Part 12

So, with Cruzatte leading, down through the wild channel of the first rapids in the Dalles of the Columbia raced the canoes. And from the rocky shores the Eneeshur Indians opened their mouths wide in astonishment.

“The Irish an’ Frinch together can lick the world,” boasted Pat.

But the place of Tim-tim, or “Timm,” for short, was close ahead. It was reached the next evening, and they camped above it, at a village of the Echeloots, or Chinook Indians, who also flattened their hats, and spoke more cluckingly than did even the Oo-tla-shoots.

They were the enemies of the Pierced Noses, but they agreed upon peace, in a council with Chief Twisted-hair. Now, after a final “smoke,” Chiefs Twisted-hair and Tetoh left, on horses, for their home. They had been good and faithful guides.

The place of Timm, at the foot of the Dalles of the Columbia, is to-day called the Long Narrows. It was three miles long and in some stretches only fifty yards wide. But the canoes, guided by Cruzatte, went through without one being wrecked. They had been badly battered, however, by the many rocks; and the next day was spent in caulking them. That night Cruzatte brought out his fiddle, a dance was held, about the fire, and the Echeloots appeared much entertained.

In the middle of the night, soon after the camp had gone to bed, Peter was awakened by Pat’s suddenly squirming out of the blanket.

“The fleas are ’atin’ me entoirely,” declared Pat. “Into the river goes ivery stitch o’ me clothes.”

Peter was glad to follow the example. By morning nearly all the men were stripped, and needs must stalk about in blankets while their clothing was being cleaned.

“’Twas the mosquitoes east of the mountains,” laughed George Shannon. “Now ’tis the fleas west of the mountains.”

But the fleas were a slight matter, when amidst grand scenery the Columbia River ever bore the canoes onward, toward the ocean and the end of the long, long journey.

After the Echeloots (whom the violin and the dancing had so entertained), more Indians were met. The banks of this Columbia were thickly populated. These Indians lived in wooden houses, too――houses walled and raftered with planks faced and trimmed by fire or by knives and little axes. The houses were furnished with bedsteads.

“As good houses as some settlers’ houses back in the Illinois country,” declared Captain Clark, who was constantly exploring among them.

The canoes that the Indians cleverly managed were large, hollowed from a single log, with high bows curving upward; farther on down, bows and sterns both were high, and had figures of men and beasts. Some of the Indians owned articles of white men’s manufacture, which they said came from below.

“What you say dese hyar Injuns call demselves, Marse Will?” York was heard to ask.

“Skilloots, York.”

“An’ what were dose we met ’foh we met dese Galoots?”

“The Chilluckittequaws, York.”

“Jes’ so,” gasped York. “But _I_ ain’t gwine to say it.”

On November 2 the canoes were partly carried around, partly slid through, the rapids which formed the foot of other rapids termed by the captains the Great Shute. Presently the river opened two miles wide, and smooth and placid. That night the water rose nine inches on a stake set at the river’s edge in front of the camp.

“We’re in tidewater, lads!” announced Captain Lewis. “The ocean tides ascend this far. That means there are no more rapids; the ocean itself can’t be very distant.”

Each night after this a stake was set out and the rise measured. Each day the men sniffed for the smell of salt water and listened for the sound of the surf. Sa-ca-ja-we-a was very much excited; she had come especially to see the big water.

During the night of November 4 the rise from the tide was two feet; the next night’s rise was four feet. Ducks and geese were many. But it rained almost every day, and every morning a fog hung low.

On the morning of November 7 the camp rose and breakfasted in a wet mist so dense that it hung on all sides like a gray curtain.

“At this rate,” quoth Pat, as the canoes headed out into the silence, “we’re liable to get half way to Chiny afore we know we’re on the Paycific at all.”

“I do believe I smell salt, though,” asserted George Shannon, sniffing. “Sa-ca-ja-we-a’s been insisting, too, that she could hear a ‘boom-boom.’”

“Listen!” bade Pat――and they paused on their oars. Peter thought that he also could hear a “boom-boom,” low and dull, but he wasn’t certain. They went on.

The captains’ boat was being piloted by a Wah-kia-cum Indian, now: a squat ugly man who wore a queer round jacket that, according to the men, had come from a ship. The river was growing wider, the fog was thinning and lifting――on a sudden the crew of the captains’ boat waved their hats, pointed before, cheered wildly. The cheer passed from boat to boat. For the fog ahead had swirled into fragments, and below it was an expanse of tumbling gray water on which the sun was trying to shine. Occasionally sounded a muffled “boom,” like the faint growl of summer thunder.

