time would have brought up the whole party, and the rest of
the baggage as far as the Shoshonee village.

Preparations were accordingly made this evening for such an arrangement.
The sun is excessively hot in the day time, but the nights very cold,
and rendered still more unpleasant from the want of any fuel except
willow brush. The appearances too of game, for many days' subsistence,
are not very favourable.

Sunday 18. In order to relieve the men of captain Clarke's party from
the heavy weight of their arms provisions and tools, we exposed a few
articles to barter for horses, and soon obtained three very good ones,
in exchange for which we gave a uniform coat, a pair of leggings, a few
handkerchiefs, three knifes and some other small articles, the whole of
which did not in the United States cost more than twenty dollars: a
fourth was purchased by the men for an old checkered shirt, a pair of
old leggings and a knife. The Indians seemed to be quite as well pleased
as ourselves at the bargains they had made. We now found that the two
inferior chiefs were somewhat displeased at not having received a
present equal to that given to the great chief, who appeared in a dress
so much finer than their own. To allay their discontent, we bestowed on
them two old coats, and promised them that if they were active in
assisting us across the mountains they should have an additional
present. This treatment completely reconciled them, and the whole Indian
party, except two men and two women, set out in perfect good humour to
return home with captain Clarke. After going fifteen miles through a
wide level valley with no wood but willows and shrubs, he encamped in
the Shoshonee cove near a narrow pass where the highlands approach
within two hundred yards of each other, and the river is only ten yards
wide. The Indians went on further, except the three chiefs and two young
men, who assisted in eating two deer brought in by the hunters. After
their departure every thing was prepared for the transportation of the
baggage, which was now exposed to the air and dried. Our game was one
deer and a beaver, and we saw an abundance of trout in the river for
which we fixed a net in the evening.

We have now reached the extreme navigable point of the Missouri, which
our observation places in latitude 43 degrees 30' 43" north. It is
difficult to comprise in any general description the characteristics of
a river so extensive, and fed by so many strea