerked the covers from our guns, and our fingers were on the
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triggers ; men in such cases generally act from instinct, and a charge from three hundred naked savages is a circumstance not well calculated to promote a cool exercise of judgment. Just as he was about to fire, Max- well recognised the leading Indian, and shouted to him in the Indian language, “ You’re a fool, God damn you, don’t you know me?” The sound of his own language seemed to shock the savage, and, swerving his horse a little, he passed us like an arrow. He wheeled, as I rode out toward him, and gave me his hand, striking his breast and exclaiming “Arapaho!” They proved to be a village of that nation, among whom Maxwell had resided as a trader a year or two previously, and recognised him accordingly. We were soon in the midst of the band, answering as well as we could a multitude of questions ; of which the very first was, of what tribe were our Indian companions who were coming in the rear ? They seemed disappointed to know that they were Cheyennes, for they had fully anticipated a grand dance around a Pawnee scalp that night.
The chief showed us his village at a grove on the river six miles ahead, and pointed out a band of buffalo on the other side of the Platte, imme- diately opposite us, which he said they were going to surround. They had seen the band early in the morning from their village, and had been making a large circuit, to avoid giving them the wind, when they discov- ered us. In a few minutes the women came galloping up, astride on their horses, and naked from their knees down, and the hips up. They followed the men, to assist in cutting up and carrying off the meat.
The wind was blowing directly across the river, and the chief requested us to halt where we were for a while, in order to avoid raising the herd. We therefore unsaddled our horses, and sat down on the bank to view the scene; and our new acquaintances rode a few hundred yards lower down, and began crossing the river. Scores of wild-looking dogs followed, looking like troops of wolves, and having, in fact, but very little of the dog in their composition. Some of them remained with us, and I checked one of the men, whom I found aiming at one, which he was about to kill for a wolf. The day had become very hot. The air was clear, with a very slight breeze; agd now, at 12 o’clock, while the barometer stood at 25.920, the attached thermometer was at 108°. Our Cheyennes had learned that with the Arapaho village were about twenty lodges of their own, including their own families ; they therefore immediately com- menced making their toilette. After bathing in the river, they invested themselves in some handsome calico shirts, which I afterward learned they had stolen from my own men, and spent some time in arranging their hair and painting themselves with some vermilion 1 had given them. While they were engaged in this satisfactory manner, one of their half-wild horses, to which the crowd of prancing animals which had just passed had recalled the freedom of her existence among the wild droves on the prairie, suddenly dashed into the hills at the top of her speed. She was their pack horse, and had on her back all the worldly wealth of our poor Cheyennes, all their accoutrements, and all the little articles which they had picked up among us, with some few presents I had given them. The loss which they seemed to regret most were their spears and shields, and some tobacco which they had received from me. However, they bore it all with the philosophy of an Indian, and laughingly con- tinued their toilette. They appeared, however, a little mortified at the thought of returning to the village in such a sorry plight. Our people
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will laugh at us,” said one of them, “ returning to the village on foot, in- stead of driving back a drove of Pawnee horses.” He demanded to know if I loved my sorrel hunter very much ; to which I replied, he was the object of my most intense affection. Far from being able to give, I was myself in want of horses ; and any suggestion of parting with the few I had valuable, was met with a peremptory refusal. In the mean time, the slaughter was about to commence on the other side. So soon as they reached it, the Indians separated into two bodies. One party proceeded directly across the prairie, toward the hills, in an extended line, while the other went up the river ; and instantly as they had given the wind to the herd, the chase commenced. The buffalo started for the hills, but were intercepted and driven back toward the river, broken and running in every direction. The clouds of dust soon covered the whole scen^e, preventing us from having any but an occasional view. It had a very singular ap- pearance to us at a distance, especially when looking with the glass. We were too far to hear the report of the guns, or any sound ; and at every instant, through the clouds of dust which the sun made luminous, we could see for a moment two or three buffalo dashing along, and close be- hind them an Indian with his long spear, or other weapon, and instantly again they disappeared. The apparent silence, and the dimly seen figures flitting by with such rapidity, gave it a kind of dreamy effect, and seemed more like a picture than a scene ‘of real life. It had been a large herd when the cerne commenced, probably three or four hundred in number ; but, though I watched them closely, I did not see one emerge from the fatal cloud where#the work of destruction was going on. After remain- ing here about an hour, we resumed our journey in the direction of the village.
Gradually, as we rode on, Indian after Indian came dropping along, laden with meat ; and by the time we had neared the lodges, the back- ward road was covered with the returning horsemen. It was a pleasant contrast with the desert road we had been travelling. Several had joined company with us, and one of the chiefs invited us to his lodge. The vil- lage consisted of about one hundred and twenty-five lodges, of which twenty were Cheyennes; the latter pitched a little apart from the Arapa- hoes. They were disposed in a scattering manner on both sides of a broad irregular street, about one hundred and fifty feet wide, and running along the river. As we rode along, I remarked near some of the lodges a kind of tripod frame, formed of three slender poles of birch, scraped very clean, to which were affixed the shield and spear, with some other weap- ons of a chief. All were scrupulously clean, the spear head was burnish- ed bright, and the shield white and stainless. It reminded me of the days of feudal chivalry ; and when, as I rode by, I yielded to the passing impulse, and touched one of the spotless shields with the muzzle of my gun, I almost expected a grim warrior to start from the lodge and resent my challenge. The master of the lodge spread out a robe for me to sit upon, and the squaws set before us a large wooden dish of bnffalo meat. He had lit his pipe in the mean while, and when it had been passed around, we commenced our dinner while he continued to smoke. Grad- ually, five or six other chiefs came in, and took their seats in silence. When we had finished, our host asked a number of questions relative to the object of our journey, of which I made no concealment; telling him simply that I had made a visit to see the country, preparatory to the es-
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tablishment of military posts on the way to the mountains. Although this was information of the highest interest to them, and by no means calculated to please them, it excited no expression of surprise, and in no way altered the grave courtesy of their demeanor. The others listened and smoked. I remarked, that in taking the pipe for the first time, each had turned the stem upward, with a rapid glance, as in offering to the Great Spirit, before he put it in his mouth. A storm had been gathering for the past hour, and some pattering drops on the lodge warned us that we had some miles to our camp. Some Indian had given Maxwell a bundle of dried meat, which was very acceptable, as we had nothing; and, springing upon our horses, we rode off at dusk in the face of a cold shower and driving wind. We found our companions under some densely foliaged old trees, about three miles up the river. Under one of them lay the trunk of a large cottonwood, to leeward of which the men had kin- dled a fire, and we sat here and roasted our meat in tolerable shelter. Nearly opposite was the mouth of one of the most considerable affluents of the South fork, la Fourche aux Castors , (Beaver fork,) heading off in the ridge to the southeast.
July 9. — This morning we caught the first faint glimpse of the Rocky mountains, about sixty miles distant. Though a tolerably bright day, there was a slight mist, and we were just able to discern the snowy sum- mit of “ Long’s peak,” (“ les deux oreilles” of the Canadians,) showing like a small cloud near the horizon. I found it easily distinguishable, there being a perceptible difference in its appearance from the white clouds that were floating about the sky. I was pleased to find that among the traders and voyageurs the name of “ Long’s peak** had been adopted and become familiar in the country. In the ravines near this place, a light brown sandstone made its first appearance. About 8, we discerned several persons on horseback a mile or two ahead, on the oppo- site side of the river. They turned in towards the river, and we rode down to meet them. We found them to be two white men, and a mu- latto named Jim Beckwith, who had left St. Louis when a boy, and gone to live with the Crow Indians. He had distinguished himself among them by some acts of daring bravery, and had risen to the rank of a chief, but had now, for some years, left them. They were in search of a band of horses that had gone off from a camp some miles above, in charge of Mr. Chabonard. Two of them continued down the river, in search of the horses, and the American turned back with us, and we rode on towards the camp. About eight miles from our sleeping place we reached Bijou’s fork, an affluent of the right bank. Where we crossed it, a short distance from the Platte, it has a sandy bed about four hundred yards broad ; the water in various small streams, a few inches deep. Seven miles further brought us to a camp of some four or five whites, (New Englanders, I be- lieve,) who had accompanied Captain Wyeth to the Columbia river, and were independent trappers. All had their squaws with them, and I was really surprised at the number of little fat buffalo-fed boys that were tum- bling about the camp, all apparently of the same age, about three or four years old. They were encamped on a rich bottom, covered with a pro- fusion of fine grass, and had a large number of fine-looking horses and mules. We rested with them a few minutes, and in about two miles ar- rived at Chabonard’s camp, on an island in the Platte. On the heights above, we met the first Spaniard I had seen in the country. Mr. Chabo-
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nard was in the service of Bent and St. Vrain’s company, and had left their fort some forty or fifty miles above, in the spring, with boats laden with the furs of the last year’s trade.- He had met the same fortune as the voyageurs on the North fork, and, finding it impossible to proceed, had taken up his summer’s residence on this island, which he had named St. Helena. The river hills appeared to be composed entirely of sand, and the Platte had lost the muddy character of its waters, and here was toler- ably clear. From the mouth of the South fork, I had found it Occasion- ally broken up by small islands; and at the time of our journey, which was at a season of the year when the waters were at a favorable stage, it was not navigable for any thing drawing six inches water. The current was very swift — the bed of the stream a coarse gravel.
From the place at which we had encountered the Arapahoes, the Piatte had been tolerably well fringed with timber, and the island here had a fine grove of very large cottonwoods, under whose broad shade the tents were pitched. There was a large drove of horses in the opposite prairie bottom; smoke was rising from the scattered fires, and the encampment had quite a patriarchal air. Mr. C. received us hospitably. One of the people was sent to gather mint, with the aid of which he concocted very good julep; and some boiled buffalo tongue, and coffee with the luxury of sugar, were soon set before us. The people in his employ were gene- rally Spaniards, and among them I saw a young Spanish woman from Taos, whom I found to be Beckwith’s wife.
July 10. — We parted with our hospitable host after breakfast the next morning, and reached St. Vrain’s fort, about forty-five miles from St. Hele- na, late in the evening. This post is situated on the South fork of the Piatte, immediately under the mountains, about seventeen miles east of Long’s peak. It is on the right bank, on the verge of the upland prairie, about forty feet above the river, of which the immediate valley is about six hun- dred yards wide. The stream is divided into various branches by small islands, among which it runs with a swift current. The bed of the river is sand and gravel, the water very clear, and here may be called a mountain stream. This region appears to be entirely free from the limestones and marls which give to the Lower Platte its yellow and dirty color. The Black hills lie between the stream and the mountains, whose snowy peaks glitter a few miles beyond. At the fort we found Mr. St. Vrain, who re- ceived us with much kindness and hospitality. Maxwell had spent the last two or three years between this post and the village of Taos ; and here he was at home, and among his friends. Spaniards frequently come over in search of employment ; and several came in shortly after our arrival. They usually obtain about six dollars a month, generally paid to them in goods. They are very useful in a camp, in taking care of horses and mules; and I engaged one, who proved to be an active, laborious man, and was of very considerable service to me. The elevation of the Platte here is five thousand four hundred feet above the sea. The neighboring mountains did not appear to enter far the region of perpetual snow, which was generally confined to the northern side of the peaks. On the south- ern, I remarked very little. Here it appeared, so far as I could judge in the distance, to descend but a few hundred feet below the summits.
I regretted that time did not permit me to visit them ; but the proper object of my survey lay among the mountains further north ; and I looked forward to an exploration of their snowy recesses with great pleasure.
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The piney region of the mountains to the south was enveloped in smoke, and I wafc informed had been on fire for several months. Pike’s peak is said to be visible from this place, about one hundred miles to the south- ward ; but the smoky state of the atmosphere prevented my seeing it. The weather continued Qvercast during my stay here, so that I failed in determining the latitude, but obtained good observations for time on the mornings of the 11th and 12th. An assumed latitude of 40° 22' 30" from the evening position of the 12th, enabled me to obtain, for a tolerably cor- rect longitude, 105° 12' 12".
