History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I.. Clark William
it is a sort of entry about ten feet from the lodge. They are very warm and compact.
They cultivate maize or Indian corn, beans, pumpkins, watermelons, squashes, and a species of tobacco peculiar to themselves.
Their commerce is chiefly with the traders who supply them with goods in return for peltries, which they procure not only by their own hunting, but in exchange for corn from their less civilized neighbours. The object chiefly in demand seemed to be red paint, but they would give any thing they had to spare for the most trifling article. One of the men to-day gave an Indian a hook made out of a pin, and he gave him in return a pair of moccasins.
They express a disposition to keep at peace with all nations, but they are well armed with fusils, and being much under the influence of the Sioux, who exchanged the goods which they get from the British for Ricara corn, their minds are sometimes poisoned and they cannot be always depended on. At the present moment they are at war with the Mandans. We are informed by Mr. Gravelines, who had passed through that country, that the Yankton or Jacques river rises about forty miles to the east or northeast of this place, the Chayenne branch of the Red river about twenty miles further, passing the Sioux, and the St. Peter's about eighty.
Saturday, 13th. In the morning our visitors left us, except the brother of the chief who accompanies us and one of the squaws. We passed at an early hour a camp of Sioux on the north bank, who merely looked at us without saying a word, and from the character of the tribe we did not solicit a conversation. At ten and a half miles we reached the mouth of a creek on the north, which takes its rise from some ponds a short distance to the northeast: to this stream we gave the name of Stoneidol creek, for after passing a willow and sand island just above its mouth, we discovered that a few miles back from the Missouri there are two stones resembling human figures, and a third like a dog; all which are objects of great veneration among the Ricaras. Their history would adorn the metamorphoses of Ovid. A young man was deeply enamoured with a girl whose parents refused their consent to the marriage. The youth went out into the fields to mourn his misfortunes; a sympathy of feeling led the lady to the same spot, and the faithful dog would not cease to follow his master. After wandering together and having nothing but grapes to subsist on, they were at last converted into stone, which beginning at the feet gradually invaded the nobler parts leaving nothing unchanged but a bunch of grapes which the female holds in her hands to this day. Whenever the Ricaras pass these sacred stones, they stop to make some offering of dress to propitiate these deities. Such is the account given by the Ricara chief which we had no mode of examining, except that we found one part of the story very agreeably confirmed; for on the river near where the event is said to have occurred, we found a greater abundance of fine grapes than we had yet seen. Above this is a small creek four and a half miles from Stoneidol creek, which is fifteen yards wide, comes in from the south, and received from us the name of Pocasse or Hay creek, in honour of the chief of the second village. Above the Ricara island, the Missouri becomes narrow and deeper, the sandbars being generally confined to the points; the current too is much more gentle; the timber on the lowlands is also in much greater quantities, though the high grounds are still naked. We proceeded on under a fine breeze from the southeast, and after making eighteen miles encamped on the north near a timbered low plain, after which we had some rain and the evening was cold. The hunters killed one deer only.
Sunday, 14th. We set out in the rain which continued during the day. At five miles we came to a creek on the south, about fifteen yards wide, and named by us Piaheto or Eagle's Feather, in honour of the third chief of the Ricaras. After dinner we stopped on a sandbar, and executed the sentence of a court martial which inflicted corporal punishment on one of the soldiers. This operation affected the Indian chief very sensibly, for he cried aloud during the punishment: we explained the offence and the reasons of it. He acknowledged that examples were necessary, and that he himself had given them by punishing with death; but his nation never whipped even children from their birth. After this we continued with the wind from the northeast, and at the distance of twelve miles, encamped in a cove of the southern bank. Immediately opposite our camp on the north side are the ruins of an ancient fortification, the greater part of which is washed into the river: nor could we distinguish more than that the walls were eight or ten feet high. The evening is wet and disagreeable, and the river which is somewhat wider than yesterday, continues to have an unusual quantity of timber. The country was level on both sides in the morning, but afterwards we passed some black bluffs on the south.
Monday, 15th. We stopped at three miles on the north a little above a camp of Ricaras who are hunting, where we were visited by about thirty Indians. They came over in their skin canoes, bringing us meat, for which we returned them beads and fishhooks. About a mile higher we found another encampment of Ricaras on the south, consisting of eight lodges: here we again ate and exchanged a few presents. As we went we discerned numbers of other Indians on both sides of the river; and at about nine miles we came to a creek on the south, where we saw many high hills resembling a house with a slanting roof; and a little below the creek an old village of the Sharha or Chayenne Indians. The morning had been cloudy, but the evening became pleasant, the wind from the northeast, and at sunset we halted, after coming ten miles over several sandbars and points, above a camp of ten Ricara lodges on the north side. We visited their camp, and smoked and eat with several of them; they all appeared kind and pleased with our attentions, and the fair sex received our men with more than hospitality. York was here again an object of astonishment; the children would follow him constantly, and if he chanced to turn towards them, run with great terror. The country of to-day is generally low and covered with timber on both sides, though in the morning we passed some barren hills on the south.
Tuesday, 16th. At this camp the squaw who accompanied the chief left us; two others were very anxious to go on with us. Just above our camp we passed a circular work or fort where the Sharha or Chayennes formerly lived: and a short distance beyond, a creek which we called Chayenne creek. At two miles is a willow island with a large sandbar on both sides above it, and a creek, both on the south, which we called Sohaweh, the Ricara name for girl; and two miles above a second creek, to which we gave the name of Chapawt, which means woman in the same language. Three miles further is an island situated in a bend to the north, about a mile and a half long, and covered with cottonwood. At the lower end of this island comes in a small creek from the north, called Keetooshsahawna or Place of Beaver. At the upper extremity of the island a river empties itself from the north: it is called Warreconne, or Elk Shed their Horns, and is about thirty-five yards wide: the island itself is named Carp island by Evans, a former traveller. As we proceeded there were great numbers of goats on the banks of the river, and we soon after saw large flocks of them in the water: they had been gradually driven into the river by the Indians who now lined the shore so as to prevent their escape, and were firing on them, while sometimes boys went into the river and killed them with sticks: they seemed to be very successful, for we counted fifty-eight which they had killed. We ourselves killed some, and then passing the lodges to which these Indians belonged, encamped at the distance of half a mile on the south, having made fourteen and a half miles. We were soon visited by numbers of these Ricaras, who crossed the river hallooing and singing: two of them then returned for some goats' flesh and buffaloe meat dried and fresh, with which they made a feast that lasted till late at night, and caused much music and merriment.
Wednesday 17th. The weather was pleasant: we passed a low ground covered with small timber on the south, and barren hills on the north which come close to the river; the wind from the northwest then become so strong that we could not move after ten o'clock, until late in the afternoon, when we were forced to use the towline, and we therefore made only six miles. We all went out hunting and examining the country. The goats, of which we see large flocks coming to the north bank of the river, spend the summer, says Mr. Gravelines, in the plains east of the Missouri, and at the present season are returning to the Black mountains, where they subsist on leaves and shrubbery during the winter, and resume their migrations in the spring. We also saw buffaloe, elk, and deer, and a number of snakes; a beaver house too was seen, and we caught a whippoorwill of a small and uncommon kind: the leaves are fast falling; the river wider than usual and full of sandbars: and on the sides of the hills are large stones, and some rock of a brownish colour in the southern bend below us. Our latitude by observation was 46° 23' 57".
Thursday 18. After three miles we reached the mouth of Le Boulet or Cannonball river: this stream rises in the Black mountains,