Twelve Of These Baskets,
Each Of Which Contains From Ninety To One Hundred Pounds,
Form A Stack, Which Is Left
Exposed till it is sent to market.
The fish thus preserved keep sound and sweet for several years,
and great
Quantities, they inform us, are sent to the Indians
who live below the falls, whence it finds its way to the whites
who visit the mouth of the Columbia. We observe, both near
the lodges and on the rocks in the river, great numbers of stacks
of these pounded fish. Besides fish, these people supplied us
with filberts and berries, and we purchased a dog for supper;
but it was with much difficulty that we were able to buy wood
enough to cook it."
On the twenty-third the voyagers made the descent of the great
falls which had so long been an object of dread to them.
The whole height of the falls is thirty-seven feet,
eight inches, in a distance of twelve hundred yards.
A portage of four hundred and fifty yards was made around
the first fall, which is twenty feet high, and perpendicular.
By means of lines the canoes were let down the rapids below.
At the season of high water the falls become mere rapids up
which the salmon can pass. On this point the journal says: -
"From the marks everywhere perceivable at the falls, it is obvious
that in high floods, which must be in the spring, the water
below the falls rises nearly to a level with that above them.
Of this rise, which is occasioned by some obstructions which we
do not as yet know, the salmon must avail themselves to pass up
the river in such multitudes that this fish is almost the only one
caught in great abundance above the falls; but below that place
we observe the salmon-trout, and the heads of a species of trout
smaller than the salmon-trout, which is in great quantities,
and which they are now burying, to be used as their winter food.
A hole of any size being dug, the sides and bottom are lined
with straw, over which skins are laid; on these the fish, after being
well dried, are laid, covered with other skins, and the hole
is closed with a layer of earth twelve or fifteen inches deep.
. . . . . . . . .
We saw no game except a sea-otter, which was shot in the narrow channel
as we were coming down, but we could not get it.
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