Heart
and Spokan Rivers.- M'Kenzie, His Route Up the Camoenum.-Bands of
Travelling Indians.- Expedition of Reed to the Caches.-
Adventures of Wandering Voyageurs and Trappers.
THE course of our narrative now takes us back to the regions
beyond the mountains, to dispose of the parties that set out from
Astoria, in company with Mr. Robert Stuart, and whom he left on
the banks of the Wallah-Wallah. Those parties likewise separated
from each other shortly after his departure, proceeding to their
respective destinations, but agreeing to meet at the mouth of the
Wallah-Wallah about the beginning of June in the following year,
with such peltries as they should have collected in the winter,
so as to convoy each other through the dangerous passes of the
Columbia.
Mr. David Stuart, one of the partners, proceeded with his men to
the post already established by him at the mouth of the
Oakinagan; having furnished this with goods and ammunition, he
proceeded three hundred miles up that river, where he established
another post in a good trading neighborhood.
Mr. Clarke, another partner, conducted his little band up Lewis
River to the mouth of a small stream coming in from the north, to
which the Canadians gave the name of the Pavion. Here he found a
village or encampment of forty huts or tents, covered with mats,
and inhabited by Nez Perces, or Pierced-nose Indians, as they are
called by the traders; but Chipunnish, as they are called by
themselves. They are a hardy, laborious, and somewhat knavish
race, who lead a precarious life, fishing and digging roots
during the summer and autumn, hunting the deer on snow-shoes
during the winter, and traversing the Rocky Mountains in the
spring, to trade for buffalo skins with the hunting tribes of the
Missouri. In these migrations they are liable to be waylaid and
attacked by the Blackfeet, and other warlike and predatory
tribes, and driven back across the mountains with the loss of
their horses, and of many of their comrades.
A life of this unsettled and precarious kind is apt to render man
selfish, and such Mr. Clarke found the inhabitants of this
village, who were deficient in the usual hospitality of Indians;
parting with everything with extreme reluctance, and showing no
sensibility to any act of kindness. At the time of his arrival,
they were all occupied in catching and curing salmon. The men
were stout, robust, active, and good looking, and the women
handsomer than those of the tribes nearer to the coast.
It was the plan of Mr. Clarke to lay up his boats here, and
proceed by land to his place of destination, which was among the
Spokan tribe of Indians, about a hundred and fifty miles distant.
He accordingly endeavored to purchase horses for the journey, but
in this he had to contend with the sordid disposition of these
people.
