y exhibit no appearance of being overflowed; the
bed is entirely composed of a light brown sand, the particles of which,
like those of the Missouri, are extremely fine. Like the dry rivers we
passed before, this seemed to have discharged its waters recently, but
the watermark indicated that its greatest depth had not been more than
two feet. This stream, if it deserve the name, we called Bigdry (Big
Dry) River."

And Big Dry it remains on the maps unto this day. In this region the
party recorded this observation:--

"The game is now in great quantities, particularly the elk and buffalo,
which last is so gentle that the men are obliged to drive them out
of the way with sticks and stones. The ravages of the beaver are very
apparent; in one place the timber was entirely prostrated for a space of
three acres in front on the river and one in depth, and great part of it
removed, though the trees were in large quantities, and some of them as
thick as the body of a man."

Yet so great have been the ravages of man among these gentle creatures,
that elk are now very rarely found in the region, and the buffalo have
almost utterly disappeared from the face of the earth. Just after
the opening of the Northern Pacific Railway, in 1883, a band of sixty
buffaloes were heard of, far to the southward of Bismarck, and a party
was organized to hunt them. The _bold_ hunters afterwards boasted that
they killed every one of this little band of survivors of their race.

The men were now (in the middle of May) greatly troubled with boils,
abscesses, and inflamed eyes, caused by the poison of the alkali that
covered much of the ground and corrupted the water. Here is an entry in
the journal of May 11:--

"About five in the afternoon one of our men (Bratton), who had been
afflicted with boils and suffered to walk on shore, came running to the
boats with loud cries, and every symptom of terror and distress. For
some time after we had taken him on board he was so much out of breath
as to be unable to describe the cause of his anxiety; but he at length
told us that about a mile and a half below he had shot a brown bear,
which immediately turned and was in close pursuit of him; but the bear
being badly wounded could not overtake him. Captain Lewis, with seven
men, immediately went in search of him; having found his track they
followed him by the blood for a mile, found him concealed in some
thick brushwood, and shot him with two balls through th