[256] A conspicuous landmark in Wheeler County, South Dakota, just below Fort Randall, at the 969 mile mark from the mouth of the Missouri. Lewis and Clark speak of it as the Dome.—Ed.

[257] Hugh Glass's adventures with wild beasts and Indians formed a kind of frontier epic, and were told around many a camp-fire. All that is known of his early life is that he came from Pennsylvania, and was spoken of as "old man Glass." He was in the Ankara campaign of 1823, and seriously wounded. Nevertheless he set out with Andrew Henry for the Yellowstone, but was nearly killed by a grizzly bear, and left to die. He survived, made his way to Fort Kiowa, and later joined Henry on the Yellowstone. See Chittenden, Fur-Trade, ii, pp. 698-705. For his death, see post, volume xxiv.—Ed.

[258] Sir George Back (1796-1878), a well-known explorer of arctic North America. He entered the navy in 1808, and in 1817 made his first northern journey in company with Sir John Franklin. Later he accompanied Franklin on several expeditions, being one of his most trusted lieutenants. In 1833 Back organized an expedition to search for Sir John Ross; his account of this latter enterprise was published as Narrative of the Arctic Land Expedition, 1833, 1834, and 1835 (London, 1836). In 1836 Back made a final voyage in the "Terror," whose narrative was published in 1838. Upon his return he received many honors, being knighted, made rear-admiral (1857), and admiral (1867). Maximilian quotes either from his earlier book, or from some of his narratives published with those of Franklin's expeditions.—Ed.

[259] Little Cedar Island, still so-called, is just above Wheeler, South Dakota, about 1010 miles up the river. Maximilian has confused the distance with that of an island beyond, upon which Fort Recovery stood, given by Bradbury as 1075 miles up. See note 261, post, p. 304, and Bradbury's Travels, our volume v, p. 99, note 66.—Ed.

[260] Bijoux Hills are on the east bank of the river, not far below Chamberlain, South Dakota. Bijoux was an engagé with Long. See our volume xvi, pp. 58-59. Catlin, North American Indians, ii, p. 432, says Bijoux was ultimately killed by the Sioux.—Ed.

[261] The name Shannon was given to the first creek by Lewis and Clark, for one of their men, George Shannon, who here rejoined them after an absence of sixteen days, when he had been lost on the prairies. It is now called Dry (or Rosebud) Creek, with Rosebud Landing at its mouth.

White, a South Dakota river, entering the Missouri in Lyman County, from the west.—Ed.

[262] This is the post usually known as Fort Recovery; see Bradbury's Travels, our volume v, p. 99, note 67.—Ed.

[263] Fort Lookout had originally been built (about 1822) by the Columbia Fur Company, and from them passed into the hands of the American Fur Company. Later, the Indian agency was established here, as Maximilian notes. It later became a military post where troops were quartered until the building of Fort Randall in 1857. The site was some ten miles above Chamberlain, on the west bank—Ed.

[264] For the Yankton, see our volume v, p. 90, note 55.—Ed.

[265] Maximilian's classification of the Dakota (or Sioux) is in accord with modern philological conclusions. J. W. Powell, "Indian Linguistic Families," in United States Bureau of Ethnology Report, 1885-86, gives six subdivisions of this great tribe—Santee, Wahpeton, Sisseton, Yankton, Yanktonnai, and Teton; the last three, or Missouri, tribes corresponding with those given by Maximilian.—Ed.

[266] See p. 287, for illustration of method of wearing hair.—Ed.

[267] See his portrait, which Maximilian calls "a striking likeness," Plate 41, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.

[268] See p. 287, for illustration of bows, arrows, and quiver.—Ed.

[269] See p. 319, for illustration of Sioux tents.—Ed.

[270] See Plate 81, figure 8, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.

[271] Schoolcraft (Expedition of Gov. Cass, p. 323) says, that the Dacotas, on the Mississippi, tanned their skins with oak bark, which I did not observe on the Missouri: they probably learned it from the Whites. The Aucas, in South America, seem to use such an instrument.—D'Orbigny Voyage, t. ii. p. 234.—Maximilian.

[272] Apparently the creeks took somewhat different courses in the time of Clark's visit—at least Crow, Wolf, and Campbell are now some distance apart in the Crow Creek Indian reservation of Buffalo County, South Dakota.—Ed.

