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Show ~58 Lewis and Clar1~e's Expediti01t perspiration ensued, his fever abated and in the morning hr was quite recovered. One of the men caught several dozen fish oftwo species: the fil·st is about nine inches long, ora white colour, rouml in shat)e; the mouth is beset both above and below with a rim of fine sharp teeth, the eye moderatcl) large, the pupil dat·k, and the iris uat·row, and of' a yellow~ ish brown colour: in form and size it rcscmJJles the white chub of the Potomac, though its head is IWoportionably smaller; they readily bite at meat or grasshoppers; but the flesh though soft and of a floc white colour is not highly flavoured. The second species is precisely of the form and about the size of the fish known by the name of the hickory shad or old 'vife, though it diffet·s from it in having the outer edge of both the up11e1' and lower jaw set with a rim of teeth, and the tongue and palate also are defended by long sharp teeth bending inwards, the eye is very large, the iris wide and of a silvery colom·; they do not inhabit muddy water, and the flavour is much SUJlCrior to that of the former species. Of the first. kind we bad seen a f'ew before we reached ~'laria's 1·iver; but had found none of the ]ast before we caught them in the Missouri above its junction with that river. The white (:at continues as high as Maria's river, but they are scarce in this 11art of the river, nor have we caught any of them since leaving the Man~ dans which weighed more than six pounds. Of other game they saw a great abundance even in their short march of nine miles. Wednesday 12. This morning captain Lewis left the bank of the river in order to avoid the steep ravines ·which generally run from the shore to the distance of one or two miles in tbe I>lain: having reached the opened country he went for twelve miles in a course a little to the west of southwest, when the sun becoming warm by nine o'clock, he returned to the river in quest of water and to kill something for breakfast, there being no water in the plain, and the buffaloe discovering theDl before they came within gunslJOt too~ • Up the e~llissout·i. 259 to flight. 'fhey reached the banks in a handsome open low ground with cottonwood, after three miles walk. Here they saw two large brown bears, and killed them both at the first fire, a circumstance which has never before occurred since we have seen that animal. Having made a meal of a 11art and hung the remainder on a tree with a note for captain Clarke, they again ascended the bluffs into the open plains. Here they saw great numbers of the burrowing squirrel, also some wolves, antelopes, muledeer, and vast herds of buffaloe. 'l'hey soon crossed a t•idge considel'ably higher than the surt·ounding plains, and ft·om its top had a beautiful view of the Rocky mountains1 which are now completely covered with snow: their gener·al com~sc is from southeast to the nor·th of northwest, and they seem to consist of several ranges which successively rise above each other till the most distant mingles with the clouds. After travelling twehe miles they again met the river, where there was a handsome plain of cottonwood; and although it \Vas not sunset, and they had only eome twenty-scv.cn miles, yet captain Lewis felt weak from his Jate disot~dcr, and therefor·e determined to go no furtl1er that night. In the course of the day they killed a quantity of game, and saw some signs of otter as well as beaver, and many tracks of the brown bear: they also caught great quaRtities of the white fish mentioned yesterday. With the broad~leafed cottonwood, which has formed the principal timber of the Missour ·i, is he1·e mixed another species differing from the 1irst only in the na1·rowness of its leaf and the greater thickness of its bark. 'l'he leaf is long, oval, acutely poiuted, about two and a half 01~ three inches long and from three quarters of an inch to an inch in width; it is smooth ami thick somelimes slightly grooved or channeled with the margin a little serrate, the upper disk of a common, the lower of a whitish green. This s11ecies seems to be preferred by the beavet• to the broad~leaved, probably because the former affords a deeper and softer bark. |