The Inconveniences Of Their Comfortless Life Are
Increased By Frequent Encounters With Their Enemies From The West,
Who Drive Them Over The Mountains With The Loss Of Their Horses,
And Sometimes The Lives Of Many Of The Nation."
After making a short stage on their journey, October 11, the party
stopped to trade with the Indians, their stock
Of provisions being low.
They were able to purchase a quantity of salmon and seven dogs.
They saw here a novel kind of vapor bath which is thus described
in the journal: -
"While this traffic was going on we observed a vapor bath or sweating-house,
in a different form from that used on the frontier of the United States
or in the Rocky Mountains. It was a hollow square six or eight
feet deep, formed in the river bank by damming up with mud the other
three sides and covering the whole completely, except an aperture
about two feet wide at the top. The bathers descend by this hole,
taking with them a number of heated stones and jugs of water;
after being seated round the room they throw the water on the stones till
the steam becomes of a temperature sufficiently high for their purposes.
The baths of the Indians in the Rocky Mountains are of different sizes,
the most common being made of mud and sticks like an oven, but the mode
of raising the steam is exactly the same. Among both these nations it is
very uncommon for a man to bathe alone; he is generally accompanied by one
or sometimes several of his acquaintances; indeed, it is so essentially
a social amusement, that to decline going in to bathe when invited by a
friend is one of the highest indignities which can be offered to him.
The Indians on the frontier generally use a bath which will accommodate
only one person, formed of a wicker-work of willows about four feet high,
arched at the top, and covered with skins.
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