The character of this country now changed considerably as the explorers turned to the northward, in their crooked course, with the river.  On the twenty-fifth of May the journal records this:—­

“The country on each side is high, broken, and rocky; the rock being either a soft brown sandstone, covered with a thin stratum of limestone, or else a hard, black, rugged granite, both usually in horizontal strata, and the sand-rock overlaying the other.  Salts and quartz, as well as some coal and pumice-stone, still appear.  The bars of the river are composed principally of gravel; the river low grounds are narrow, and afford scarcely any timber; nor is there much pine on the hills.  The buffalo have now become scarce; we saw a polecat (skunk) this evening, which was the first for several days; in the course of the day we also saw several herds of the bighorned animals among the steep cliffs on the north, and killed several of them.”

The bighorned animals, the first of which were killed here, were sometimes called “Rocky Mountain sheep.”  But sheep they were not, bearing hair and not wool.  As we have said, they are now more commonly known as bighorns.

The patience of the explorers was rewarded, on Sunday, May 26, 1806, by their first view of the Rocky Mountains.  Here is the journal’s record on that date:—­

“It was here (Cow Creek, Mont.) that, after ascending the highest summit of the hills on the north side of the river, Captain Lewis first caught a distant view of the Rock mountains—­the object of all our hopes, and the reward of all our ambition.  On both sides of the river, and at no great distance from it, the mountains followed its course.  Above these at the distance of fifty miles from us, an irregular range of mountains spread from west to northwest from his position.  To the north of these, a few elevated points, the most remarkable of which bore N. 65’0 W., appeared above the horizon; and as the sun shone on the snows of their summits, he obtained a clear and satisfactory view of those mountains which close on the Missouri the passage to the Pacific.”

As they continued to ascend the Missouri they found themselves confronted by many considerable rapids which sometimes delayed their progress.  They also set forth this observation:  “The only animals we have observed are the elk, the bighorn, and the hare common to this country.”  Wayfarers across the plains now call this hare the jack-rabbit.  The river soon became very rapid with a marked descent, indicating their nearness to its mountain sources.  The journal says:—­