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Show GROUSE CREEK----PRAIRIE DOGS. 227 On the following morning, the 29th of July, the river was rather turbid, and there must have been heavy rain higher up. Nothing particular occurred on this day. At six in the morning of the 30th, we came to a stream which is, doubtless, the Grouse Creek of Lewis and Clarke. There were a couple of islands, which we took to be Lewis and Clarke's Pot Islands, and a stream near them, for their Teapot Creek, a name which, like many others given by these travellers, amused us much. We could not help observing that such names are not well chosen, especially as it would not be difficult to find better ones, even by merely retaining the generally harmonious Indian names. Toward seven o'clock in the evening, as we were sailing by the eminences which resembled the lower mountains of Switzerland, we were much surprised to see a boat, with three men, which soon afterwards came alongside our vessel. It had on board, Doucette, the Blackfoot interpreter, and two engages, from Fort Me Kenzie, who had been sent to meet us ; they had left the fort three days before, where they told us there were 150 tents of the Piekanns, or Black-foot Indians; the remainder of this tribe were scattered about Maria River. They likewise said that the Fall Indians, or Gros Ventres des Prairies, had encamped on Bighorn River, to wait for us : that those Indians, however, had not at this moment any articles for trade, but hoped to receive some presents. This was no pleasant information for Mr. Mitchell, as he was not just then in a condition to make many presents, and, besides, did not much trust those Indians. Not far from the place where we now were, Doucette had shot a large bear, which was left on the bank of the Missouri, a piece of news which was very agreeable to me, and of which I resolved to take advantage. This morning, the 31st of July, being very fine, I set out early, with Messrs. Mitchell and Bodmer, Doucette, Dreidoppel, and the two brothers Beauchamp, all armed with rifles, or guns, to look for the bear, which had been killed the day before. The engages carried ropes and hatchets. In the thick underwood and high grass of the forest, we first killed a rattlesnake, and, after proceeding a good half league, reached the bank of the river, where we found the bear still untouched. He was feeding on a buffalo cow, drowned in the river, when Doucette shot him through the heart, on which he ran up the bank, which was about ten feet high, and fell dead at the top. After taking his measure, the skin was stripped off, and the flesh cut from the bones, to prepare the skeleton. The bones having been partly cleaned, were tied together, and drawn up, by a rope, into a tree, intending to take them in our return, after they had been a little more cleaned by the birds of prey and insects. As soon as this work was finished, we followed the vessel, which, meantime, had got considerably the start of us; yet, in the prairie beyond the wood, we stopped at a large, so called, village of the prairie dogs, to kill some of these animals. They sat in parties of two or three on the flat little eminences of their burrows, uttered their cry, which is not a bark, but a shrill squeak, and vanished. Making as little noise as possible, we sat I |