[Lewis:]
December 1st. 1805.
Cloudy morning wind from the S.E. sent out the men to
hunt and examin the country, they soon returned all except
Drewyer and informed me that the wood was so thick it was
almost impenetrable and that there was but little appearance
of game; they had seen the track of one deer only and a few
small grey squirrels. [ILLUSTRATION]
these s[q]uirrels are
about the size of the
red squirrel of the
lakes and eastern Atlantic
States, their bellies
are of a redish
yellow, or tanners
ooze colour the tale
flat and as long as the
body eyes black and
moderately large back
and sides of a greyish
brown
the brier with a
brown bark and three
l[e]aves which putforth
at the extremety
of the twigs like the
leaves of the blackbury
brier, tho' it is a kind of shrub and rises sometimes to
the hight of 10 fe[et] the green brier yet in leaf; the ash
with a remarkable large leaf; the large black alder. the large
elder with sky blue buries. the broad leave shrub which grows
something like the quill wood but has no joints, the leaf broad
and deeply indented, the bark p[e]als and hangs on the stem
and is of a yelowish brown colour. the seven bark is also
found here as is the common low cramburry there is a wild
crab apple which the natives eat this growth differs but little
in appearance from that of the wild crab of the Atlantic States.
but the fruit consists of little oval burries which grow in clusters
at the extremities of the twigs like the black haws. the
fruit is of a brown colour, oval form and about double as large
as the black haw; the rind is smoth and tough somewhat
hard; the seed is like that of the wild crab and nearly as large;
the pulp is soft of a pale yellow coulour; and when the fruit
has been touched by the frost is not unpleasant, being an
agreeable assed. the tree which bears a red burry in clusters
of a round form and size of a red haw. the leaf like that of
the small magnolia, and bark smoth and of a brickdust red
coulour it appears to be of the evergreen kind. half after one
oclock Drewyer not yet arrived. heard him shoot 5 times just
above us and am in hopes he has fallen in with a gang of elk.
[In Clark's handwriting:] Capt. Lewis rough notes when he
left Capt. Clark near the mouth of Columbia for a few days to
examine the S.W. side.
