Friday May 9th 1806.
We sent out several hunters early this morning with instructions
to meet us at the lodge of the Twisted hair. Collecting
our horses detained us untill 9.A.M. when we charged our
packhorses and set out. our rout lay through a level rich
country similar to that of yesterday; at the distance of 6 miles
we arrived at the lodge of the twisted hair; this habitation was
built in the usual form with sticks mats and dryed hay, and
contained 2 fir[e]s and about 12 persons. even at this small
habitation there was an appendage of the soletary lodge, the
retreat of the tawney damsels when nature causes them to be
driven into coventry; here we halted as had been previously
concerted, and one man with 2 horses accompa[n]yed the
twisted hair to the canoe camp,[6]
about 4 ms. in quest of the
saddles. the Twisted hair sent two young men in surch of
our horses agreeably to his promis. The country along
the rocky mountains for several hundred miles in length and
about 50 in width is level extreemly fertile and in many parts
covered with a tall and open growth of the longleafed pine,
near the watercourses the hills are steep and lofty tho' [they]
are covered with a good soil not remarkably stony and possess
more timber than the level country. the bottom lands
on the watercou[r]ses are reather narrow and confined tho'
fertile & seldom inundated. this country would form an extensive
settlement; the climate appears quite as mild as that
of similar latitude on the Atlantic coast if not more so and it
cannot be otherwise than healthy; it possesses a fine dry pure
air. the grass and many plants are now upwards of knee high.
I have no doubt but this tract of country if cultivated would
produce in great abundance every article essentially necessary
to the comfort and subsistence of civillized man. to it's present
inhabitants nature seems to have dealt with a liberal hand,
for she has distributed a great variety of esculent plants over
the face of the country which furnish them a plentifull store
of provision; these are acquired with but little toil, when prepared
after the method of the natives afford not only a nutricious
but an agreeable food. among other roots those called
by them the quawmash and Cows are esteemed the most
agreeable and valuable as they are also the most abundant.
the
cows is a knobbed root of an irregularly rounded form
not unlike the gensang in form and consistence. this root
they collect, rub of[f] a thin black rhind which covers it and
pounding it expose it in cakes to the sun. these cakes are
about an inch and 1/4 thick and 6 by 18 in width, when dryed
they either eat this bread alone without any further preparation,
or boil it and make a thick musilage; the latter is most
common and much the most agreeable. the flavor of this
root is not very unlike the gensang. this root they collect as
early as the snows disappear in the spring and continue to collect
it untill the quawmash supplys it's place which happens
about the latter end of June. the quawmash is also collected
for a few weaks after it first makes it's appearance in the spring,
but when the scape appears it is no longer fit for use untill the
seed are ripe which happens about the time just mentioned,
and then the cows declines.
[7]
the latter is also frequently dryed
in the sun and pounded afterwards and then used in making
soope. I observed a few trees of the larch and a few small
bushes of the balsam fir near the lodge of the Twisted hair.
at 2 P.M. our hunters joined us Drewyer killed a deer but
lost it in the river. a few pheasants was the produce of the
hunt. we procured a few roots of cows of which we made
soope. late in the evening The Twisted hair and willard
returned; they brought about half of our saddles, and some
powder and lead which had been buried at that place. my
saddle was among the number of those which were lost.
about the same time the young men arrived with 21 of our
horses. the greater part of our horses were in fine order.
five of them appeared to have been so much injured by the
indians riding them last fall that they had not yet recovered
and were in low order. three others had soar backs. we had
these horses caught and hubbled. the situation of our camp
was a disagreeable one in an open plain; the wind blew violently
and was cold. at seven P.M. it began to rain and hail,
at 9 it was succeeded by a heavy shower of snow which continued
untill the next morning. Several indians joined us
this evening from the village of the
broken arm or Tunnachemootoolt
and continued all night. The man who had imposed
himself on us as a relation of the twisted hair rejoined
us this evening we found him an impertinent proud supercilious
fellow and of no kind of rispectability in the nation, we
therefore did not indulge his advances towards a very intimate
connection. The Cutnose lodged with the twisted hair I
beleive they have become good friends again. several indians
slept about us.
