taste and a purgative effect. A beaver was caught last night
by one of the Frenchmen; we killed two geese, and saw some cranes, the
largest bird of that kind common to the Missouri and Mississippi, and
perfectly white except the large feathers on the two first joints of the
wing which are black. Under a bluff opposite to our encampment we
discovered some Indians with horses, whom we supposed were Minnetarees,
but the width of the river prevented our speaking to them.

Friday, 12th. We set off early and passed a high range of hills on the
south side, our periogues being obliged to go over to the south in order
to avoid a sandbank which was rapidly falling in. At six miles we came
to at the lower side of the entrance of the Little Missouri, where we
remained during the day for the purpose of making celestial
observations. This river empties itself on the south side of the
Missouri, one thousand six hundred and ninety-three miles from its
confluence with the Mississippi. It rises to the west of the Black
mountains, across the northern extremity of which it finds a narrow
rapid passage along high perpendicular banks, then seeks the Missouri in
a northeastern direction, through a broken country with highlands bare
of timber, and the low grounds particularly supplied with cottonwood,
elm, small ash, box, alder, and an undergrowth of willow, redwood,
sometimes called red or swamp-willow, the redberry and chokecherry. In
its course it passes near the northwest side of the Turtle mountain,
which is said to be only twelve or fifteen miles from its mouth in a
straight line a little to the south of west, so that both the Little
Missouri and Knife river have been laid down too far southwest. It
enters the Missouri with a bold current, and is one hundred and
thirty-four yards wide, but its greatest depth is two feet and a half,
and this joined to its rapidity and its sandbars, make the navigation
difficult except for canoes, which may ascend it for a considerable
distance. At the mouth, and as far as we could discern from the hills
between the two rivers about three miles from their junction, the
country is much broken, the soil consisting of a deep rich dark coloured
loam, intermixed with a small proportion of fine sand and covered
generally with a short grass resembling blue grass. In its colour, the
nature of its bed, and its general appearance, it resembles so much the
Missouri as to induce a belief that the countries they water a