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Show I i 288 DAMAGE TO OUR COLLECTIONS. north bank. As the sun now shone with considerable power, we hastened completely to unload the boat, to open and unpack all the chests and trunks, one by one. How grieved were we to find all our clothes, books, collections, some mathematical instruments, in a word, all our effects, entirely wet and soaked. The chests were, for the most part, open in all the joints, and quite useless; but what afflicted me the most, was my fine botanical collection of the Upper Missouri, made with labour and expense of time, which I could not now put into dry paper, and which therefore, was, for the most part, lost, as well as the Indian leather dresses, which became mouldy. We had now no resource but to remain where we were till most of our things were dried; a most disagreeable necessity. A large spot of the prairie was covered with our scattered effects, and a wind arising caused some disorder among our goods, and we were obliged to take care that nothing might be lost. My extensive herbarium had to be laid, on account of the wind, under the shelter of the eminences of a small lateral ravine, which took me the whole day, and yet all the plants became black and mouldy. At this place, Morrin killed, for the use of our kitchen, a deer (Cervus maerotis), which had already assumed its grey under coat. This kind of deer is distinguished and well known by its long ears, which are especially remarkable in the female, as the annexed woodcut shows. When the flesh was cooked, we all wrapped ourselves in our blankets, and lay down to sleep on the high bank of the river, while two persons constantly kept guard, and were relieved every two hours. I had to keep watch with Thiebaut from nine to eleven o'clock, which was not an unpleasant time, as the night was warm and still, and rather moonlight. A deer crossed the river pretty near us, as it began to dawn, but nobody fired, in order not to make any unneces- |