[273] This is a climbing plant, and the leaves are a very nourishing food for horses and oxen, which are said to thrive upon it. The root has a bulb, about the size of a walnut, with a violet outer skin, and white inside, which is said to be a wholesome food for man.—Maximilian.

[274] Clark describes the Big Bend as being from a mile to a mile and a quarter at its neck, with a low range of hills running across, from ninety to a hundred and eighty feet high. He himself walked across the "gouge;" but the boats were a day and a half in passing around.—Ed.

[275] Medicine Creek was called by Lewis and Clark Tyler's River. It is a western affluent of the Missouri, and the hills mentioned are known as Medicine Butte, in Lyman County. The mouth of the creek is the site of the Red Cloud or Lower Brulé Indian agency. This creek and hills should be distinguished from Medicine Knoll and a creek of that name, eastern affluents a few miles higher up.—Ed.

[276] Daniel Lamont, supposed to be of a Scotch family, was one of the original members of the Columbia Fur Company, and became one of the three partners of the "Upper Missouri Outfit." He was for many years in the fur-trade, but little is known of his personal history.

Colonel David D. Mitchell was a Virginian by birth (1806), who early entered the fur-trade—first as a clerk, later as a partner in the American Fur Company. In 1832 he built the first fort for that company among the Blackfeet (see our volume xxiii), and was for some time in charge at Fort Clark, where Larpenteur speaks of him as "very much of a gentleman." In 1841, Mitchell was chosen superintendent of Indian affairs for the Western Department, with headquarters at St. Louis—a position which he filled until 1852. Joining the volunteer service for the Mexican War, he was chosen lieutenant-colonel of Colonel Sterling Price's regiment, and advanced first to New Mexico and later to Chihuahua with Colonel Alexander Doniphan. Mitchell died in St. Louis in 1861.—Ed.

[277] This island is now known as Fort George (or Airhart's) Island.—Ed.

[278] The second Fort Teton was built about 1828; it has been contended by several authorities that its site was south of or below Teton River; but in the light of Maximilian's testimony, this appears improbable. The first Fort Teton was probably that built by Joseph La Framboise in 1817. Maximilian does not state that Fort Tecumseh was the successor of Fort Teton, and the predecessor of Fort Pierre, although alluding to the former—see note 278, post. On the entire subject see "Fort Pierre and its Neighbors," in South Dakota Historical Collections (Aberdeen, 1902), i, pp. 263-379.—Ed.

[279] Fort Pierre was built by the American Fur Company in 1831-32 to replace Fort Tecumseh, which had begun to be undermined by the river. The site chosen was three miles above the mouth of the Teton, about one thousand yards back from the river. The post was christened in June, 1832, upon the visit of Pierre Chouteau, jr., in whose honor it was named. Fort Pierre continued to be the entrepôt of the upper Missouri until 1855, when the company sold the post to the United States, then engaged in a campaign against the hostile Sioux. General Harney wintered here (1855-56) with one thousand two hundred men. The following year (1857), Fort Pierre was abandoned for Fort Randall, a hundred miles farther down the river; the old post was demolished, the best of its fittings transferred to the new post, and the rest allowed to fall into the hands of the Indians. The same year a trader built a new post, also popularly called Fort Pierre, three miles above the old one. New Fort Pierre, a company trading post, was built in 1859 about two miles above the original stockade. This was abandoned in the Sioux outbreak of 1863, and the goods removed to the neighborhood of Fort Sully, a government post established on an island below the city of Pierre, South Dakota.—Ed.

[280] Fort Tecumseh was the principal establishment on this part of the river for the Columbia Fur Company, being built about 1822. When this concern was consolidated with the American Fur Company, the latter made headquarters at Fort Tecumseh until the building of the original Fort Pierre (1831-32). Its site has been thought, by a misreading of authorities, to have been on the east bank; but it was probably only a short distance below old Fort Pierre, on the western bank.—Ed.

[281] William Laidlaw was a Scotchman who had been trained in the British fur companies, and came to the Missouri with the Columbia Fur Company. He was for several years the factor of Forts Tecumseh and Pierre, and was then promoted to the charge of Fort Union, where he was as late as 1845—probably for some time after. When he finally retired, it was to settle near Liberty, Missouri, where he died a poor man. He was an able trader, but of quick, irascible temper, and unpopular with his subordinates.—Ed.