The Pacific Ocean! But they did not reach it this day; the fog closed in again, and the rain. They did not reach it the next day, although the waves were so high in this, the mouth of the Columbia, that half the party were seasick; and the water was salty. They did not reach it the next day, nor the next. Wind and rain kept beating them back. Sa-ca-ja-we-a was frightened.

“The spirits are angry. They do not want us here,” she whimpered, crouching over little Toussaint, under a grass mat raised on a pole.

“The only way we’ll reach the sea is to be washed into it,” groaned Pat. “Sure, don’t the very stones an’ logs come a-rollin’ down the hills? Now for the first time I wish I hadn’t started, an’ here I am at the ind!”

Yes, miserable were they all. There was no chance to dry clothing and food, and scarcely an opportunity to stir. The mouth of the river formed a wind-swept bay miles wide. The captains thought that if camp might only be moved around a point ahead, and to a high sand beach, it would be more comfortable. A deserted Indian village stood there, with no inhabitants “except fleas”; and, as Pat said: “We’ll be all the warmer for the exercise they give us.”

Not until the afternoon of November 15 did the opportunity to move come. The sky cleared, the wind suddenly dropped; the canoes were reloaded in a hurry, and the point was rounded.

Now the ocean was in full sight, outside the bay; from the boards of the Indian houses rude cabins were erected; hunters and explorers were sent out.

XVI

THE WINTER AT FORT CLATSOP

But no ships from the United States or any other nation were to be found. Only the long gray swells appeared, as far as eye could see, rolling in to burst thunderously upon the white sands and the naked rocks; and the only people ashore were the Indians. Ships and white men had been here, said the Indians, during the summer; and many of the Indians spoke a curious mixture of English and native words. Captain Lewis discovered a place, in the bay, where white men had camped.

A high point overlooking the lonely ocean was given the name Cape Disappointment.

“Now, wouldn’t it have been a fine end to our trip from the Mississippi clane to the Paycific if a nice big ship all stocked with flour an’ p’taties an’ boots an’ socks had been waitin’ for us,” quoth Pat. “Sure, mebbe the United States has forgotten us.”

“We’ll have to build winter quarters at once, Will,” said Captain Lewis. “The rain is rotting all our goods and clothes, and spoiling our provisions. We must get under cover. There’ll be no ships before next summer, according to the Indians.”

“Timber for cabins, wood for fires, game and fresh water for the messes, and shelter from the ocean tides――let’s look about, then,” answered Captain Clark. “The Indians say that skins and meat are abundant a little way south.”

Captain Lewis found it――a good site, on the south side of the bay formed by the mouth of the Columbia, and three miles up a little river called to-day the Lewis and Clark River. It was back ten miles from the ocean, and in the midst of tall pines, with great shaking bogs near, on which elk fed.

The first fair morning, which was December 7, camp was moved to the new grounds.

The walls of the seven cabins rose fast; and when it came time to put on the roofs, Pat, the boss carpenter, was delighted to find a species of pine that split into boards ten feet long, and two feet wide, with never a knot or crack.

“The finest puncheons I iver have seen,” he asserted, “for floors an’ roofs both. We’ll be snug an’ dry in a jiffy, an’ all ready for Christmas.”

“It’s a far cry back to last Christmas, Pat,” spoke George. “We’ve come through a lot of country.”

“An’ here we are,” reminded Pat.

Yes; Christmas――Peter’s first Christmas――was indeed a long way behind. That Christmas of 1804 had been celebrated in new Fort Mandan among the Mandans and Minnetarees beside the snowy Missouri River. What were Chiefs Big White and Black Cat doing now? Was Fort Mandan being kept ready for the return of the Long Knife and the Red Head?

This Christmas of 1805 was celebrated in new Fort Clatsop, among the flat-headed Clatsops and Chinooks and Cathlamets at the mouth of the rainy Columbia River. The men fired a volley, before breakfast, and in front of the captains’ door old Cruzatte, accompanied by Drouillard and the other Frenchmen, sang a lively Christmas song. But there was no feast, because the only food in stock was some roots, pounded fish, and lean elk meat. The captains distributed a little tobacco to the men who smoked, and Peter and the men who did not use tobacco received each a handkerchief.

