0N The 1st Of September, Mr. Stuart And His Companions Resumed
Their Journey, Bending Their Course Eastward, Along The Course Of
Snake River.
As they advanced the country opened.
The hills which
had hemmed in the river receded on either hand, and great sandy
and dusty plains extended before them. Occasionally there were
intervals of pasturage, and the banks of the river were fringed
with willows and cottonwood, so that its course might be traced
from the hilltops, winding under an umbrageous covert, through a
wide sunburnt landscape. The soil, however, was generally poor;
there was in some places a miserable growth of wormwood, and a
plant called saltweed, resembling pennyroyal; but the summer had
parched the plains, and left but little pasturage. The game, too,
had disappeared. The hunter looked in vain over the lifeless
landscape; now and then a few antelope might be seen, but not
within reach of the rifle. We forbear to follow the travellers in
a week's wandering over these barren wastes, where they suffered
much from hunger, having to depend upon a few fish from the
streams, and now and then a little dried salmon, or a dog,
procured from some forlorn lodge of Shoshonies.
Tired of these cheerless wastes, they left the banks of Snake
River on the 7th of September, under guidance of Mr. Miller, who
having acquired some knowledge of the country during his trapping
campaign, undertook to conduct them across the mountains by a
better route than that by Fort Henry, and one more out of the
range of the Blackfeet.
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