[282] See p. 319, for plan of Fort Pierre.—Ed.

[283] For Pierre Dorion, see our volume v, p. 38, note 7. Although Maximilian speaks of him as "old Dorion," it is probable that this was another son of Pierre, sr.; for Pierre, jr., was a grown man at the time of the Lewis and Clark expedition, and his father was a Frenchman, not a half-breed.—Ed.

[284] See the portrait of the Dakota woman, Plate 42, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.

[285] The red pipe-clay is found chiefly on a lateral stream of the Big Sioux River, but also in other places, for instance, on St. Peter's River; and it is said, that the several Indian tribes behave peaceably towards each other while they are digging up the stone in that place, but again treat each other as enemies as soon as they have left it. Persons who have visited the quarries on the Big Sioux River have given me the following description of them: the red stone occurs in large beds or strata, where the perpendicular sides of the stream show divers alternating layers. The strata of red stone, which are at the most a foot thick, alternate with yellow, blue, white, and other kinds of clay. The green turf on the surface, and the upper stratum, are removed, and the red-brown colour of the stone is generally more lively and beautiful the deeper you go down. It is possible to obtain large pieces, and to make beautiful slabs of them. The Indians make not only pipe-heads of this stone, but likewise war-clubs, which, however, are only carried in their hands for show.—Maximilian.

Comment by Ed. The first white person to visit the Pipestone quarries in southwest Minnesota was the artist George Catlin, who in 1836 obtained permission from the Indians to inspect this sacred spot. The mineral has since been called "catlinite," from his name. There are, however, other quarries in Dakota, Wisconsin, and Minnesota.

[286] See Plate 81, figure 12, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv, for a figure of a Dakota pipe; also illustration on opposite page of Dakota pipes.—Ed.

[287] See p. 323, for illustration of a Dakota with plaited hair.—Ed.

[288] See Plate 81, figure 9, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.

[289] For the Teton, see our volume v, p. 104, note 71. The Teton bands (as at present classified) are the Brulé, Sans Arcs, Blackfeet (not to be confused with the Blackfoot tribe of Algonquian origin), Miniconjou, Two Kettle, Oglala, and Hunkpapa. The Yankton bands are not classified by Powell.—Ed.

[290] See p. 287, for illustration of method of wearing hair.—Ed.

[291] See Plate 30, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv, for an Indian horse-race.—Ed.

[292] See p. 323, for illustration of this Teton.—Ed.

[293] See p. 323, for illustration of hill of baked clay.—Ed.

[294] Called "No Timber Creek," by Lewis and Clark. It is now Chantier in Stanley County, a term clipped from its Siouan name.—Ed.

[295] For the Cheyenne River see our volume v, p. 126, note 81. Cheyenne Island, about three miles long, below the river's embouchment, was called "Pania" by Lewis and Clark. They note also an old Arikara village, of which only a circular wall remained.—Ed.

[296] For the Cheyenne, see our volume v, p. 140, note 88. Their migration was from the northeast, the habitat of the Algonquian stock.—Ed.

[297] Coues, in his edition of Biddle's Lewis and Clark, identifies the island called "Caution" by the explorers, as the present Plum Island. The Little Cheyenne is a prairie stream coming into the Mission from the northeast, in Potter County, South Dakota.—Ed.

[298] Called Beaver (or Otter) Creek by Lewis and Clark; probably the present Swan Creek, in Walworth County, with the town of Lebeau at its mouth.—Ed.

[299] For this stream, see our volume v, p. 127, note 82.—Ed.

[300] For these rivers, see our volume v, p. 127, note 83.—Ed.

[301] In Lewis and Clark's time there were three Arikara villages on the Missouri. The lower village on the island, headed by the chief Kakawissassa, had been abandoned by 1811. See Bradbury's Travels, our volume v, p. 127.—Ed.

[302] A party returning from Santa Fé in the winter of 1832-33, was attacked January 1, on the Canadian River, lost all of their property, and had one man killed. The Arikara apparently never reoccupied their village permanently. Audubon found them in 1843 in one village with the Mandan, where they lived until removed to Fort Berthold reservation.—Ed.

