They
Welcomed Them, Therefore, To Their Tents, Set Food Before Them;
And Entertained Them To The Best Of Their Power.
They had been successful in their hunt, and their camp was full
of jerked buffalo meat, all of the choicest kind, and extremely
fat.
Mr. Hunt purchased enough of them, in addition to what had
been killed and cured by his own hunters, to load all the horses
excepting those reserved for the partners and the wife of Pierre
Dorion. He found, also, a few beaver skins in their camp, for
which he paid liberally, as an inducement to them to hunt for
more; informing them that some of his party intended to live
among the mountains, and trade with the native hunters for their
peltries. The poor Snakes soon comprehended the advantages thus
held out to them, and promised to exert themselves to procure a
quantity of beaver skins for future traffic. Being now well
supplied with provisions, Mr. Hunt broke up his encampment on the
24th of September, and continued on to the west. A march of
fifteen miles, over a mountain ridge, brought them to a stream
about fifty feet in width, which Hoback, one of their guides, who
had trapped about the neighborhood when in the service of Mr.
Henry, recognized for one of the head waters of the Columbia. The
travellers hailed it with delight, as the first stream they had
encountered tending toward their point of destination. They kept
along it for two days, during which, from the contribution of
many rills and brooks, it gradually swelled into a small river.
As it meandered among rocks and precipices, they were frequently
obliged to ford it, and such was its rapidity that the men were
often in danger of being swept away.
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