July 12. — The kindness of Mr. St. Vrain had enabled me to obtain a couple of horses and three good mules ; and, with a further addition to our party of the Spaniard whom I had hired, and two others, who were going to obtain service at Laramie’s fork, we resumed our journey at 10, on the morning of the 12th. We had been able to procure nothing at the post, in the way of provision. An expected supply from Taos had not yet arrived, and a few pounds of coffee was all that could be spared to us. In addition to this, we had dried meat enough for the first day ; on the next, we expected to find buffalo. From this post, according to the estimate of the country, the fort at the mouth of Laramie’s fork, which was our next point of destination, was nearly due north, distant about one hundred and twenty -five miles.
For a short distance, our road lay down the valley of the Platte, which resembled a garden in the splendor of fields of varied flowers, which filled the air with fragrance. The only timber I noticed consisted of poplar, birch, cottonwood, and wiilow. In something less than three miles, we crossed Thompson’s creek, one of the affluents to the left bank of the South fork — a fine stream about sixty-five feet wide, and three feet deep. Journeying on, the low dark line of the Black hills lying between us and the mountains to the left, in about ten miles from the fort, we reached Cache a la Poudre , where we halted to noon. This is a very beautiful moun- tain stream, about one hundred feet wide, flowing with a full swift cur- rent over a rocky bed. We halted under the shade of some cottonwoods, with which the stream is wooded seatteringly. In the upper part of its course, it runs amid the wildest mountain scenery, and, breaking through the Black hills, falls into the Platte about ten miles below this place. In the course of our late journey, I had managed to become the possessor of a very untractable mule — a perfect vixen — and her I had turned over to my Spaniard. It occupied us about half an hour to-day to get the saddle upon her; but, once on her back, Jose could not be dismounted, realizing the accounts given of Mexican horses and horsemanship ; and we contin- ued our route in the afternoon.
At evening, we encamped on Crow (?) creek, having travelled about twenty-eight miles. None of the party were well acquainted with the country, and I had great difficulty in ascertaining what were the names of the streams we crossed between the North and South forks of the Platte. This I supposed to be Crow creek. It is what is called a salt stream, and the water stands in pools, having no continuous course. A fine-grained sandstone made its appearance in the banks. The observations of the night placed us in latitude 40° 42', longitude 104° 57' 49". The barom- eter at sunset was 25.231; attached thermometer at 66°. Sky clear, except in the east, with a light wind from the north.
July 13. — There being no wood here, we used last night the hois de
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vache, which is very plentiful. At our camp this morning, the barometer was at 25.2 35 ; the attached thermometer 60°. A few clouds were moving through a deep-blue sky, with a light wind from the west. After a ride of twelve miles, in a northerly direction, over a plain covered with innu- merable quantities of cacti , we reached a small creek in which there was water, and where several herds of buffalo were scattered about among the ravines, which always afford good pasturage. We seem now to be pass- ing along the base of a plateau of the Black hills, in which the formation consists of marls, some of them white and laminated ; the country to the left rising suddenly, and falling off gradually and uniformly to the right. In five or six miles of a northeasterly course, we struck a high ridge, broken into conical peaks, on whose summits large boulders were gathered in heaps. The magnetic direction of the ridge is northwest and south- east, the glittering white of its precipitous sides making it visible for many miles to the south. It is composed of a soft earthy limestone and marls, resembling that, hereafter described, in the neighborhood of the Chimney rock, on the North fork of the Platte, easily worked by the winds and rains, and sometimes moulded into very fantastic shapes. At the foot of the northern slope was the bed of a creek, some forty feet wide, coming, by frequent falls, from the bench above. It was shut in by high perpen- dicular banks, in which were strata of white laminated marl. Its bed was perfectly dry, and the leading feature of the whole region is one of remarkable aridity, and perfect freedom from moisture. In about six miles we crossed the bed of another dry creek ; and, continuing our ride over a high level prairie, a little before sundown we came suddenly upon a beautiful creek, which revived us with a feeling of delighted sur- prise by the pleasant contrast of the deep verdure of its banks with the parched desert we had passed. We had suffered much to-day, both men and horses, for want of water ; having met with it but once in our unin- terrupted march of forty miles, and an exclusive meat diet creates much thirst.
“ Las bestias tienen mucha hambre” said the young Spaniard, inquir- ingly ; “ y la genie tambien ,” said I, “ amigo , we’ll camp here.” A stream of good and clear water ran winding about through the little valley, and a herd of buffalo were quietly feeding a little distance below. It was quite a hunter’s paradise ; and while some ran down toward the band to kill one for supper, others collected bois de vache for a fire, there being no wood ; and I amused myself with hunting for plants among the grass.
It will be seen, by occasional remarks on the geological formation, that the constituents of the soil in these regions are good, and every day served to strengthen the impression in my mind, confirmed by subsequent ob- servation, that the barren appearance of the country is due almost en- tirely to the extreme dryness of the climate. Along our route, the country had seemed to increase constantly in elevation. According to the indica- tion of the barometer, we were at our encampment 5,440 feet above the sea.
The evening was very clear, with a fresh breeze from the south, 50° east. The barometer at sunset was 24.862, the thermometer attached showing 68°. I supposed this to be a fork of Lodge Pole creek, so far as I could determine from our uncertain means of information. Astronomi- cal observations gave for the camp a longitude of 104° 39' 37", and lati- tude 41° 08' 31".
3
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July 14, — The wind continued fresh from the same quarter in the morn- ing ; the day being cleat, with the exception of a few clouds in the hori- zon. At our camp at 6 o’clock, the height of the barometer was 24.830, the attached thermometer 61°. Our course this morning was directly north by compass, the variation being 15° or 16° easterly. A ride of four miles brought us to Lodge Pole creek, which we had seen at its mouth on the South fork ; crossing on the way two dry streams, in eighteen miles from our encampment of the past night, we reached a high bleak ridge, composed entirely of the same earthy limestone and marl previously de- scribed. I had never seen any thing which impressed so strongly on my mind a feeling of desolation. The valley, through which ran the waters of Horse creek, lay in view to the north, but too far to have any influence on the immediate view. On the peak of the ridge where I was standing, some six or seven hundred feet above the river, the wind was high and bleak; the barren and arid country seemed as if it had been swept by fires, and in every direction the same dull ash-colored hue, derived from the formation, met the eye. On the summits were some stunted pines, many of them dead, all wearing the same ashen hue of desolation. We left the place with pleasure ; and, after we had descended several hundred -feet, halted in one of the ravines, which, at the distance of every mile or two, cut the flanks of the ridge with little rushing streams, wearing some- thing of a mountain character. We had already begun to exchange the comparatively barren lands for those of a more fertile character. Though the sandstone formed the broken banks of the creek, yet they were cov- ered with a thin grass ; and the fifty or sixty feet which formed the bottom land of the little stream were clothed with very luxuriant grass, among which I remarked willow and cherry, ( cerasus virginiana ;) and a quan- tity of gooseberry and currant bushes occupied the greater part.
The creek was three or four feet l>road, and about six inches deep, with a swift current of clear water, and tolerably cool. We had struck it too low down to find the cold water, which we should have enjoyed nearer to its sources. At 2, p. m., the barometer was at 25.050, the attached thermometer 104°. A day of hot sunshine, with clouds, and a moderate breeze from the south. Continuing down the stream, in about four miles we reached its mouth, at one of the main branches of Horse creek. Looking back upon the ridge, whose direction appeared to be a little to the north of east, we saw it seamed at frequent intervals with the dark lines of wooded streams, affluents of the river that flowed so far as we could see along its base. We crossed, in the space of twelve miles from our noon halt, three or four forks of Horse creek, and encamped at sunset on the most easterly.
The fork on which we encamped appeared to have followed an easterly direction up to this place ; but here it makes a very sudden bend to the north, passing between two ranges of precipitous hills, called, as I was in- formed, Goshen’s hole. There is somewhere in or near this locality a place so called, but I am not certain thkt it was the place of our encamp- ment. Looking back upon the spot, at the distance of a few miles to the northward, the hills appear to shut in the prairie, through which runs the creek, with a semi-circular sweep, which might very naturally be called a hole in the hills. The geological composition of the ridge is the same which constitutes the rock of the Court-house and Chimney, on the North fork, which appeared to me a continuation of this ridge. The winds and rains work this formation into a variety of singular forms. The pass into
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Goshen’s hole is about two miles wide, and the hill on the western side imitates, in an extraordinary manner, a massive fortified place, with a re- markable fulness of detail. The rock is marl and earthy limestone, white, without the least appearance of vegetation, and much resembles masonry at a little distance ; and here it sweeps around a level area two or three hundred yards in diameter, and in the 'form of a half moon, terminating on either extremity in enormous bastions. Along the whole line of the parapets appear domes and slender minarets, forty or fifty feet high, giving it every appearance of an old fortified town. On the waters of White river, where this formation exists in great extent, it presents appearances which excite the admiration of the solitary voyageur, and form a frequent theme of their conversation when speaking of the wonders of the country. Sometimes it offers the perfectly illusive appearance of a large city, with numerous streets and magnificent buildings, among which the Canadians never fail to see their cabaret ; and sometimes it takes the form of a soli- tary house, with many large chambers, into which they drive their horses at night, and sleep in these natural defences perfectly secure from any at- tack of prowling savages. Before reaching our camp at Goshen’s hole, in crossing the immense detritus at the foot of the Castle rock, we were in- volved amidst winding passages cut by the waters of the hill; and where, with a breadth scarcely large enough for the passage of a horse, the walls rise thirty and forty feet perpendicularly. This formation supplies the discoloration of the Platte. At sunset, the height of the mercurial column was 25.500, the attached thermometer 80°, and wind moderate from S. 38° E. Clouds covered the sky with the rise of the moon, but I succeeded in obtaining the usual astronomical observations, which placed us in latitude 41° 40' 13", and longitude 104° 24' 36".
July 15. — At 6 this morning, the barometer was at 25.515, the thermom- eter 72°; the day was fine, with some clouds looking dark on the south, with a fresh breeze from the same quarter. We found that in our journey across the country we had kept too much to the eastward. This morning, accord- ingly, we travelled by compass some 15 or 20° to the west of north, and struck the Platte some thirteen miles below Fort Laramie. The day was extremely hot, and among the hills the wind seemed to have just issued from an oven. Our horses were much distressed, as we had travelled hard ; and it was with some difficulty that they were all brought to the Platte ; which we reached at 1 o’clock. In riding in towards the river, we found the trail of our carts, which appeared to have passed a day or two since.
After having allowed our animals two hours for food and repose, we resumed our journey, and towards the close of the day came in sight of Laramie’s fork. Issuing from the river hills, we came first in view of Fort Platte, a post belonging to Messrs. Sybille, Adams, & Co., situated immediately in the point of land at the junction of Laramie with the Platte. Like the post we had visited on the South fork, it was built of earth, and still unfinished, being enclosed with walls (or rather houses) on three of the sides, and open on the fourth to the river. A few hundred yards brought us in view of the post of the American Fur Company, call- ed Fort John, or Laramie. This was a large post, having more the air of military construction than the fort at the mouth of the river. It is on the left bank, on a rising ground some twenty five feet above the water; and its lofty walls, whitewashed and picketed, with the large bastions at the
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\
angles, gave it quite an imposing appearance in the uncertain light of evening. A cluster of lodges, which the language told us belonged to Sioux Indians, was pitched under the walls, and, with the fine back ground of the Black hills and the prominent peak of Laramie mountain, strongly drawn in the clear light of the western sky, where the sun had already set, the whole formed at the moment a strikingly beautiful picture. From the company at St. Louis I had letters for Mr. Boudeau, the gentle- man in charge of the post, by whom I was received with great hospitality and an efficient kindness, which was invaluable to me during my stay in the country. I found our people encamped on the bank, a short distance above the fort.. All were well ; and, in the enjoyment of a bountiful sup- per, which coffee and bread made luxurious to us, we soon forgot the fa- tigues of the last ten days.