[303] Known to the traders as "Old Star" present at Fort Clark in 1847; see Larpenteur's Journal, ii, p. 246.—Ed.

[304] For the Arikara and Lisa see our volume v, p. 113, note 76, and p. 97, note 64, respectively. Fort Manuel, Lisa's post, erected in 1800, was near the Arikara villages, the site not being definitely determined.—Ed.

[305] These are now called Cheyenne Hills. Lewis and Clark speak of one with a top resembling the slanting roof of a house.—Ed.

[306] Lewis and Clark give this as Warraconne (Elk shed their horns) Creek; now Beaver (or Sand) Creek, in Emmons County, North Dakota.—Ed.

[307] On a careful investigation, I have not been able to discover from what source Lewis and Clarke procured a part of their singular denominations for the affluents of the Missouri; for, in the languages of the neighbouring Indian nations, they have entirely different names.—Maximilian.

[308] The French form for this river was Le Boulet. It rises somewhat north of the Black Hills, flows east in two branches across North Dakota, and empties into the Missouri in Morton County.—Ed.

[309] For a brief sketch of the Mandan, see our volume v, pp. 113, 114, note 76. Maximilian is a chief authority for the customs of this interesting tribe. See our volume xxiii.—Ed.

[310] Alexander Harvey was a clerk of the American Fur Company. Born and reared in St. Louis, he quarrelled with his first employers while still a minor, and ran away to join the fur company. He was for several years at Fort McKenzie, and one of the participants in the Blackfoot massacre of 1843-44. Harvey was a bold and desperate character, and tales of his atrocities are narrated by Larpenteur, a fellow employé. In 1845 he left the company's employ, and organized a rival concern, of which he was head. He was living at Fort Yates as late as 1896.—Ed.

[311] The black-tailed or mule deer of the Americans (Cervus macrotis, Say), has been described, by later zoologists, from an imperfect skin; I will, therefore, give an imperfect description from nature. It is larger than the Virginian deer, not so light, has a larger hoof, much longer ears, and does not run so swiftly—not quicker than a buffalo cow. It casts its horns in March, and throws off the rough skin of them in August. They have, generally, only one young one—sometimes two; they are marked with white spots, on a pale yellowish-red ground. One of these animals, of three or four years old, in shape nearly resembled the Virginian deer; the hair of the body was hard and scanty; the whole of a pale yellowish-red; the breast greyish-brown, and, on the belly, yellowish-white. In winter, the colour nearly resembles that of our deer in the same season. Each of the horns of this deer had four antlers, nearly as in Cervus elaphus. Woodcut B represents the horns of a large deer of this species.—Maximilian.

Comment by Ed. See p. 347, for illustration of antlers of deer.

[312] Marked on Lewis and Clark's map as Shepherd River; it is now Apple Creek, flowing from the east in Bismarck County, North Dakota.—Ed.

[313] For Heart River, see our volume v, p. 148, note 91.—Ed.

[314] On the west bank; Square Butte Creek takes its name therefrom.—Ed.

[315] Lewis and Clark here met a party of Mandan on a hunting excursion. This creek has not been certainly identified, the river's bed having changed in the vicinity. It is probably Deer Creek, in Oliver County.—Ed.

[316] Old Mandan villages had been scattered all along this reach of the river, Lewis and Clark noting the first remains below Heart River.—Ed.

[317] The Cheyenne River of North Dakota—not to be confused with the Missour affluent in South Dakota—is the largest western tributary of Red River of the North. Devil's Lake, a large body of fresh water in Halsey County, was a favorite habitat of the Sioux. South of it is now an Indian reservation, chiefly for Sisseton and Wahpeton Sioux. St. Peter's River is the present Minnesota; its source is in Big Stone Lake, on the boundary of Minnesota and South Dakota.—Ed.

[318] Lewis and Clark called the first Mandan village Ma-too-ton-ka. This was in a wooded bend, three miles below the site of Fort Clark.—Ed.

