On the hills we observed considerable quantities of dwarf juniper, which seldom grows higher than three feet.  We killed in the course of the day an elk, three geese and a beaver.  The beaver on this part of the Missouri are in greater quantities, larger and fatter, and their fur is more abundant and of a darker colour than any we had hitherto seen:  their favourite food seems to be the bark of the cottonwood and willow, as we have seen no other species of tree that has been touched by them, and these they gnaw to the ground through a diameter of twenty inches.

The next day, Friday, 19th, the wind was so high from northwest that we could not proceed, but being less violent on

Saturday, 20th, we set off about seven o’clock, and had nearly lost one of the canoes as we left the shore, by the falling in of a large part of the bank.  The wind too became again so strong that we could scarcely make one mile an hour, and the sudden squalls so dangerous to the small boats, that we stopped for the night among some willows on the north, not being able to advance more than six and a half miles.  In walking through the neighbouring plains we found a fine fertile soil covered with cottonwood, some box, alder, ash, red elm, and an undergrowth of willow, rosebushes, honeysuckle, red willow, gooseberry, currant, and serviceberries, and along the foot of the hills great quantities of hysop.  Our hunters procured elk and deer which are now lean, and six beaver which are fatter and more palatable.  Along the plain there were also some Indian camps; near one of these was a scaffold about seven feet high, on which were two sleds with their harness, and under it the body of a female, carefully wrapped in several dressed buffaloe skins; near it lay a bag made of buffaloe skin, containing a pair of moccasins, some red and blue paint, beaver’s nails, scrapers for dressing hides, some dried roots, several plaits of sweet grass, and a small quantity of Mandan tobacco.  These things as well as the body itself had probably fallen down by accident, as the custom is to place them on the scaffold.  At a little distance was the body of a dog not yet decayed, who had met this reward for having dragged thus far in the sled the corpse of his mistress, to whom according to the Indian usage he had been sacrificed.

Sunday, 21st.  Last night there was a hard white frost, and this morning the weather cold, but clear and pleasant:  in the course of the day however it became cloudy and the wind rose.  The country is of the same description as within the few last days.  We saw immense quantities of buffaloe, elk, deer, antelopes, geese, and some swan and ducks, out of which we procured three deer, four buffaloe calves, which last are equal in flavour to the most delicious veal; also two beaver, and an otter.  We passed one large and two small creeks on the south side, and reached at sixteen miles the mouth of Whiteearth river, coming in from the north.  This river before