July 16. — I found that, during my absence, the situation of affairs had undergone some change ; and the usual quiet and somewhat monotonous regularity of the camp had given place to excitement and alarm. The circumstances which occasioned this change will be found narrated in the following extract from the journal of Mr. Preuss, which commences with the day of our separation on the South fork of the Platte.
Extract from the journal of Mr. Preuss .
“July 6. — We crossed the plateau or highland between the two forks in about six hours. I let my horse go as slow as he liked, to indemnify us both for the previous hardship ; and about noon we reached the North fork. There was no sign that our party had passed ; we rode, therefore, to some pine trees, unsaddled the horses, and stretched our limbs on the grass, awaiting the arrival of our company. After remaining here two hours, my companion became impatient, mounted his horse again, and rode off down the river to see if he could discover our people. I felt so marode yet, that it was a horrible idea to me to bestride that saddle again; so 1 lay still. 1 knew they could not come any other way, and then my companion, one of the best men of the company, would not abandon me. The sun went down; he did not come. Uneasy I did not feel, but very hungry ; I had no provisions, but I could make a fire ; and as I espied two doves in a tree, I tried to kill one; but it needs a better marksman than myself to kill a little bird with a rifle. I made a large fire, however, lighted my pipe — this true friend of mine in every emergency — lay down, and let my thoughts wander to the far east. It was not many minutes after when I heard the tramp of a horse, and my faithful companion was by my side. He had found the party, who had been delayed by making their cache , about seven miles below. To the good supper which he brought with him I did ample justice. He had forgotten salt, and I tried the soldier’s substitute in time of war, and used gunpowder ; but it an- swered badly — bitter enough, but no flavor of kitchen salt. I slept well ; and was only disturbed by two owls, which were attracted by the fire, and took their place in the tree under which we slept. Their music seemed as disagreeable to my companion as to myself ; he fired his rifle twice, and then they let us alone.
“July 7. — At about 10 o’clock, the party arrived; and we continued our journey through a country which offered but little to interest the traveller. The soil was much more sandy than in the valley below the confluence
»
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of the forks, and the face of the country no longer presented the refresh- ing green which had hitherto characterized it. The rich grass was now found only in dispersed spots, on low grounds, and on the bottom land of the streams. A long drought, joined to extreme heat, had so parched up the upper prairies, that they were in many places bald, or covered only with a thin growth of yellow and poor grass. The nature of the soil ren- ders it extremely susceptible to the vicissitudes of the climate. Between the forks, and from their junction to the Black hills, the formation con- sists of marl and a soft earthy limestone, with granitic sandstone. Such a formation cannot give rise to a sterile soil ; and, on our return in Septem- ber, when the country had been watered by frequent rains, the valley of the Platte looked like a garden ; so rich was the verdure of the grasses, and so luxuriant the bloom of abundant flowers. The wild sage begins to make its appearance, and timber is so scarce that we generally made our fires of the bois de vache. With the exception of now and then an isolated tree or two, standing like a light-house on the river bank, there is none whatever to be seen.
“ July 8. — Our road to-day was a solitary one. No game made its appear- ance— not even a buffalo or a stray antelope ; and nothing occurred to break the monotony until about 5 o’clock, when the caravan made a sudden halt. There was a galloping in of scouts and horsemen from every side — a hur- rying to and fro in noisy confusion ; rifles were taken from their cover ; bullet pouches examined : in short, there was the cry of 6 Indians,’ heard again. I had become so much accustomed to these alarms, that now they made but little impression on me ; and before I had time to become ex- cited, the new comers were ascertained to be whites. It was a large party of traders and trappers, conducted by Mr. Bridger, a man well known in the history of the country. As the sun was low, and there was a fine grass patch not far ahead, they turned back and encamped for the night with us. Mr. Bridger was invited to supper ; and, after ihe table cloth was removed, we listened with eager interest to an account of their adventures. What they had met, we would be likely to encounter; the chances which had befallen them, would probably happen to us ; and we looked upon their life as a picture of our own. He informed us that the condition of the country had become exceedingly dangerous. The Sioux, who had been badly disposed, had broken out into open histility, and in the preced- ing autumn his party had encountered them in a severe engagement, in which a number of lives had been lost on both sides. United with the Cheyenne and Gros Ventre Indians, they were scouring the upper country in war parties of great force, and were at this time in the neighborhood of the Red Buttes, a famous landmark, which was directly on our path. They had declared war upon every living thing which should be found westward of that point ; though their main object was to attack a large camp of whites and Snake Indians, who had a rendezvous in the Sweet Water valley. Availing himself of his intimate knowledge of the country, he had reached Laramie by an unusual route through the Black hills, and avoided coming into contact with any of the scattered parties. This gen- tleman offered his services to accompany us so far as the head of the Sweet Water ; but the absence of our leader, which was deeply regretted by us all, rendered it impossible for us to enter upon such arrangement. In a camp consisting of men whose lives had been spent in this country, I ex- pected to find every one prepared for occurrences of this nature; but, to
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my great surprise, I found, on the contrary, that this news had thrown them all into the greatest consternation ; and, on every side, I heard only one exclamation, 4 II n’y aura pas de vie pour nous’ All the night, scat- tered groups were assembled around the fires, smoking their pipes, and listening with the greatest eagerness to exaggerated details of Indian hos- tilities ; and in the morniug I found the camp dispirited, and agitated by a variety of conflicting opinions. A majority of the people were strongly disposed to return ; but Clement Lambert, with some five or six others, professed their determination to follow Mr. Fremont to the uttermost limit of his journey. The others yielded to their remonstrances, and, some- what ashamed of their cowardice, concluded to advance at least so far as Laramie fork, eastward of which they were aware no danger was to be apprehended. Notwithstanding the confusion and excitement, we were very early on the road, as the days were extremely hot, and we were anxious to profit by the freshness of the morning. The soft marly form- ation, over which we were now journeying, frequently offers to the trav- eller views of remarkable and picturesque beauty. To several of these localities, where the winds and the rain have worked the bluffs into curious shapes, the voyageurs have given names according to some fan- cied resemblance. One of these, called the Court-house , we passed about six miles from our encampment of last night, and toward noon came in sight of the celebrated Chimney rock . It looks, at this distance of about thirty miles, like what it is called — the long chimney of a steam factory es- tablishment, or a shot tower in Baltimore. Nothing occurred to interrupt the quiet of the day, and we encamped on the river, after a march of twen- ty-four miles. Buffalo had become very scarce, and but one cow had been killed, of which the meat had been cut into thin slices, and hung around the carts to dry.
u July 10. — We continued along the same fine plainly beaten road, which the smooth surface of the country afforded us, for a distance of six hundred and thirty miles, from the frontiers of Missouri to the Laramie fork. In the course of the day we met some whites, who were following along in the train of Mr. Bridger ; and, after a day’s journey of twenty-four miles, encamped about sunset at the Chimney rock, of which the an- nexed drawing will render any description unnecessary. It consists of marl and earthy limestone, and the weather is rapidly diminishing its height, which is now not more than two hundred feet above the river. Travellers who visited it some years since placed its height at upwards of five hundred feet.
“ July 11. — The valley of the North fork is of a variable breadth, from one to four, and sometimes six miles. Fifteen miles from the Chimney rock we reached one of those places where the river strikes the bluffs, and forces the road to make a considerable circuit over the uplands. This presented an escarpment on the river of about nine hundred yards in length, and is familiarly known as Scott’s bluffs. We had made a journey of thirty miles before we again struck the river, at a place where some scanty grass afforded an insufficient pasturage to our animals. About twenty miles from the Chimney rock we had found a very beau- tiful spring of excellent and cold water ; but it was in such a deep ravine, and so small, that the animals could not profit by it, and we therefore halted only a few minutes, and found a resting place ten miles further on. The plain between Scott’s bluffs and Chimney rock was almost
so -r t
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entirely covered with drift wood, consisting principally of cedar, which, we were informed, had been supplied from the Black hills, in a flood five or six years since.
“ July 12. — Nine miles from our encampment of yesterday we crossed Horse creek, a shallow stream of clear water, about seventy yards wide, falling into the Platte on the right bank. It was lightly timbered, and great quantities of drift wood were piled up on the banks, appearing to be supplied by the creek from above. After a journey of twenty-six miles, we encamped on a rich bottom, which afforded fine grass to our animals. Buffalo have entirely disappeared, and we live now upon the dried meat, which is exceedingly poor food. The marl and earthy limestone, which constituted the formation for several days past, had changed during the day into a compact white or grayish white limestone, sometimes contain- ing hornstone ; and at the place of our encampment this evening, some strata in the river hills cropped out to the height of thirty or forty feet, consisting of a fine-grained granitic sandstone; one of the strata closely resembling gneiss.
“ July 13. — To-day, about 4 o’clock, we reached Fort Laramie, where we were cordially received ; we pitched our camp a little above the fort, on the bank of Laramie river, in which the pure and clear water of the mountain stream looked refreshingly cool, and made a pleasant contrast to the muddy, yellow waters of the Platte.”
I walked up to visit our friends at the fort, which is a quadrangular structure, built of clay, after the fashion of the Mexicans, who are gene- rally employed in building them. The walls are about fifteen feet high, surmounted with a wooden palisade, and form a portion of ranges of houses, which entirely surround a yard of about one hundred and thirty feet square. Every apartment has its door and window — all, of course, opening on the inside. There are two entrances, opposite each other, and midway the wall, one of which is a large and public entrance ; the other smaller and more private — a sort of postern gate.' Over the great entrance is a square tower with loopholes, and, like the rest of the work, built of earth. At two of the angles, and diagonally opposite each other, are large square bastions, so arranged as to sweep the four faces of the walls.
This post belongs to the American Fur Company, and, at the time of our visit, was in charge of Mr. Boudeau. Two of the company’s clerks, Messrs. Galpin and Kellogg, were with him, and he had in the fort about sixteen men. As usual, these had found wives among the Indian squaws; and, with the usual accompaniment of children, the place had quite a populous appearance. It is hardly necessary to say, that the object of the establish- ment is trade with the neighboring tribes, who, in the course of the year, generally make two or three visits to the fort. In addition to this, traders, with a small outfit, are constantly kept amongst them. The articles of trade consist, on the one side, almost entirely of buffalo robes; and, on the other, of blankets, calicoes, guns, powder, ^and lead, with such cheap or- naments as glass beads, looking-glasses, rings, vermilion for painting, to- bacco, and principally, and in spite of the prohibition, of spirits, brought into the country in the form of alcohol, and diluted with water before sold. While mentioning this fact, it is but justice to the American Fur Company to state, that, throughout the country, I have always found them strenuously opposed to the introduction of spirituous liquors. But,
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in the present state of things, when the country is supplied with alcohol, when a keg of it will purchase from an Indian every thing he possesses — his furs, his lodge, his horses, and even his wife and children — and when any vagabond who has money enough to purchase a mule can go into a village and trade against them successfully, without withdrawing entirely from the trade, it is impossible for them to discontinue its use. In their opposition to this practice, the company is sustained, not only by their obligation to the laws of the country and the welfare of the Indians, but clearly, also, on grounds of policy ; for, with heavy and expensive outfits, they contend at manifestly great disadvantage against the numerous inde- pendent and unlicensed traders, who enter the country from various ave- nues, from the United States and from Mexico, having no other stock in trade than some kegs of liquor, which they sell at the modest price of thirty-six dollars per gallon. The difference between the regular trader and the coureur des bois , (as the French call the itinerant or peddling tra- ders,) with respect to the sale of spirits, is here, as it always has been, fix- ed and permanent, and growing out of the nature of their trade. The regular trader looks ahead, and has an interest in the preservation of the Indians, and in the regular pursuit of their business, and the preservation of their arms, horses, and every thing necessary to their future and perma- nent success in hunting : the coureur des bois has no permanent interest, and gets what he can, and for what he can, from every Indian he meets, even at the risk of disabling him from doing any thing more at hunting.
