until June 10, unwilling to impose upon
their hosts, and hence were in sore straits most of the time.

"May 21st. On parceling out the stores, the stock of each man was found
to consist of only one awl and one knitting-pin, one half ounce of
vermilion, two needles, and about a yard of ribbon--a slender means of
bartering for our subsistence; but the men have been so much accustomed
to privations that now neither the want of meat nor the scanty funds of
the party excites the least anxiety among them."

Again they were reduced to a diet of wild roots; but the amiable old
chief discovered their situation, paid them a visit, and informed them
that most of the horses running at large upon the surrounding plain
belonged to the people of his village, insisting that if the party
stood in want of meat, they would use these animals as their own.
Surely the noble Nez Perces deserved better at the hands of our
government than they got in later years. The benefits they were so
ready to confer in time of need were shamelessly forgotten.

June 1st two of the men, who had been sent to trade with the Indians
for a supply of roots, and who carried all that remained of the
merchandise, had the misfortune to lose it in the river. Then, says the
journal, "we created a new fund, by cutting off the buttons from our
clothes and preparing some eye-water and basilicon, to which were added
some phials and small tin boxes in which we had once kept phosphorus.
With this cargo two men set out in the morning to trade, and brought
home three bushels of roots and some bread, which, in our situation,
was as important as the return of an East India ship."

"June 8th.... Several foot-races were run between our men and the
Indians; the latter, who are very active and fond of these races,
proved themselves very expert, and one of them was as fleet as our
swiftest runners. After the races were over, the men divided themselves
into two parties and played prison base, an exercise which we are
desirous of encouraging, before we begin the passage over the
mountains, as several of the men are becoming lazy from inaction."

On the 10th they left this camp and moved eastward, drawing slowly
toward the mountains, and keeping an anxious lookout for hunting
grounds. In this quest they were not successful; all the wild creatures
round about had suffered much in the long winter, and the few they were
able to secure were so much reduced in flesh as to be unfit for f