The rain poured all day, but the cabins were tight above and below, so that everybody stayed dry and warm.

Now the expedition might settle down to the winter’s routine. Chimneys were yet to be put up for the men’s cabins――fires were tried, in open hearths in the middle of the rooms, Indian fashion, and proved too smoky. A fence of high, close pickets, as at Fort Mandan, needs must be erected to guard against attack.

The captains’ cabin had been built around a large stump, smoothly sawed; this was their writing table, on which they spread their maps and journals. Captain Clark had traded with the Indians for a panther skin seven feet long; this made a good rug. York occupied the same cabin. Chaboneau was the captains’ cook; he and Sa-ca-ja-we-a and little Toussaint lived in another room, built on. The men were divided into four messes, each with a cook, and the supplies were doled out from the storehouse every morning.

Drouillard, the chief hunter, and George Shannon, John Collins, Francois Labiche and Reuben Fields were sent out to hunt for elk and deer; but the meat spoiled so quickly, even although smoked, in this damp climate, that Joe Fields, William Bratton, Alec Willard, George Gibson and Peter Wiser were ordered to the seashore with kettles, to make salt.

They built a furnace or fireplace, of stones, and boiled down kettlesful of salt water. They brought back a gallon of good salt, for table use and for preserving the meat. All winter the salt-makers were kept at work. Peter served his turn.

The hunters were constantly out, chasing elk over the bogs. The meat not eaten was salted and smoke-dried; from the tallow, candles were run, in reed moulds; and from the hides the men made shirts and trousers and moccasins, in preparation for the next journey. The captains determined that the whole party should return by land, as soon as the travel season opened. No ship was to be expected.

The captains led out exploring parties. Captain Clark gained a great reputation as a shot; with a single ball no larger than a pea he clipped off the heads of geese and ducks.

“Kloshe musquet! Kum-tux musquet!” exclaimed the Indians. “Very good musket! Do not understand this kind of musket!”

Their own guns were rusty flint-locks, loaded with poor powder and gravel. Their bows were beautiful and true, but were not strong enough for killing elk. They were not nearly so strong as the bows of the Otoes and the Sioux, decided Peter; not nearly so strong as his own Mandan bow.

The Indians from all around visited the fort. The Chinooks, under Chief Com-com-ly, who had only one eye (“Same as me,” chuckled Cruzatte), lived on the north side of the bay; on this south side lived the Clatsops, under Chief Co-bo-way. Nearer the sea lived the Tilla-mooks. Up the Columbia River lived Cath-lam-ets. These all looked much alike, being small, ugly, and flat-footed and crooked-legged from squatting so much in their canoes and by their fires.

They were well acquainted with white men. One squaw had the name “J. Bowman” tattooed on her arm. The captain spent much time talking with them, and learned of the ships and the white traders who had been in here.

“Tyee (chief) Haley; so many mast (and Chief Com-com-ly held up three fingers); stay long.”

And――――

“Callalamet; wood leg; trader.”

And――――

“Tyee Davidson; three mast; hunt elk.”

And so forth, all of which the captains, particularly Captain Lewis, carefully wrote down.

The visitors brought provisions and goods to trade: fish, a little elk and deer, high-crowned hats woven of grass and bark, grass bowls that held water, so tight they were; grass mats, furs. Some of the chiefs wore splendid robes of sea-otter skin. These were priced very dear, for the Indians were shrewd traders. They wanted fish-hooks, knives, and files, in exchange for ordinary articles; but only blue beads would buy the otter-skin robes.

For one otter-skin robe Captain Clark offered a watch, a handkerchief, a dollar, and a bunch of red beads.

“No, no! Tyee ka-mo-suck!” refused the Indian. “Chief beads.”

But Sa-ca-ja-we-a gave to the captain her own girdle of blue “chief beads,” and for it he bought a robe.

There were several new roots that the men grew to like. One root, sha-na-taw-hee, was a thistle root, purple after it had been roasted.

“Tastes like a parsnip, only swater,” declared Pat.

Another root was cul-whay-ma; two feet long and slender. It also was sweet and wholesome. But the best root was the wappatoo――“a rale Irish p’tatie,” said Pat.

This was brought down by Skilloots and the Wah-ki-a-cums, from up-river. It was a species of lily, and grew in the lakes. The Indian women waded in, breast-deep, and poking with their toes loosened the bulbs, which rose then to the surface. That was cold work.