The fort had a very cool and clean appearance. The great entrance, in which I found the gentlemen assembled, and which was floored, and about fifteen feet long, made a pleasant, shaded seat, through which the breeze swept constantly ; for this country is famous for high winds. In the course of conversation, I learned the following particulars, which will ex- plain the condition of the country: For several years the Cheyennes and
Sioux had gradually become more and more hostile to the whites, and in the latter part of August, 1S41, had had a rather severe engagement with a party of sixty men, under the command of Mr. Frapp, of St. Louis. The Indians lost eight or ten warriors, and the whites had their leader and four men killed. This fight took place on the waters of Snake river; and it was this party, on their return under Mr. Bridger, which had spread so much alarm among my people. In the course of the spring, two other small parties had been cut off by the Sioux — one on their return from the Crow nation, and the other among the Black hills. The emigrants to Oregon and Mr. Bridger’s party met here, a few days before our arrival. Division and misunderstandings had grown up among them ; they were already somewhat disheartened by the fatigue of their long and weari- some journey, and the feet of their cattle had become so much worn as to be scarcely able to travel. In this situation, they were not likely to find encouragement in the hostile attitude of the Indians, and the new and unexpected difficulties which sprang up before them. They were told that the country was entirely swept of grass, and that few or no buffa- lo were to be found on their line of route ; and, with their weakened ani- mals, it would be impossible for them to transport their heavy wagons over the mountain. Under these circumstances, they disposed of their wagons and cattle at the forts; selling them at the prices they had paid in the States, and taking in exchange coffee and sugar at one dollar a pound, and miserable worn-out horses, which died before they reached
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the mountains. Mr. Boudeau informed me that he had purchased thirty, and the lower fort, eighty head of fine cattle, some of them of the Durham breed. Mr. Fitzpatrick, whose name and high reputation are familiar to all who interest themselves in the history of this country, had reached Laramie in company with Mr. Bridger ; and the emigrants were fortunate enough to obtain his services to guide them as far as the British post of Fort Hall, about two hundred and fifty miles beyond the South Pass of the mountains. They had started for this post on the 4th of July, and, immediaiely after their departure, a war party of three hundred and fifty braves sat out upon their trail. As their principal chief or partisan had lost some relations in the recent fight, and had sworn to kill the first whites on his path, it was supposed that their intention was to attack the party, should a favorable opportunity offer ; or, if they were foiled in their prin- cipal object by the vigilance of Mr. Fitzpatrick, content themselves with stealing horses and cutting off stragglers. These had been gone but a few days previous to our arrival.
The effect of the engagement with Mr. Frapp had been greatly to irri- tate the hostile spirit of the savages; and immediately subsequent to that event, the Gros Ventre Indians had united with the Oglallahs and Chey- ennes, and taken the field in great force — so far as I could ascertain, to the amount of eight hundred lodges. Their object was to make an attack on a camp of Snake and Crow Indians, and a body of about one hundred whites, who had made a rendezvous somewhere in the Green river valley, or on the Sweet Water. After spending some time in buffalo hunting in the neighborhood of the Medicine Bow mountain, they were to cross over to the Green river waters, and return to Laramie by way of the South Pass and the Sweet Water valley. According to the calculation of the Indians, Mr. Boudeau informed me they were somewhere near the head of the Sweet Water. I subsequently learned that the party led by Mr. Fitzpat- rick were overtaken by their pursuers near Rock Independence, in the valley of the Sweet Water; but his skill and resolution saved them from surprise, and, small as his force was, they did not venture to attack him openly. Here they lost one of their party by an accident, and, continuing up the valley, they came suddenly upon the large village. From these they met with a doubtful reception. Long residence and familiar acquaint- ance had given to Mr. Fitzpatrick great personal influence among them, and a portion of them were disposed to let him pass quietly ; but by far the greater number were inclined to hostile measures ; and the chiefs spent the whole of one night, during which they kept the little party in the midst of them, in council, debating the question of attacking them the r^xt day ; but the influence of “ the Broken Hand,” as they called Mr. Fitzpatrick, (one of his hands having been shattered by the bursting of a gun,) at length prevailed, and obtained for them an unmolested passa/ge ; but they sternly assured him that tnis path was no longer open? and that any party of whites which should hereafter be found upo^i it would meet with certain, destruction. From all that I have been* able to learn, I have no doubt that the emigrants owe their lives to ]bir. Fitzpatrick.
Thus it would appear that the. country was swarming with scattered war parties ; and when I he^r(j) during the day, the various contradictory and exaggerated rumors which were incessantly repeated to them, I was not surprised that sq much alarm prevailed among my men. Carson, one of the best and. most experienced mountaineers, fully supported the
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opinion given by Bridger of the dangerous state of the country, aud openly expressed his conviction that we could not escape without some sharp encounters with the Indians. In addition to this, he made his will ; and among the circumstances which were constantly occurring to increase ' their alarm, this was the most unfortunate ; and I found that a number of my party had become so much intimidated, that they had requested to be discharged at this place. I dined to-day at Fort Platte, which has been mentioned as situated at the junction of Laramie river with the Ne- braska. Here I heard a confirmation of the statements given above. The party of warriors, which had started a few days since on the trail of the emigrants, was expected back in fourteen days, to join the village with which their families and the old men had remained. The arrival of the latter was hourly expected ; and some Indians have just come in who had left them on the Laramie fork, about twenty miles above. Mr. Bissonette, one of the traders belonging to Fort Platte, urged the propriety of taking with me an interpreter and two or three old men of the village ; in which case, he thought there would be little or no hazard in encounter- ing any of the war parties. The principal danger was in being attacked before they should know who we were.
They had a confused idea of the numbers and power of our people, and dreaded to bring upon themselves the military force of the United States. This gentleman, who spoke the language fluently, offered his services to accompany me so far as the Red Buttes. He was desirous to join the large party on its return, for purposes of trade, and it would suit his views, as well as my own, to go with us to the Buttes; beyond which point it would be impossible to prevail on a Sioux to venture, on account of their fear of the Crows. From Fort Laramie to the Red Buttes, by the ordi- nary road, is one hundred and thirty-five miles ; and, though only on the threshold of danger, it seemed better to secure the services of an inter- preter for the partial distance, than to have none at all.
So far as frequent interruption from the Indians would allow, we occu- pied ourselves in making some astronomical calculations, and bringing up the general map to this stage of our journey ; but the tent was generally occupied by a succession of our ceremonious visiters. Some came for presents, and others for information of our object in coming to the country ; now and then, one would dart up to the tent on horseback, jerk off his trappings, and stand silently at the door, holding his horse by the halter, signifying his desire to trade. Occasionally a savage would stalk in with an invitation to a feast of honor, a dog feast, and deliberately sit down and wait quietly until I was ready to accompany him. I went to one ; the women and children were sitting outside the lodge, and we took our seats on buffalo robes spread around. The dog was in a large pot over the fire, in the middle of the lodge, and immediately on our arrival was dished up in large wooden bowls, one of which was handed to each. The flesh appeared very glutinous, with something of the flavor and ap- pearance of mutton. Feeling something move behind me, I looked round, and found that I had taken my seat among a litter of fat young puppies. Had I been nice in such matters, the prejudices of civilization might have interfered with my tranquillity ; but, fortunately, I am not of delicate nerves, and continued quietly to empty my platter.
The weather was:cloudy at evening, with a moderate south wind, aud the thermometer at 6 o’clock 85°. I was disappointed in my hope of ob-
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twining an observation of an oecultation, which took place about midnight. The moon brought with her heavy banks of clouds, through which she scarcely made her appearance during the night.
The morning of the 18th was cloudy and calm, the thermometer at 6 o’clock at 64°. About 9, with a moderate wind from the west, a storm of rain came on, accompanied by sharp thunder and lightning, which lasted about an hour. During the day the expected village arrived, consisting principally of old men, women, and children. They had a considerable number of horses, and large troops of dogs. Their lodges were pitched near the fort, and our camp was constantly crowded with Indians of all sizes, from morning until night ; at which time some of the soldiers gen- erally came to drive them all off to the village. My tent was the only place which they respected. Here only came the chiefs and men of dis- tinction, and generally one of them remained to drive away the women and children. The numerous strange instruments, applied to still stranger uses, excited awe and admiration among them, and those which I used in talking with the sun and stars they looked upon with especial rever- ence, as mysterious things of “ great medicine.” Of the three barometers which I had brought with me thus far successfully, I found that two were out of order, and spent the greater part of the 1 9th in repairing them — an operation of no small difficulty in the midst of the incessant interrup- tions to which I was subjected. We had the misfortune to break here a large thermometer, graduated to show fifths of a degree, which I used to ascertain the temperature of boiling water, and with which I had promised myself some interesting experiments in the mountains. We had but one remaining, on which the graduation extended sufficiently high ; and this was too small for exact observations. During our stay here, the men had been engaged in making numerous repairs, arranging pack saddles, and otherwise preparing for the chances of a rough road and mountain travel. All things of this nature being ready, I gathered them around me in the evening, and told them that “ I had determined to proceed the next day. They were all well armed. I had engaged the services of Mr. Bissonette as interpreter, and had taken, in the circumstances, every possible means to insure our safety. In the rumors we had heard, I believed there was much exaggeration, and then they were men accustomed to this kind of life and to the country ; and that these were the dangers of every day occurrence, and to be expected in the ordinary course of their service. They had heard of the unsettled condition of the country before leaving St. Louis, and therefore could not make it a reason for breaking their en- gagements. Still, I was unwilling to take with me, on a service of some certain danger, men on whom I could not rely ; and as I had understood that there were among them some who were disposed to cowardice, and anxious to return, they had but to come forward at once, and state their desire, and they would be discharged with the amount due to them for the time they had served.” To their honor be it said, there was but one among them who had the face to come forward and avail himself of the permission. I asked him some few questions, in order to expose him to the ridicule of the men, and let him go. The day after our departure, he engaged himself to one of the forts, and set off with a party for the Upper Missouri. I did not think that the situation of the country justified me in taking our young companions, Messrs. Brant and Benton, along with us. In case of misfortune, it would have been thought, at the least, an act of
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great imprudence ; and therefore, though reluctantly, I determined to leave them. Randolph had been the life of the camp, and the “ petit garpon” was much regretted by the men, to whom his buoyant spirits had afforded great amusement. They all, however, agreed in the propriety of leaving him at the fort, because, as they said, he might cost the lives of some of the men in a fight with the Indians.
July 21. — A portion of our baggage, with our field notes and observa- tions, and several instrumants, were left at the fort. One of the gentlemen, Mr. Galpin, took charge of a barometer, which he engaged to observe during my absence; and I intrusted to Randolph, by way of occupation, the regular winding up of two of my chronometers, which were among the instruments left. Our observations showed that the chronometer which I retained for the continuation of our voyage had preserved its rate in a most satisfactory manner. As deduced from it, the longitude of Fort Laramie is 7h . 01' 21", and from lunar distance Ih . 01' 29"; giving for the adopted longitude 104° 47' 43". Comparing the barometrical observations made during our stay here, with those of Dr. G. Engelman at St. Louis, we find for the elevation of the fort above the Gulf of Mexico 4,470 feet. The winter climate here is remarkably mild for the latitude ; but rainy weather is frequent, and the place is celebrated for winds, of which the prevailing one is west. An east wind in summer, and a south wind in winter, are said to be always accompanied with rain.
We were ready to depart; the tents were struck, the mules geared up, and our horses saddled, and we walked up to the fort to take the stirrup cup with our friends in an excellent home-brewed preparation. While thus pleasantly engaged, seated in one of the little cool chambers, at the door of which a man had been stationed to prevent all intrusion from the Indians, a number of chiefs, several of them powerful fine-looking men, forced their way into the room in spite of all opposition. Handing me the following letter, they took their seats in silence :
“ Fort Platte, Juffiel 1, 1842.
“ Mr. Fremont : Les ches s’etant assembles presentement me disent de vous avertir de ne point vous mettre en route, avant que le parti de jeunes gens, qui est en dehors, soient de letour. De plus, ils me disent qu’ils sont tre certains qu’ils feront feu a la premiere rencontre. Ils doivent etre de retour dans sept a D/uit jours. Excusez si je vous fais cos observations, mais il me sern^\e qu’il est mon devoir de vous avertir du danger. Meme de phi^ ies chefs sont les porteurs de ce billet, qui vous defendent de partir avant le retour des guerriers.
