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Show 202 Lewis and Clm·ke's Expedition of the shoulder. Tl1e antelopes arc yet lean and the females are with young: this fleet and quick-sighted animal is generally the vietim of its curiosity: when they first sec the hunters they run with gt·eat velocity; if he lies down on the ground and lifts up his arm, his hat, or his foot, the antelope returns on a light trot to look at the object, and sometimes goes and returns two or three times till they a11proach 'vithin reach of the rifle: so too they sometimes leave theil· flock to go and look at the wolves who crouch down, and if the antelope be frightened at fir~tt repeat the same manamvre, and sometimes relieve each other till they decoy it from the party when they seize it. But generally the wolves take them as they are crossing the rivers, for although !Wift of foot they are not good swimmers. Wednesday, May 1. The wind was in our favour and we were enabled to use the sails till twelve o'clock, when the wind became so high and squally that we were forced to come to at the distance of ten miles on the south, in a lo" ground stocked with cottonwood, and remain there during the day; one of the canoes being separated from us, and not able to cross over in consequence of the high waves. 'l1he country around is more pleasant than that thrcmgh which we had passed for several days, the hills being lower, the low grounds wider and better supplied with timber, which consists principally of cottonwood: the undergrowth willow on the banks and sandbars, rosebushes, red willow, and the b1•oad-leafed willow in the low plains, while the high country on both sides is one extensive plain without wood, though the soil is a dat·k, rich, mellow loam. Our hunters killed a huffaloe, an elk, a goat, and two beaver, and also a bird of the }llover kind. . 'l'hursday, 2d. 'I,be wind continued high during the mght, and at daylight it began to snow and did not stop till ten o'clock, when the ground was covered an inch deep, forming a striking contrast with tl1e vegetation which ia now considerably advanced; some flowers having pot forth, Up the .lJlissour·i. ZOJ ""d the cotton\vood leaves as large as a dollat·. '.r.be wind lulled about five o'clock in the afternoon, and we then proceeded along wide fertile low grounds and high level plains, and encamped at the distance of four miles. Our game today was deer, elk, and buffaloe: we also procured three l1eaver who are quite gentle, as they have not been hunted, but when the hunters are in pursuit they never leave theil' buts during the day: this animal we esteem a great delicacy, particularly the tail, which when boiled resembles in flavour the flesh tongues and sounds of the codfish, and is generally so large as to afford a plentiful mt>al for two men. One of the hunters in passing near an old Indian camp found several yards of scarlet cloth, suspended on the bough of a tree as a sacrifice to the deity by the Assiniboins: the custom of making these offerings being common among that people as indeed among all the Indians on the ~1i ssouri. The air was sharp this evening; the water froze on the oars as we rowed, and in the morning, F,riday, sd, the weather became quite cold, tl1e ice was a quarter of au inch thick in the kettle, and the snow still continued on the hills though it bas melted from the plains. 'rhe wind too continued high from the west, IJut not so violently as to prevent our going on. At two mile~ from om· encampment we passed a curious collection of bu sbt.~" about thirty feet high and ten or twelve in diameter, t ied in the form of a fascine and standing on end in the middle of the low ground: this too we supposed to have been left by thelmlians as a religious sacrifice: at twelve o·clock the usuHl hour we halted for dinner. 'l.1he Jow grounds on the 1·ive1' are much wider than common, sometimes extending· from five to nine miles to the highlands, which are much Iowet· than heretofore, not being lllOl'e than fifty 01' sixty rect above the lower plain: thr·ough all this valley traces of the ancient bed of the river are every where visible, and since the hills have become lower, the stra.tas of <~oal, but·nt earth, and pumicestone have in a great measure ceased, |