The wappatoo roots were held at a rather stiff figure, because they could be traded to the other Indians, if not to the white men.

The Clatsops were the best Indians. The Cath-lam-ets were treacherous; one would have killed Hugh McNeal had not a Chinook woman warned Hugh. The Chinooks were thievish.

“No Chinook shall be admitted into the fort without special invitation,” finally ordered Captain Lewis.

So after that when Indians appeared outside they always shouted: “No Chinook. Clatsop.” Or “Skilloot,” or whatever they chanced to be or pretended to be. Another order was issued that no Indians should remain in the fort over night.

The Indians brought many fleas, too――“the wan thing for which we’ve nothin’ to trade,” as said Pat.

The greatest excitement of the winter was the arrival of a whale. Chief Co-bo-way of the Clatsops came with the news, and also with three dogs and some blubber. He said that the whale had been stranded ashore near the Tillamooks’ village down the coast. He was given a pair of old satin breeches, and went away much pleased.

Joe Fields and George Gibson appeared at the fort with the gallon of salt from the salt camp, and with some more of the whale blubber. They said that the Indians all were flocking to the whale and cutting it up. The blubber, when cooked, looked and tasted like beaver tail――it was very good; and Captain Clark immediately organized a party to go to the spot and get what blubber they might.

Naturally, everybody was anxious to see the whale.

“You’d better take Peter, hadn’t you, Captain?” suggested Captain Lewis. “He’s a boy――he ought to see what there is to be seen.”

“By all means,” agreed Captain Clark. “Do you know what a whale is, Peter?”

“A big fish,” answered Peter, eagerly.

“Yes; a big warm-blooded fish; a fish bigger than a buffalo.”

Now, Sa-ca-ja-we-a had heard; she had helped Chaboneau cook the blubber for the captains. But she had not been invited to go. In fact, all this time the Bird-woman had not been even so far as the big water. She had worked in the fort.

Suddenly she did a very surprising thing, for an Indian woman. When she believed that she was to be left out of the sightseeing party, she wept.

“Why you want to go?” scolded Chaboneau. “Ze capitaines no haf time to wait for woman with baby. You stay by ze lodge fire; dat is place for womans.”

Sa-ca-ja-we-a tilted her chin at him and went straight to Captain Clark.

“Capitin! I speak a leetle.”

“What is it, Sa-ca-ja-we-a?”

“I come long way, capitin. I carry baby, I cold, hungry, wet, seeck, I keep up an’ I no complain. I show you trail; when you no know which way, I say ‘Snake people here,’ an’ you find Snakes. When Indians see me, dey say: ‘Dis no war party,’ an’ dey kind to you. When you get hungry for bread, I gif you one leetle bit I carry all way from Mandan town, so you can taste. When you want otter robe, I gif you my belt, an’ you get otter robe. I been here all dis time, an’ I not yet go near de big water dat I travel many days to see. Now dere is a big fish; odders go, Chaboneau say I mus’ stay an’ care for Toussaint an’ help cook. I feel bad, capitin――I――I――――” and poor little Bird-woman hid her face in her shawl and sobbed.

The captain placed his hand kindly upon her shoulder.

“You shall go, Sa-ca-ja-we-a. You shall go with us and see the ocean and the big fish; and Chaboneau can stay by the fire and tend to the baby.”

Sa-ca-ja-we-a smiled and dried her eyes. Very proud, she made ready. But Chaboneau went, too――because he, likewise, wished to inspect the great wonder which had been cast ashore.

The whale was 105 feet long. The busy Indians had stripped it to the bones, and with difficulty Captain Clark managed to buy 300 pounds of blubber and some oil.

Thus, with hunting, trading, and making garments of leather, the winter passed. An astonishingly mild winter it was, too, of little frost and wet snow, but of much rain and fog which gave the men rheumatism, and which, by spoiling the food and cutting down exercise, gave them boils and stomach complaint, also.

The captains were constantly hoping for a ship and fresh supplies. None was sighted.

So February merged with March. The elk were retiring from the low country to the high, following the grass. On some days the fort had only one day’s provisions in store.

“I can find no elk, notting,” complained Drouillard, the chief hunter.

The Indians hoarded their own food very close, to make it last until the salmon began to run again, in the spring.