“ Je suis votre obeissant serviteur,
“JOSEPH BISSONETTE,
“ Par L. B. CHARTRAIN.
“ Les noms de quelques chefs. — Le Chapeau de Loutre, le Casseur de Fleches, la Nuit Koir, la Queue de Boeuf.”
[Translation.]
“ Fort Platte, July 1, 1842.
“Mr. Fremont: The chiefs, having assembled in council, have just told me to warn you not to set out before the party of young men which
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is now out shall have returned. Furthermore, they tell me that they are very sure they will fire upon you as soon as they meet you. They are expected back in seven or eight days. Excuse me for making these ob- servations, but it seems my duty to warn you of danger. Moreover, the chiefs who prohibit your setting out before the return of the warriors are the bearers of this note.
“ I am your obedient servant,
“ JOSEPH BISSONETTE,
“ By L. B. CHARTRAIN.
“ Names of some of the chiefs. — The Otter Hat, the Breaker of Arrows, the Black Night, the Bull’s Tail.”
After reading this, I mentioned its purport to my companions ; and, see- ing that all were fully possessed of its contents, one of the Indians rose up, and, having first shaken hands with me, spoke as follows :
“ You have come among us at a bad time. Some of our people have been killed, and our young men, who are gone to the mountains, are eager to avenge the blood of their relations, which has been shed by the whites. Our young men are bad, and, if they meet you, they will believe that you are carrying goods and ammunition to their enemies, and will fire upon you. You have told us that this will make war. We know that our great father has many soldiers and big guns, and we are anxious to have our lives. We love the whites, and are desirous of peace. Think- ing of all these things, we have determined to keep you here until our warriors return. We are glad to see you among us. Our father is rich, and we expected that you would have brought presents to us- — horses, and guns, and blankets. But we are glad to see you. We look upon your coming as the light which goes before the sun ; for you will tell our great father that you have seen us, and that we are naked and poor, and have nothing to eat; and he will send us all these things.” He was followed by the others, to the same effect.
The observations of the savage appeared reasonable ; but I was aware that they had in view only the present object of detaining me, and were unwilling I should go further into the country. In reply, I asked them, through the interpretation of Mr. Boudeau, to select two or three of their number to accompany us until we should meet their people — they should spread their robes in my tent and eat at my table, and on our return I would give them presents in reward of their services. They declined, saying that there were no young men left in the village, antt that they were too old to travel so many days on horseback, and preferred now to smoke their pipes in the lodge, and let the warriors go on the war path. Besides, they had no power over the young men, and were afraid to inter- fere with them. In my turn I addressed them : “ You say that you love the whites; why have you killed so many already this spring? You say that you love the whites, and are full of many expressions of friendship to us ; but you are not willing to undergo the fatigue of a few days’ ride to save our lives. We do not believe what you have said, and will not lis- ten to you. Whatever a chief among us tells his soldiers to do, is done. We are the soldiers of the great chief, your father. He has told us to come here and see this country, and ail the Indians, his children. Why
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should we not go ? Before we came, we heard that you had killed his people, and ceased to be his children ; but we came among you peaceably, holding out our hands. Now we find that the stories we heard are not lies, and that you are no longer his friends and children. We have thrown away our bodies, and will not turn back. When you told us that your young men would kill us, you did not know that our hearts were strong, and you did not see the rifles which my young men carry in their hands. We are few, and you are many, and may kill us all ; but there will be mucli crying in your villages, for many of y.our young men will stay be- hind, and forget to return with your warriors from the mountains. Do you think that our great chief will let his soldiers die, and forget to cover their graves ? Before the snows melt again, his warriors will sweep away your villages as the fire does the prairie in the autumn. See ! I have pulled down my white houses , and my people are ready : when the sun is ten paces higher, we shall be on the march. If you have any thing to tell us, you will say it soon.” I broke up the conference, as I could do noth- ing with these people ; and, being resolved to proceed, nothing was to be gained by delay. Accompanied by our hospitable friends, we returned to the camp. We had mounted our horses, and our parting salutations had been exchanged, when one of the chiefs (the Bull’s Tail) arrived to tell me that they had determined to send a young man with us; and if I would point out the place of our evening camp, he should join us there. “ The young man is poor,” said he ; “ he has no horse, and expects you to give him one.” I described to him the place where I intended to encamp, and, shaking hands, in a few minutes we were among the hills, and this last habitation of whites shut out from our view.
The road led over an interesting plateau between the North fork of the Platte on the right, and Laramie river on the left. At the distance of ten miles from the foit, we entered the sandy bed of a creek, a kind of defile, shaded by precipitous rocks, down which we wound our way for several hundred yards, to a place where, on the left bank, a very large spring gushes with considerable noise and force out of the limestone rock. It is called “ the Warm Spring,” and furnishes to the hitherto dry bed of the creek a considerable rivulet. On the opposite side, a little below the spring, is a lofty limestone escarpment, partially shaded by a grove of large trees, whose green foliage, in contrast with the whiteness of the rock, renders this a picturesque locality. The rock is fossiliferous, and, so far as I was able to determine the character of the fossils, belongs to the carbonif- erous limestone of the Missouri river, and is probably the western limit of that formation. Beyond this point I met with no fossils of any descrip- tion.
I was desirous to visit the Platte near the point where it leaves the Black hills, and therefore followed this stream, for two or three miles, to the mouth ; where I encamped on a spot which afforded good grass and j mile ( equisetum ) for our animals. Our tents having been found too thin to protect ourselves and the instruments from the rains, which in this elevated country are attended with cold and unpleasant weather, I had procured from the Indians at Laramie a tolerably large lodge, about eigh- teen feet in diameter, and twenty feet in height. Such a lodge, when properly pitched, is, from its conical form, almost perfectly secure against the violent winds which are frequent in this region, and, with a fire in the centre, is a dry and warm shelter in bad weather. By raising the lower
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part, so as to permit the breeze to pass freely, it is converted into a pleas- ant summer residence, with the extraordinary advantage of being entirely free from mosquitoes, one of which I have never seen in an Indian lodge. While we were engaged very unskilfully in erecting this, the interpreter, Mr. Bissonette, arrived, accompanied by the Indian and his wife. She laughed at our awkwardness, and offered her assistance, of which we were frequently afterward obliged to avail ourselves, before the men acquired sufficient expertness to pitch it without difficulty. From this place we had a fine view of the gorge where the Platte issues from the Black hills, changing its character abruptly from a mountain stream into a river of the plains. Immediately around us the valley of the stream was tolerably open ; and at the distance of a few miles, wher.e the river had cut its way through the hills, was the narrow cleft, on one side of which a lofty preci- pice of bright red rock rose vertically above the low hills which lay be- tween us.
July 22. — In the morning, while breakfast was being prepared, I visited this place with my favorite man, Basil Lajeunesse. Entering so far as there was footing for the mules, we dismounted, and, tying our animals, continued our way on foot. Like the whole country, the scenery of the river had undergone an entire change, and was in this place the most beautiful I have ever seen. The breadth of the stream, generally near that of its valley, was from two to three hundred feet, with a swift cur- rent, occasionally broken by rapids, and the water perfectly clear. On either side rose the red precipices, vertical, and sometimes overhanging, two and four hundred feet in height, crowned with green summits, on which were scattered a few pines. At the foot of the rocks was the usual detritus, formed of masses fallen from above. Among the pines that grew here, and on the occasional banks, were the cherry, ( cerasus virginiana,) currants, and grains de boeuf ( shepherdia argentea.) Viewed in the sun- shine of a pleasant morning, the scenery was of a most striking and ro- mantic beauty, which arose from the picturesque disposition of the objects, and the vivid contrast of colors. I thought with much pleasure of our approaching descent in the canoe through such interesting places ; and, in the expectation of being able at that time to give to them a full examina- tion, did not now dwell so much as might have been desirable upon the geological formations along the line of the river, where they are developed with great clearness. The upper portion of the red strata consists of very compact clay, in which are occasionally seen imbedded large pebbles. Below was a stratum of compact red sandstone, changing a little above the river into a very hard siliceous limestone. There is a small but hand- some open prairie immediately below this place, on the left bank of the river, which would be a good locality for a military post. There are some open groves of cottonwood on the Platte. The small stream which comes in at this place is well timbered with pine, and good building rock is abundant.
If it is in contemplation to keep open the communications with Oregon territory, a show of military force in this country is absolutely necessary; and a combination of advantages renders the neighborhood of Fort Lara- mie the most suitable place, on the line of the Platte, for the establishment of a military post. It is connected with the mouth of the Platte and the Upper Missouri by excellent roads, which are in frequent use, and would not in any way interfere with the range of the buffalo, on which the
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[ 174 ]
neighboring Indians mainly depend for support. It would render any posts on the Lower Platte unnecessary; the ordinary communication be- tween it and the Missouri being sufficient to control the intermediate In- dians. It would operate effectually to prevent any such coalitions as are now formed among the Gros Ventres, Sioux, Cheyennes, and other Indians, and would keep the Oregon road through the valley of the Sweet Water and the South Pass of the mountains constantly open. A glance at the map which accompanies this report will show that it lies at the foot of a broken and mountainous region, along which, by the establishment of small posts in the neighborhood of St. Vrain’s fort, on the South fork of the Platte, and Bent’s fort, on the Arkansas, a line of communication would be formed, by good wagon roads, with our southern military posts, which would entirely command thfe mountain passes, hold some of the most troublesome tribes in check, and protect and facilitate our intercourse with the neighboring Spanish settlements. The valleys of the rivers on which they would be situated are fertile ; the country, which supports immense herds of buffalo, is admirably adapted to grazing ; and herds of cattle might be maintained by the posts, or obtained from the Spanish country, which aiready supplies a portion of their provisions to the trading posts mentioned above.
Just as we were leaving the camp this morning, our Indian came up, and stated his intention of not proceeding any further until he had seen the horse which I intended to give him. I felt strongly tempted to drive him out of the camp ; but his presence appeared to give confidence to my men, and the interpreter thought it absolutely necessary. I was there- fore obliged to do what he requested, and pointed out the animal, with which he seemed satisfied, and we continued our journey. I had ima- gined that Mr. Bissonette’s long residence had made him acquainted with the country, and, according to his advice, proceeded directly forward, without attempting to regain the usual road. He afterward informed me that he had rarely ever lost sight of the fort ; but the effect of the mistake was to involve us for a day or two among the hills, where, although we lost no time, we encountered an exceedingly rough road.
To the south, along our line of march to-day, the main chain of the Black or Laramie hills rises precipitously. Time did not permit me to visit them; but, from comparative information, the ridge is composed of the coarse sandstone or conglomerate hereafter described. It appears to enter the region of clouds, which are arrested in their course, and lie in masses along the summits. An inverted cone of black cloud (cumulus) rested during all the forenoon on the lofty peak of Laramie mountain, which I estimated to be about two thousand feet above the fort, or six thousand five hundred above the sea. We halted to noon on the Fourche A mire, so called from being timbered principally with the Hard amlre, (a species of poplar,) with which the valley of the little stream is tolerably well wooded, and which, with large expansive summits, grows to the height of sixty or seventy feet.
The bed of the creek is sand and gravel, the water dispersed over the broad bed in several shallow streams. We found here, on the right bank, in the shade of the trees, a fine spring of very cold water. It will be re- marked that I do not mention, in this portion of the journey, the tempera- ture of the air, sand, springs, &c, — an omission which will be explained in
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the course of the narrative. In my search for plants, I was well rewarded at this place.
With the change in the geological formation on leaving Fort Laramie, the whole face of the country has entirely altered its appearance. East- ward of that meridian, the principal objects which strike the eye of a travel- ler are the absence of timber, and the immense expanse of prairie, covered, with the verdure of rich grasses, and highly adapted for pasturage. Wher- ever they are not disturbed by the vicinity of man, large herds of buffalo give animation to this country. Westward of Laramie river, the region is sandy, and apparently sterile ; and the place pf the grass is usurped by the artemisia and other odoriferous plants, to whose growth the sandy soil and dry air of this elevated region seem highly favorable.
