History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I.

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Our camp is by observation in latitude 41° 3' 11". Immediately behind it is a plain about five miles wide, one half covered with wood, the other dry and elevated. The low grounds on the south near the junction of the two rivers, are rich, but subject to be overflowed. Farther up, the banks are higher, and opposite our camp the first hills approach the river, and are covered with timber, such as oak, walnut, and elm. The intermediate country is watered by the Papillon, or Butterfly creek, of about eighteen yards wide, and three miles from the Platte; on the north are high open plains and prairies, and at nine miles from the Platte, the Musquitoe creek, and two or three small willow islands. We stayed here several days, during which we dried our provisions, made new oars, and prepared our despatches and maps of the country we had passed, for the president of the United States, to whom we intend to send them by a periogue from this place. The hunters have found game scarce in this neighbourhood; they have seen deer, turkies, and grouse; we have also an abundance of ripe grapes; and one of our men caught a white catfish, the eyes of which were small, and its tail resembling that of a dolphin. The present season is that in which the Indians go out into the prairies to hunt the buffaloe; but as we discovered some hunter's tracks, and observed the plains on fire in the direction of their villages, we hoped that they might have returned to gather the green indian corn, and therefore despatched two men to the Ottoes or Pawnee villages with a present of tobacco, and an invitation to the chiefs to visit us. They returned after two days absence. Their first course was through an open prairie to the south, in which they crossed Butterfly creek. They then reached a small beautiful river, called Come de Cerf, or Elkhorn river, about one hundred yards wide, with clear water and a gravelly channel. It empties a little below the Ottoe village into the Platte, which they crossed, and arrived at the town about forty-five miles from our camp. They found no Indians there, though they saw some fresh tracks of a small party. The Ottoes were once a powerful nation, and lived about twenty miles above the Platte, on the southern bank of the Missouri. Being reduced, they migrated to the neighborhood of the Pawnees, under whose protection they now live. Their village is on the south side of the Platte, about thirty miles from its mouth; and their number is two hundred men, including about thirty families of Missouri Indians, who are incorporated with them. Five leagues above them, on the same side of the river, resides the nation of Pawnees. This people were among the most numerous of the Missouri Indians, but have gradually been dispersed and broken, and even since the year 1797, have undergone some sensible changes. They now consist of four bands; the first is the one just mentioned, of about five hundred men, to whom of late years have been added the second band, who are called republican Pawnees, from their having lived on the republican branch of the river Kanzas, whence they emigrated to join the principal band of Pawnees: the republican Pawnees amount to nearly two hundred and fifty men. The third, are the Pawnees Loups, or Wolf Pawnees, who reside on the Wolf fork of the Platte, about ninety miles from the principal Pawnees, and number two hundred and eighty men. The fourth band originally resided on the Kanzas and Arkansaw, but in their wars with the Osages, they were so often defeated, that they at last retired to their present position on the Red river, where they form a tribe of four hundred men. All these tribes live in villages, and raise corn; but during the intervals of culture rove in the plains in quest of buffaloe.

Beyond them on the river, and westward of the Black mountains, are the Kaninaviesch, consisting of about four hundred men. They are supposed to have emigrated originally from the Pawnees nation; but they have degenerated from the improvements of the parent tribe, and no longer live in villages, but rove through the plains.

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The next morning, August 20, the Indians mounted their horses and left us, having received a canister of whiskey at parting. We then set sail, and after passing two islands on the north, came to on that side under some bluffs; the first near the river since we left the Ayauwa village. Here we had the misfortune to lose one of our sergeants, Charles Floyd. He was yesterday seized with a bilious cholic, and all our care and attention were ineffectual to relieve him: a little before his death, he said to captain Clark, "I am going to leave you," his strength failed him as he added "I want you to write me a letter," but he died with a composure which justified the high opinion we had formed of his firmness and good conduct. He was buried on the top of the bluff with the honours due to a brave soldier; and the place of his interment marked by a cedar post, on which his name and the day of his death were inscribed. About a mile beyond this place, to which we gave his name, is a small river about thirty yards wide, on the north, which we called Floyd's river, where we encamped. We had a breeze from the southeast, and made thirteen miles.

August 21. The same breeze from the southeast carried us by a small willow creek on the north, about one mile and a half above Floyd's river. Here began a range of bluffs which continued till near the mouth of the great Sioux river, three miles beyond Floyd's. This river comes in from the north, and is about one hundred and ten yards wide. Mr. Durion, our Sioux interpreter, who is well acquainted with it, says that it is navigable upwards of two hundred miles to the falls, and even beyond them; that its sources are near those of the St. Peters. He also says, that below the falls a creek falls in from the eastward, after passing through cliffs of red rock: of this the Indians make their pipes; and the necessity of procuring that article, has introduced a sort of law of nations, by which the banks of the creek are sacred, and even tribes at war meet without hostility at these quarries, which possess a right of asylum. Thus we find even among savages certain principles deemed sacred, by which the rigours of their merciless system of warfare are mitigated. A sense of common danger, where stronger ties are wanting, gives all the binding force of more solemn obligations. The importance of preserving the known and settled rules of warfare among civilized nations, in all their integrity, becomes strikingly evident; since even savages, with their few precarious wants, cannot exist in a state of peace or war where this faith is once violated. The wind became southerly, and blew with such violence that we took a reef in our sail: it also blew the sand from the bars in such quantities, that we could not see the channel at any distance ahead. At four and a quarter miles, we came to two willow islands, beyond which are several sandbars; and at twelve miles, a spot where the Mahas once had a village, now no longer existing. We again passed a number of sandbars, and encamped on the south; having come twenty-four and three quarter miles. The country through which we passed has the same uniform appearance ever since we left the river Platte: rich low-grounds near the river, succeeded by undulating prairies, with timber near the waters. Some wolves were seen to-day on the sandbeaches to the south; we also procured an excellent fruit, resembling a red currant, growing on a shrub like the privy, and about the height of a wild plum.

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