“Six blue blankets, wan red wan, five striped wans that used to be our big United States flag, some old breeches an’ waistcuts, an’ Cap’n Clark’s artillery dress-coat an’ hat――faith, that’s all we’ve got an’ at prisent prices they wouldn’t buy a square meal,” reported Patrick Gass. “We’ll be atin’ ourselves naked.”

“Dose t’ings be need’ for boats an’ hosses,” said Cruzatte. “Of de leetle t’ings we haf scarce one hat full. How we go back four t’ousand miles I do not know.”

XVII

FRIENDLY YELLEPT, THE WALLA WALLA

“Drouillard,” spoke Captain Lewis, “we must have another canoe. These Indians down here won’t sell us any. Try what you can do up the river.”

It was the middle of March. The captains had intended to wait until at least the first of April, before starting on the back trail, so as not to arrive at the mountains until June. Then the snows would have melted, and there would be game. But meat already was extremely scarce around Fort Clatsop; the expedition would better start at once, and hunt along the way.

“I try de Cath-lam-et――dey haf canoes,” answered Drouillard. “But dey will hol’ dem dear. I t’ink I must take de best t’ings we haf. Mebbe you let me take your lace coat, capitaine?”

“What! My only dress uniform?” exclaimed Captain Lewis. “Why not that artillery coat?”

“But that’s mine!” laughed Captain Clark.

“One day a Cath-lam-et see your lace coat an’ like it. I sure I get canoe for it,” persisted Drouillard.

“All right,” sighed Captain Lewis. “Another canoe we must have. I’ll hold councils in my leather clothes.”

So the canny Drouillard, who was half Indian himself, went up the Cath-lam-ets and traded the laced dress-coat for a canoe.

Sergeant Pat was ordered to count the moccasins in stock. He reported 338 pairs, manufactured during the winter from the hides of the 131 elk and twenty deer that had been killed.

To Chief Co-bo-way (or Com-mo-wool), of the Clatsops, was given the fort and all its furniture. He had been exceedingly friendly; and now he appeared to appreciate the gift very much.

“I will make my home in the house where the white chiefs lived,” he declared.

Captain Lewis and Captain Clark and several of the men had long before carved their names into trees, as a record for other white men to see. And there, on a rock, also was “PETER.” During the winter Peter had made great progress in reading and writing. However, something more official and explanatory than only inscriptions on trees was needed, that the trading ships which came in might know and might carry the news to the world. Therefore the captains wrote out statements containing the names of the party and maps of the country explored. The notices said:

The object of this list is, that through the medium of some civilized person, who may see the same, it may be made known to the world that the party consisting of the persons whose names are hereunto affixed, and who were sent out by the government of the United States to explore the interior of the continent of North America, did penetrate the same by the way of the Missouri and Columbia Rivers, to the discharge of the latter into the Pacific Ocean, where they arrived on the 14th day of November, 1805, and departed the 23rd day of March, 1806, on their return to the United States, by the same route by which they had come out.

One copy was pasted up on a smooth post in the headquarters cabin. Other copies were given to the Clatsops and the Chinooks, who promised to hand them to white traders.

“Sure, we’ll beat the news home,” asserted Sergeant Pat. “For the ships’ll be a long time makin’ it, by Chiny an’ the inds o’ the world, while it’s straight across we go.”

And this proved truth. Had the captains only known, at the very time the notices were being written, the American trading brig Lydia, of Boston, Captain Hill, was cruising along the coast, and in the first week of April anchored in the mouth of the Columbia. But the other Americans had been gone two weeks, and Chief Coboway was ruler of Fort Clatsop. So Captain Hill took one of the statements, carried it to China with him, and delivered it at Boston not until May, 1807.

At 1 o’clock of March 23, this 1806, Fort Clatsop was abandoned; out into the little river that flowed past it the five canoes glided, and headed down for the Columbia――thence eastward which was _homeward_!

The men swung their hats, of tattered felt, of furs, and of Chinook weave from grass and bark; and cheered.

“De nex’ winter we spen’ in de United States,” rejoiced Cruzatte. “I play my feedle at Cahokia an’ make de pleasure dere.”

“We’ve come away with plenty powder and lead, and plenty salt; that’s one good job,” remarked Pat.

The powder, sealed in lead canisters, had kept splendidly. Now there were 140 pounds of it. And as to salt――twelve gallons had been packed.