One of the prominent characteristics in the face of the country is the ex- traordinary abundance of the artemisias. They grow every where — on the hills, and over the river bottoms, in tough, twisted, wiry clumps ; and, wherever the beaten track was left, they rendered the progress of the carts rough and slow.- As the country increased in elevation on our advance to the west, they increased in size ; and the whole air is strongly impreg- nated and saturated with the odor of camphor and spirits of turpentine which belongs to this plant. This climate has been found very favorable to the restoration of health, particularly in cases of consumption ; and pos- sibly the respiration of air so highly impregnated by aromatic plants may have some influence.
Our dried meat had given out, and we began to be in want of food; but one of the hunters killed an antelope this evening, which afforded some relief, although it did not go far among so many hungry men. At 8 o’clock at night, after a march of twenty-seven miles, we reached our proposed en- campment on the Fer-h-Cheval , or Horse-shoe creek. Here we found good grass, with a great quantity of prele, which furnished good food for our tired animals. This creek is well timbered, principally with Hard amtre , and, with the exception of Deer creek, which we had not yet reach- ed, is the largest affluent of the right bank between Laramie and the mouth of the Sweet Water.
July 23. — The present year had been one of unparalleled drought, and throughout the country the water had been almost dried up. By availing themselves of the annual rise, the traders had invariably succeeded in carrying their furs to the Missouri ; but this season, as has already been mentioned, on both forks of the Platte they had entirely failed. The greater number of the springs, and many of the streams, which made- halting places for the voyageurs, had been dried up. Every where the soil looked parched and burnt ; the scanty yellow grass crisped under the foot, and even the hardiest plants were destroyed by want of moisture. I think it necessary to mention this fact, because to the rapid evaporation in such an elevated region, nearly five thousand feet above the sea, almost wholly unprotected by timber, should be attributed much of the sterile appearance of the country, in the destruction of vegetation, and the numerous saline efflorescences which covered the ground. Such I afterward found to be the case.
I was informed that the roving villages of Indians and travellers had never met with difficulty in finding an abundance of grass for their horses ; and now it was after great search that we were able to find a scanty patch of grass, sufficient to keep them from sinking ; and in the course of a day 4
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or two they began to suffer very much. We found none to-day at noon ; and, in the course of our search on the Platte, came to a grove of cotton- wood, where some Indian village had recently encamped. Boughs of the cottonwood yet green covered the ground, which the Indians had cut down to feed their horses upon. It is only in the winter that recourse is had to this means of sustaining them ; and their resort to it at this time was a striking evidence of the state of the country. We followed their example, and turned our horses into a grove of young poplars. This began to pre- sent itself as a very serious evil, for on our animals depended altogether the further prosecution of our journey.
Shortly after we had left this place, the scouts came galloping in with the alarm of Indians. We turned ir* immediately toward the river, which here had a steep high bank, where we formed with the carts a very close barricade, resting on the river, within which the animals were strongly hohbled and picketed. The guns were discharged and reloaded, and men thrown forward, under cover of the bank, in the direction by which the Indians were expected. Our interpreter, who, with the Indian, had gone to meet them, came in, in about ten minutes, accompanied by two Sioux. They looked sulky, and we could obtain from them only some confused information. We learned that they belonged to the party which had been on the trail of the emigrants, whom they had overtaken at Rock Independ- ence, on the Sweet Water. Here the party had disagreed, and came nigh fighting among themselves. One portion were desirous of attacking the whites, but the others were opposed to it ; and finally they had broken up into small bands, and dispersed over the country. The greater portion of them had gone over into the territory of the Crows, and intended to return by way of the Wind river valley, in the hope of being able to fail upon some small parties of Crow Indians. The remainder were returning down the Platte, in scattered parties of ten and twenty ; and those whom we had encountered belonged to those who had advocated an attack on the emi- grants. Several of the men suggested shooting them on the spot ; but I promptly discountenanced any such proceeding. They further informed / me that buffalo were very scarce, and little or no grass to be found. There had been no rain, and innumerable quantities of grasshoppers had destroy- ed the grass. This insect had been so numerous since leaving Fort Lara- mie, that the ground seemed alive with them ; and in walking, a little moving cloud preceded our footsteps. This was bad news. ' No grass, no buffalo — food for neither horse nor man. I gave them some plugs of to- bacco, and they went off, apparently well satisfied to be clear of us ; for my men Sid not look upon them very lovingly, and they glanced suspi- ciously at our warlike preparations, and the little ring of rifles which sur- rounded lhem. They were evidently in a bad humor, and shot one of their horses when they had left us a short distance.
We continued our march, and, after a journey of about twenty-one miles, encamped on the Platte. During the day, I had occasionally remarked among the hills the psoralea esculenta, the bread root of the Indians. The Sioux use this root very extensively, and I have frequently met with it among them, cut into thin slices and dried. In the course of the even- ing we were visited by six Indians, who told us that a larger party was en- camped a few miles above. Astronomical observations placed us in longi- tude 104° 59' 59", and latitude 42° 39’ 25".
We made the next day twenty-two miles, and encamped on the right
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bank of the Platte, where a handsome meadow afforded tolerably good grass. There were the remains of an old fort here, thrown up in some sudden emergency, and on the opposite side was a picturesque bluff of ferruginous sandstone. There was a handsome grove a little above, and scattered groups of trees bordered the river. Buffalo made their appear- ance this afternoon, and the hunters came in, shortly after we had encamp- ed, with three fine cows. The night was fine, and observations gave for the latitude pf the camp, 42° 47' 40".
July 25. — We made but thirteen miles this day, and encamped about noon in a pleasant grove on the right bank. Low scaffolds were erected, upon which the meat was laid, cut up into thin strips, and small fires kindled below. Our object was to profit by the vicinity of the buffalo, to lay in a stock of provisions for ten or fifteen days. In the course of the afternoon the hunters brought in five or six cows, and all hands were kept busily employed in preparing the meat, to the drying of which the guard attended during the night. Our people had recovered their gayety, and the busy figures around the blazing fires gave a picturesque air to the camp. A very serious accident occurred this morning, in the breaking of one of the barometers. These had been the object of my constant solici- tude, and, as I had intended them principally for mountain service, I had used them as seldom as possible ; taking them always down at night, and on the occurrence of storms, in order to lessen the chances of being broken. I was reduced to one, a standard barometer of Troughton’s construction. This I determined to preserve, if possible. The latitude is 42° 51' 35", and by a mean of the results from chronometer and lunar distances, the adopted longitude of this camp is 105° 50' 45".
July 26. — Early this morning we were again in motion. We had a stock of provisions for fifteen days carefully stored away in the carts, and this I resolved should only be encroached upon when our rifles should fail to procure us present support. I determined to reach the mountains, if it were in any way possible. In the mean time, buffalo were plenty. In six miles from our encampment, (which, by way of distinction, we shall call Dried Meat camp,) we crossed a handsome stream, called La Foarche Bois6e. It is well timbered, and, among the flowers in bloom on its banks, I remarked several asters.
Five miles further, we made our noon halt, on the banks of the Platte, in the shade of some cottonwoods. There were here, as generally now along the river, thickets of hippophase , the grains de bceuf of the country. They were of two kinds — one bearing a red berry, (the shepherdia argen - tia of Nuttall ;) the other a yellow berry, of which the Tartars are said to make a kind of rob.
By a meridian observation, the latitude of the place was 42° 50' 08". It was my daily practice to take observations of the sun’s meridian altitude; and why they arc not given, will appear in the sequel. Eight miles further we reached the mouth of Deer creek, where we encamped. Here was an abundance of rich grass, and our animals were compensated for past priva- tions. This stream was at this time twenty feet broad, and well timbered with cottonwood of an uncommon size. It is the largest tributary of the Platte, between the mouth of the Sweet Water and the Laramie. Our as- tronomical observations gave for the mouth of the stream a longitude of 106° 08’ 24", and latitude 42° 52' 24".
July 27. — Nothing worthy of mention occurred on this day ; we trav-
f
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elled later than usual, having spent some time in searching for grass, crossing and recrossing the river before we could find a sufficient quantity for our animals. Toward dusk, we encamped among some artemisia hushes, two and three feet in height, where some scattered patches of | short tough grass afforded a scanty supply. In crossing, we had occasion to observe that the river was frequently too deep to be forded, though we always succeeded in finding a place where the water did not enter the carts. The stream continued very clear, with two or three* hundred feet breadth of water, and the sandy bed and banks were frequently covered with large round pebbles. We had travelled this day twenty-seven miles. The main chain of the Black hills was' here only about seven miles to the south, on the right bank of the river, rising abruptly to the height of I eight and twelve hundred feet. Patches of green grass in the ravines on the steep sides marked the presence of springs, and the summits were clad with pines.
July 28. — In two miles from our encampment, we reached the place where the regular road crosses the Platte. There was two hundred feet breadth of water at this time in the bed, which has a variable width of ' eight to fifteen hundred feet. The channels were generally three feet deep, and there were large angular rocks on the bottom, which made the ford in some places a little difficult. Even at its low stages, this river cannot be crossed at random, and this has always been used as the best ford. The low stage of the waters the present year had made it fordable in almost any part of its course, where access could be had to its bed.
For the satisfaction of travellers, I will endeavor to give some descrip- tion of the nature of the road from Laramie to this point. The nature of the soil may be inferred from its geological formation. The limestone at the eastern limit of this section is succeeded by limestone without fossils, a great variety of sandstone, consisting principally of red sandstone and fine conglomerates. The red sandstone is argillaceous, with compact white gypsum or alabaster, very beautiful. The other sandstones are gray, yel- low, and ferruginous, sometimes very coarse. The apparent sterility of the country must therefore be sought for in other causes than the nature of the soil. The face of the country cannot with propriety be called hilly. It is a succession of long ridges, made by the numerous streams which come down from the neighboring mountain range. The ridges have an undu- lating surface, with some such appearance as the ocean presents in an or- dinary breeze.
The road which is now generally followed through this region is there- . fore a very good one, without any difficult ascents to overcome. The principal obstructions are near the river, where the transient waters of heavy rains have made deep ravines with steep banks, which renders fre- quent circuits necessary. It will be remembered that wagons pass this road only once or twice a year, which is by no means sufficient to break down the stubborn roots of the innumerable artemisia bushes. A partial absence of these is often the* only indication of the track ; and the rough- ness produced by their roots in many places gives the road the character of one newly opened in a wooded country. This is usually considered the worst part of the road east of the mountains ; and, as it passes through an open prairie region, may be much improved, so as to avoid the greater part | of the inequalities it now presents. %
From the mouth of the Kansas to the Green^iver valley, west of the |
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Rocky mountains, there is no such thing as a mountain road on the line of communication.
We continued our way, and four miles beyond the ford Indians were discovered again ; and I halted while a party were sent forward to ascertain who they were. In a short time they returned, accompanied by a number of Indians of the Oglallah band of Sioux. From them we received some interesting information. They had formed part of the great village, which they informed us had broken up, and was on its way home. The greater part of the village, including the Arapahoes, Cheyennes, and Oglallahs, had crossed the Platte eight or ten miles below the mouth of the Sweet Water, and were now behind the mountains to the south of us, intending to regain the Platte by way of Deer creek. They had taken this unusual route in search of grass and game. They gave us a very discouraging picture of the country. The great drought, and the plague of grasshop- pers, had swept it so that scarce a blade of grass was to be seen, and there was not a buffalo to be found in the whole region. Their people, they further said, had been nearly starved to death, and we would find their road marked by lodges which they had thrown away in order to move more rapidly, and by the carcasses of the horses which they had eaten, ' or which had perished by starvation. Such was the prospect before us.
When he had finished the interpretation of these things, Mr. Bissonette immediately rode up to me, and urgently advised that I should entirely abandon the further prosecution of my exploration. “ Le meilleure avis queje pourrais voas donner c’est de virer de suite” “ The best advice I can give you, is to turn back at once.” It was his own intention to re- turn, as we had now reached the point to which he had engaged to attend me. In reply, I called up my rrien, and communicated to them fully the information I had just received. I then expressed to them my fixed de- termination to proceed to the end of the enterprise on which I had been sent ; but as the situation of the country gave me some reason to appre- hend that it might be attended with an unfortunate result to some of us,. I would leave it optional with them to continue with me or to return.
