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Show SINGULAR STRATA OF BITUMINOUS COAL. 143 On the following morning, the 14th, we had a very difficult navigation, and were even obliged to put back, so that the Assiniboin overtook and passed us, and we followed it up the river on the north bank, and afterwards landed forty men to lighten the vessel; ran happily over a sand bank, and again passed the Assiniboin. In the preceding year, the whole prairie was seen from the steamer to be covered with herds of buffaloes, but now there were no living creatures, except a few wild geese and ducks, which had likewise become scarce, since the termination of the great forest below the La Platte River. The monotony of this rude landscape was, however, soon interrupted by the appearance of a canoe, in which were four white men rowing down the river. A boat was speedily manned, into which Mr. McKenzie and Mr. Sandford went, well armed, in order to speak to them, because they were supposed to be engages of the Company who were deserting. We were informed by them, that the Arikkaras, a dangerous Indian tribe, had lately murdered three beaver hunters, one of whom was a man named Glass, well known in the country, of whom I shall have occasion to speak in the sequel. Upon an island, to which we came, was a real wilderness; the beavers had formed a kind of abattis, by felling poplars; another island was remarkable because there is a hot spring opposite to it, on the main land, the water of which has no mineral taste. On the left bank, about five or six miles below Cedar Island, we observed the remains of Indian huts. Mr. Me Kenzie had met here, in the preceding year, a camp of the Punca Indians. On the steep banks were coloured stripes, or regular strata; some black, doubtless bituminous coal, others reddish brown, and, in several places, burnt black. Some parts had burnt very lately, and, in many places, had fallen in. Unhappily we were not able more closely to examine these remarkable strata. We fastened the vessel for the night to the western coast; and the lightning was very brilliant. On the following day, the 15th of May, we saw in the thickets, behind which the prairie extended, many traces of an Indian camp ; heads of elks, stags, and other animals, were scattered about; the marks of horses' feet were everywhere visible; and a practicable trodden path led through the thickets. At noon, when the thermometer was at 77°, the Assiniboin again passed us, and, with the keel-boat Maria, vanished from our sight. At four in the afternoon, we reached the place where we had stopped the preceding night, with the help of the keel-boat, which had returned, and at length succeeded in getting forward; but again had a storm of thunder and lightning. The whole country, beyond the banks, consisted of hills, rising one above the other; some covered with verdure, some of a yellowish colour, mostly without life and variety. While the lightning flashed from the dense black clouds, we again overtook the Assiniboin, which had landed its wood-cutters to fell some cedars on the steep mountain. We, too, landed 300 paces further up, to cut down cedars for fuel. At this place there was the narrow deep ravine of a small stream, now dry, in which we caught a pale yellow bat, and saw some snakes, and the scattered bones of buffaloes. We climbed from the bottom of the ravine up the sin- |