Among them were some five or six who I knew would remain. We had still ten days’ provisions; and, should no game be found, when this stock was expended, we had our horses and mules, which we could eat when other means of subsistence failed. But not a man flinched from the undertaking. “ We’ll eat the mules,” said Basil Lajeunesse ; and thereupon we shook hands with our interpreter and his Indians, and parted. With them I sent back one of my men, Dumes, whom the effects of an old wound in the leg rendered incapable of continuing the journey on foot, and his horse seemed on the point of giving out. Having re~ solved to disencumber ourselves immediately of every thing not abso- lutely necessary to our future operations, I turned directly in toward the river, and encamped on the left bank, a little above the place where our council had been held, and where a thick grove of willows offered a suit- able spot for the object I had in view.
The carts having been discharged, the covers and wheels were taken, off, and, with the frames, carried into some low places among the willows, and concealed in the dense foliage in such a manner that the glitter of the iron work might not attract the observation of some straggling Indian. In the sand, which had been blown up into waves among the willows, a large hole was then dug, ten feet square, and six deep. In the mean time,
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all our effects had been spread out upon the ground, and whatever was designed to be carried along with us separated and laid aside, and the re- maining part carried to the hole and carefully covered up. As much as possible, all traces of our proceedings were obliterated, and it wanted but a rain to render our cache safe beyond discovery. All the men were now set at work to arrange the pack saddles and make up the packs.
The day was very warm and calm, and the sky entirely clear, except where, as usual along the summits of the mountainous ridge opposite, the clouds had congregated in masses. Our lodge had been planted, and, on account of the heat, the ground pins had been taken out, and the lower part slightly raised. Near to it was standing the barometer, which swung in a tripod frame; and within the lodge, where a small fire had been built, Mr. Preuss was occupied in observing the temperature of boiling water. At this instant, and without any warning until it was within fifty yards, a violent gust of wind dashed down the lodge, burying under it Mr. Preuss and about a dozen men, who had attempted to keep it from being carried away. I succeeded in saving the barometer, which the lodge was carry- ing off with itself, but the thermometer was broken. We had no others of a high graduation, none of those which remained going higher than 135° Fahrenheit. Our astronomical observations gave to this place, which we named Cache camp, a longitude of 106° 38' 26", latitude 42° 50' 53".
July 29. — All our arrangements having been completed, we left the en- campment at 7 o’clock this morning. In this vicinity the ordinary road leaves the Platte, and crosses over to the Sweet Water river, which it strikes near Rock Independence. Instead of following this road, I had determined to keep the immediate valley of the Piatte so far as the mouth of the Sweet Water, in the expectation of finding better grass. To this I was further prompted by the nature of my instructions. To Mr. Carson was assigned the office of guide, as we had now reached a part of the country with which, or a great part of which, long residence had made him familiar. In a few miles we reached the Red Buttes, a famous land- mark in this country, whose geological composition is red sandstone, lime- stone, and calcareous sandstone and pudding stone.
The river here cuts its way through a ridge ; on the eastern side of it are the lofty escarpments of red argillaceous sandstone, which are called the Red Buttes. In this passage the stream is not much compressed or pent up, there being a bank of considerable though variable breadth on either side. Immediately on entering, we discovered a band of buffalo. The hunters failed to kill any of them; the leading hunter being thrown into a ravine, which occasioned some delay, and in the mean time the herd clambered up the steep face of the ridge. It is sometimes wonderful to see these apparently clumsy animals make their way up and down the most rugged and broken precipices. We halted to noon before we had cleared this passage, at a spot twelve miles distant from Cache camp, where we found an abundance of grass. So far, the account of the Indians was found to be false. On the banks were willow and cherry trees. The cherries were not yet ripe, but in the thickets were numerous fresh tracks of the grizzly bear, which are very fond of this fruit. The soil here is red, the composition being derived from the red sandstone. About seven miles brought us through the ridge, in which the course of the river is north and south. Here the valley opens out broadly, and high walls of the red formation present themselves among the hills to the east. We crossed
HOT SPRTNG GATE
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here a pretty little creek, an affluent of the right bank. It is well timber- ed with cottonwood in this vicinity, and the absinthe has lost its shrub- like character, and becomes small trees six and eight feet in height, and so#metimes eight inches in diameter. Two or three miles above this creek we made our encampment, having travelled to-day twenty-five miles. Our animals fared well here, as there is an abundance of grass. The river bed is made up of pebbles, and in the bank, at the level of the water, is a conglomerate of coarse pebbles about the size of ostrich eggs, and which I remarked in the banks of the Laramie fork. It is overlaid by a soil of mixed clay and sand, six feet thick. By astronomical observations, our position is in longitude 106° 54' 32", and latitude 42° 38'.
July 30. — After travelling about twelve miles this morning, we reached a place where the Indian village had crossed the river. Here were the poles of discarded lodges and skeletons of horses lying about. Mr. Carson, who had never been higher up than this point on the river, which has the character of being exceedingly rugged, and walled in by precipices above, thought it advisable to camp near this place, where we were certain of ob- taining grass, and to-morrow make our crossing among the rugged hills to the Sweet Water river. Accordingly we turned back and descended the river to an island near by, which was about twenty acres in size, covered with a luxuriant growth of grass. The formation here I found highly interesting. Immediately at this island the river is again shut up in the rugged hills, which come down to it from the main ridge in a succession of spurs three or four hundred feet high, and alternated with green level prairillons or meadows, bordered on the river banks with thickets of wil- low, and having many plants to interest the traveller. The island lies be- tween two of these ridges, three or four hundred yards apart, of which that on the right bank is composed entirely of red argillaceous sandstone, with thin layers of fibrous gypsum. On the left bank, the ridge is com- posed entirely of siliceous pudding stone, the pebbles in Jhe numerous strata increasing in size from the top to the bottom, where they are as large as a man’s head. So far as I was able to determine, these strata in- cline to the northeast, with a dip of about 15°. This pudding stone, or conglomerate formation, I was enabled to trace through an extended range of country, from a few miles east of the meridian of Fort Laramie to where I found it superposed on the granite of the Ttocky mountains, in longitude 109° 00'. From its appearance, the main chain of the Laramie mountain is composed of this rock ; and in a number of places I found isolated hills, which served to mark a former level, which had been probably swept away.
These conglomerates are very friable, and easily decomposed ; and I am inclined to think this formation is the source from which was derived the great deposite of sand and gravel which forms the surface rock of the prairie country west of the Mississippi.
Crossing the ridge of red sandstone, and traversing the little prairie which lies to the southward of it, we made in the afternoon an excursion to a place which we have called the Hot Spring Gate. This place has much the ap- pearance of a gate, by which the Platte passes through a ridge composed of a white and calcareous sandstone. The length' of the passage is about four hundred yards, with a smooth green prairie on either side. Through this place, the stream flows with a quiet current, unbroken by any rapid, and is about seventy yards wide between the walls, which rise perpen-
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dicularly from the water. To that on the right bank, which is the lowpr, the barometer gave a height of three hundred and sixty feet. Annexed is a view of this place, which will be more particularly described here- after, as we passed through it on our return.
We saw here numerous herds of mountain sheep, and frequently heard the volley of rattling stones which accompanied their rapid descent down the steep hills. This was the first place at which we had killed any of these animals ; and, in consequence of this circumstance, and of the abundance of these sheep or goats, (for they are called by each name,) we gave to our encampment the name of Goat Island. Their flesh is much esteemed by the hunters, and has very much the flavor of the Allegany mountain sheep. I have frequently seen the horns of this animal three feet long and seventeen inches in circumference at the base, weighing eleven pounds. But two or three of these were killed by our party at this place, and of these the horns were small. The use of these horns seems to be to protect the animal’s head in pitching down precipices to avoid pursuing wolves — their only safety being in places where they can- not be followed. The bones are very strong and solid, the marrow occu- pying but a very small portion of the bone in the leg, about the thickness of a rye straw. The hair is short, resembling the winter color of our com- mon deer, which it nearly approaches in size and appearance. Except in the horns, it has no resemblance whatever to the goat. The longitude of this place, resulting from chronometer and lunar distances, and an occulta- tion of £ Arietis, is 107° 13' 29", and the latitude 42° 33' 27". One of our horses, which had given out, we left to receive strength on the island, intend- ing to take her, 'perhaps, on our return.
July 31. — This morning we left the course of the Platte, to cross over to the Sweet Water. Our way, for a few*miles, lay up the sandy bed of a dry creek, in which I found several interesting plants. Leaving this, we wound om wa^ to the summit of the hills, of which the peaks are here eight hunared feet above the Platte, bare and rocky. A long and gradual slope led from these hills to the Sweet Water, which we reached in fifteen miles from Goat Island. I made an early encampment here, in order to give the hunters an opportunity to procure a supply from several bands of buffalo, which made their appearance in the valley near by. The stream here is about sixty feet wide, and at this time twelve to eighteen inches deep, with a very moderate current.
The adjoining prairies are sandy, but the immediate river bottom is a good soil, which afforded an abundance of soft green grass to our horses, and where I found a variety of interesting plants, which made their ap- pearance for the first time. A rain to-night made it unpleasantly cold ; and there was no tree here, to enable us to pitch our single tent, the poles of which had been le.ft at Cache camp . We had, therefore, no shelter except what was to be found under cover of the absinthe bushes, which grew in many thick patches, one or tw? and sometimes three feet high.
August 1. — The hunters went ahead this morning, as buffalo appeared tolerably abundant, and I was desirous to secure a small stock of pro- visions; and we moved about seven miles up the valley, ana encamped one mile below Rock Independence. This is an isolated granite rock, about six hundred and fifty yards long, and forty in height. Except in a depression of the summit, where a little soil supports a scanty growth
devil’s gate
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of shrubs, with a solitary dwarf pine, it is entirely bare. Every where within six or eight feet of the ground, where the surface is sufficiently smooth, and in some places sixty or eighty feet above, the rock is inscribed with the names of travellers. Many a name famous in the history of this country, and some well known to science, are to be found mixed among those of the traders and of travellers for pleasure and curiosity, and of mis- sionaries among the savages. Some of these have been washed away by the rain, but the greater number are still very legible. The position of this rock is in longitude 107° 56', latitude 42° 29' 36". We remained at our camp of August 1st until noon of the next day, occupied in drying meat. By observation, the longitude of the place is 107° 25' 23", latitude 42° 29' 56".
August 2. — Five miles above Rock Independence we came to a place called the Devil’s Gate, where the Sweet Water cuts through the point of a granite ridge. The length of the passage is about three hundred yards, and the width thirty-five yards. The walls of rock are vertical, and about four hundred feet in height; and the stream in the gate is almost entirely choked up by masses which have fallen from above. In the wall, on the right bank, is a dike of trap rock, cutting through a fine-grained gray gran- ite. Near the point of this ridge crop out some strata of the valley forma- tion, consisting of a grayish micaceous sandstone, and fine-grained con- glomerate, and marl. We encamped eight miles above the Devil’s Gate, of which a view is given*in the annexed plate. There was no timber of any kind on the river, but good fires were made of drift wood, aided by the bois de vache.
We had to-night no shelter from the rain, which commenced with squalls of wind about sunset. The country here is exceedingly pic- turesque. On either side of the valley; which is four or five miles broad, the mountains rise to the height of twelve and 'fifteen hundred or two thousand feet. On the south side, the range appears to be .timbered, and to-night is luminous with fires — probably the work of the Indians, who have just passed through the valley. On the north, broken and granite masses rise abruptly from the green sward of the river, terminating in a line of broken summits. Except in the crevices of the rock, and here and there on a ledge or bench of the mountain, where a few hardy pines have clustered together, these are perfectly bare and destitute of vege- tation.
Among these masses, where there are sometimes isolated hills and ridges, green valleys open in upon the river, which sweeps the base of these mountains for thirty-six miles. Every where its deep verdure and profusion of beautiful flowers is in pleasing contrast with the sterile grandeur of the rock and the barrenness of the sandy plain, which, from the right bank of the river, sweeps up to the mountain range that forms its southern boundary. The great evaporation on the sandy soil of this elevated plain, and the saline efflorescences which whiten the ground, and shine like lakes reflecting the sun, make a soil wholly unfit fox culti- vation.
August 3. — We were early on the road the next morning, travelling along the upland part of the valley, which is overgrown with artemisia. Scattered about on the plain are occasional small isolated hills. One of these which I examined, about fifty feet high, consisted of white clay and marl, in nearly horizontal strata. Several bands of buffalo made their ap-
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pearance to-day. with herds of antelope ; and a grizzly bear — the only one we encountered during the journey— was seen scrambling up among the rocks. As we passed over a slight rise near the river, we caught the first view of the Wind river mountains, appearing, at this distance of about seventy miles, to be a low and dark mountainous ridge. The view dissipat- ed in a moment the pictures which had been created in our minds, by many descriptions of travellers, who have compared these mountains to the Alps in Switzerland, and speak of the glittering peaks which rise in icy majesty amidst the eternal glaciers nine or ten thousand feet into the region of eter- nal snows. The nakedness of the river was relieved by groves of willows, where we encamped at night, after a march of twenty-six miles ; and nu- merous bright-colored flowers had made the river bottom look gay as a garden. We found here a horse, which had been abandoned by the In- dians, because his hoofs had been so much worn that he was unable to travel; and, during the night, a dog came into the camp.
August 4. — Our camp was at the foot of the granite mountains, which we climbed this morning to take some barometrical heights; and here among the rocks was seen the first magpie. On our return, we saw one at the mouth of the Platte river. We left here one of our horses, which was unable to proceed farther. A few miles from the encampment we left the river, which makes a bend to the south, and, traversing an undulating country, consisting of a grayish micaceous sandstone and fine-grained con- glomerates, struck it again, and encamped, after a journey of twenty-five miles. Astronomical observations placed us in latitude 42° 32' 30", and longitude 108° 30' 13".
August 5. — The morning was dark, with a driving rain, and disagree- ably cold. We continued our route as usual ; but the weather became so bad, that we were glad to avail ourselves of the shelter offered by a small island, about ten miles above our last encampment, which was covered with a dense growth of willows. There was fine grass for our animals, and the timber afforded us comfortable protection and good fires. In the afternoon, the sun broke through the clouds for a short time, and the ba- rometer at 5, p. m., was at 23.713, the thermometer 60°, with the wind strong from the northwest. We availed ourselves of the fine weather to make excursions in the neighborhood. The river, at this place, is border- ed by hills of the valley formation. They are of moderate height ; one of the highest peaks on the right bank being, according to the barometer, one hundred and eighty feet above the river. On the left bank they are higher. They consist of a fine white clayey sandstone, a white calcareous sandstone, and coarse sandstone or pudding stone.
August 6. — It continued steadily raining all the day ; but, notwithstand- ing, we left our encampment in the afternoon. Our animals had been much refreshed by their repose, and an abundance of rich, soft grass, which had been much improved by the rains. In about three miles, we reached the entrance of a kanyon , where the Sweet Water issues upon the more open valley we had passed ovet. Immediately at the entrance, and super- imposed directly upon the granite, are strata of compact calcareous sand- stone and chert, alternating with fine white and reddish white, and fine gray and red sandstones. These strata dip to the eastward at an angle of about 18°, and form the western limit of the sandstone and limestone forma- tions on the line of our route. Here we entered among the primitive rocks. The usual road passes to the right of this place; but we wound,
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or rather scrambled, our way up the narrow valley for several hours. Wildness and disorder were the character of this scenery. The river had been swollen by the late rains, and came rushing through with an impetuous current, three or four feet deep, and generally twenty yards broad. The valley was sometimes the breadth of the stream, and sometimes opened into little green meadows, sixty yards wide, with open groves of aspen. The stream was bordered throughout with aspen, beech, and willow; and tall pines grew on the sides and summits of the crags. On both sides, the granite rocks rose precipitously to the height of three hundred and five hundred feet, terminating in jagged and broken pointed peaks ; and frag- ments of fallen rock lay piled up at the foot of the precipices. Gneiss, mica slate, and a white granite, were among the varieties I noticed. Here were many old traces of beaver on the stream ; remnants of dams, near which were lying trees, which they had cut down, one and two feet in diameter. The hills entirely shut up the river- at the end of about five miles, and we turned up a ravine that led to a high prairie, which seemed to be the general level of the country. Hence, to the summit of the ridge, there is a regular and very gradual rise. Blocks of granite were piled up at the heads of the ravines, and small bare knolls of mica slate and milky quartz protruded at frequent intervals on the prairie, which was whitened in occasional spots with srji^J^alt jajses, where the water had evaporated, and left the bed covered with a shining incrustation of salt. The evening was very cold, a northwest wind driving a fine rain in our faces ; and at nightfall we descended to a little stream, on which we encamped, about two miles from the Sweet Water. Here had recently been a very large ( camp of Snake and Crow Indians ; and some large poles lying about af- forded the means of pitching a tent, and making other places of shelter. Our fires to-night were made principally of the dry branches of the arte- misia, which covered the slopes. It burns quickly, with a clear oily flame, and makes a hot fire. The hills here are composed of hard, compact mica slate, with veins of quartz.
•August 7. — We left our encampment with the rising sun. As we rose from the bed of the creek, the snow line of the mountains stretched grandly before us, the white peaks glittering in the sun. They had been hidden in the dark weather of the last few days, and it had been snowing on them, wThile it rained in the plains. We crossed a ridge, and again struck the Sweet Water — here a beautiful, swift stream, with a more open valley, timbered with beech and cottonwood. It now began to lose itself in the many small forks which make its head ; and we continued up the main stream until near noon, when we left it a few miles, to make our noon halt on a small creek among the hills, from which the stream issues by a small opening. Within was a beautiful grassy spot, covered with an open grove of large beech trees, among which I found several plants that I had not previously seen.
The afternoon was cloudy, with squalls of rain ; but the weather be- came fine at sunset, when we again encamped on the Sweet Water, with- in a few miles of the South Pass. The country over which we have passed to-day consists principally of the compact mica slate, which crops out on all the ridges, making .the uplands very rocky and slaty. In the escarpments which border the creeks, it is seen alternating with a light- colored granite, at an inclination of 45° ; the beds varying in thickness from two or three feet to six or eight hundred. At a distance, the granite
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y frequently has the appearance of irregular lumps of clay, hardened by ex- posure. A variety of asters may now be numbered amoug the character- istic plants, and the artemisia continues in full glory ; but cacti have be- come rare, and mosses begin to dispute the hills with them. The evening was damp and unpleasant; the thermometer, at 10 o’clock, being at 36°, and the grass wet with a heavy dew. Our astronomical observations placed this encamptment in longitude 109° 21' 32", and latitude 42° 27' 15".
Early in the morning we resumed our journey, the weather still cloudy, with occasional rain. Our general course was west, as I had determined to cross the dividing ridge by a bridle path among the broken country more immediately at the foot of the mountains, and return by the wagon road, two and a half miles to the south of the point where the trail crosses.
* A bout six miles from our encampment brought us to the summit. The ascent had been so gradual, that, with all the intimate knowledge pos- sessed by Carson, who had. made this country his home for seventeen years, we were obliged to watch very closely to find the place at which we had reached the culminating point. This was between two low hills, rising on either hand fifty or sixty feet. When I looked back at them, from the foot of the immediate slope on the western plain, their summits appeared to be about one hundred and twenty feet above. From the im- pression on my mind at this time, and subsequently on our return, I should compare the elevation which we surmounted immediately at the Pass, to the ascent of the Capitol hill from the avenue, at Washington. It is diffi- cult for me to fix positively the breadth of this pass. From the broken ground where it commences, at the foot of the Wind river chain, the view to the southeast is over a champaign country, broken, at the distance of nineteen miles, by the Table rock ; which, with the other isolated hills in its vicinity, seems to stand on a comparative plain. This I judged to be its termination, the ridge recovering its rugged character with the Table rock. It will be seen that it in no manner resembles the places to which the term is commonly applied — nothing of the gorge-like character and winding ascents of the Allegheny passes in America: nothing of the Great St. Bernard and Simplon passes in Europe. Approaching it from the mouth of the Sweet Water, a sandy plain, one hundred and twenty miles long, conducts, by a gradual and regular ascent, to the summit, about seven thousand feet above the sea ; and the traveller, without being re- minded of any change by toilsome ascents, suddenly finds himself on the waters which flow to the Pacific ocean. By the route we had travelled, the distance from Fort Laramie is three hundred and twenty miles, or nine hundred and fifty from the mouth of the Kansas.
Continuing our march, we reached, in eight miles from the Pass, the Little Sandy, one of the tributaries of the Colorado, or Green river of the Gulf of California. The weather had grown fine during the morning, and we remained here the rest of the day, to dry our baggage and take some astronomical observations. The stream was about forty feet wide, and two or three deep, with clear water and a full swift current, over a sandy bed. It was timbered with a growth of low bushy and dense willows, among which were little verdant spots, which gave our animals fine grass, and where I found a number of interesting plants. Among the neighbor- ing hills I noticed fragments of granite containing magnetic iron. Longi- tude of the camp was 109° 37' 59", and latitude 42° 27’ 34".
August 9. — We made our noon halt to-day on Big Sandy, another
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tributary of Green river. The face of the country traversed was of a brown sand of granite materials, the detritus of the neighboring mountains. Strata of the milky quartz cropped out, and blocks of granite were scat- tered about, containing magnetic iron. On Sandy creek the formation was of parti-colored sand, exhibited in escarpments fifty to eighty feet high. In the afternoon we had a severe storm of hail, and encamped at sunset on the first New Fork. Within the space of a few miles, the Wind moun- tains supply a number of tributaries to Green river, which are all called the New Forks. Near our camp were two remarkable isolated hills, one of them sufficiently large to merit the name of mountain. They are called the Two Buttes, and will serve to identify the place of our encampment,' which the observations of the evening placed in longitude 109° 58' li", and latitude 42° 42' 46". On the right bank of the stream, opposite to the large hill, the strata which are displayed consist of decomposing granite, which supplies the brown sand of which the face of the country is com- posed to a considerable depth.
•August 10. — The air at sunrise is clear and pure, and the morning ex- tremely cold, but beautiful. A lofty snow peak of the mountain is glitter- ing in the first rays of the sun, which has not yet reached us. The long mountain wall>to the east, rising two thousand feet abruptly from the plain, behind which we see the peaks, is still dark, and cuts clear against the glowing sky. A fog, just risen from the river, lies along the base of the mountain. A little before sunrise, the thermometer was at 35°, and at sunrise 33°. Water froze last night, and fires are very comfortable. The scenery becomes hourly more interesting and grand, and the view here is truly magnificent; but, indeed, it needs something to repay the long prai- rie journey of a thousand miles. The sun has just shot above the wall, and makes a magical change. The whole valley is glowing and bright, and all the mountain peaks are gleaming like silver. Though these snow mountains are not the Alps, they have their own character of grandeur and magnificence, and will doubtless find pens and pencils to do them justice. In the scene before us, we feel how much wood improves a view. The pines on the mountain seemed to give it much additional beauty. I was agreeably disappointed in the character of the streams on this side of the ridge. Instead of the creeks, which description had led me to expect,
I find bold, broad streams, with three or four feet water, and a rapid cur- rent. The fork on which we are encamped is upwards of a hundred feet ♦ wide, timbered with groves or thickets of the low willow. We were now approaching the loftiest part of the Wind river chain ; and I left the val- ley a few miles from our encampment, intending to penetrate the moun- tains as far as possible with the whole party. We were soon involved in very broken ground, among long ridges covered with fragments of granite Winding our way up a long ravine, we came unexpectedly in view of a most beautiful lake, set like a gem in the mountains. The sheet of water lay transversely across the direction