[319] Fort Clark, named in honor of General William Clark, was built in 1831 as the American Fur Company's post among the Mandan. An earlier post near by, had been the company's home since 1822. Fort Clark was second in importance only to Forts Union and Pierre. A trusted employé was kept as chief factor, and the post was maintained until the close of the fur-trading era. Its site was eight miles below the mouth of Big Knife River, on the west bank, some eighty or ninety paces back from the river, and about three-quarters of a mile lower down and on the opposite side of the river from Fort Mandan, Lewis and Clark's wintering place (1804-05).—Ed.

[320] The Wolf chief, called by the French traders Chef de Loup, and by Catlin Ha-na-ta-nu-mauk, was head chief of the nation. Of an austere and haughty nature, he was feared rather than beloved by the tribe, whose idol was Four Bears, the second chief. Bodmer painted this chief in two ways (see Plates 46 and 47, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv). Catlin also secured his likeness both in full dress and in mourning. Catlin describes in detail a buffalo robe covered with paintings representing his exploits; see Catlin, North American Indians, i, pp. 145-154.—Ed.

[321] James Kipp was born in Canada in 1788. When about twenty years of age he entered the fur-trade, as hunter and trapper in the Red River region. By 1818 he was on the upper Missouri, and became the agent of the Columbia Fur Company at its Mandan post. Later, he became a trusted employé of the American Fur Company, building Fort Piegan among the Blackfeet (1831). For many years he was chief factor at Fort Clark, transferring (1835) to Fort McKenzie. Audubon found him in charge of Fort Alexander, on the Yellowstone, in 1843, and two years later he was entrusted with the important post at Fort Union. He retired from the fur-trade in 1865, and settled upon his Missouri farm, which he had acquired many years before. As late as 1876 he once more visited the Mandan, whose language he was said to have been the first white man to master.—Ed.

[322] For Toussaint Charbonneau, see Brackenridge's Journal, in our volume vi, p. 32, note 3.—Ed.

[323] For the Crow Indians, see our volume v, p. 226, note 121.—Ed.

[324] See Plate 13, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.

[325] See Plate 49, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.

[326] See p. 347, for illustration of Sioux burial stages.—Ed.

[327] For the traditions of the first man, Nu-mohk-muck-a-nah, consult Catlin, North American Indians, i, pp. 178-181.—Ed.

[328] For the Minitaree, see our volume v, pp. 113, 114, note 76. An extended account is given by Washington Matthews, "Ethnography and Philology of the Hidatsa Indians," in United States Geological and Geographical Survey of the Territories, Miscellaneous Publications, No. 7 (Washington, 1877). Maximilian classes with the Minitaree villages that of the Ahnahaway, or Gens des Souliers, also called Wetersoon, whom Lewis and Clark considered a separate though allied tribe.—Ed.

[329] See Plate 81, figures 5 and 6, in the accompanying atlas, volume xxv of our series.—Ed.

[330] Ibid., figure 10.—Ed.

[331] Catlin says that Long Hair was the head chief of the tribe, having received his office from the circumstance of having the longest hair in the tribe. Campbell and Sublette stated that they had lived in his lodge and examined his hair, which measured ten feet and seven inches of natural growth.—Ed.

[332] Fort Cass was built by the American Fur Company in the autumn of 1832, on the right bank of the Yellowstone, two or three miles below the mouth of the Bighorn. It was intended for the Crow trade, and frequently was called Tulloch's fort from its founder, a company employé. Wyeth, on his famous voyage, passed this fort in a bull-boat, August 18, 1833. See Irving, Rocky Mountains, ii, pp. 159-161. About 1838 Fort Cass was abandoned in favor of Fort Van Buren farther down the Yellowstone.—Ed.

[333] The bardaches will be spoken of when we are treating of the customs of the Mandans.—Maximilian.

[334] See p. 347, for illustration of Sioux burial stages.—Ed.

[335] Knife River, called by the French Rivière de Couteau, and by the Indians Minah Wakpa, is a prairie stream, whose course is in general east, entering the Missouri in Mercer County, North Dakota. The town of Stanton is now on the site of the third village, Awachawi—Ed.

[336] See p. 361, for illustration of a Blackfoot musical instrument.—Ed.

[337] This fort of Pilcher, built for the Missouri Fur Company about 1822, was about eleven miles above the mouth of Knife River, and named Fort Vanderburgh. Not proving profitable, it was maintained but a short time. See another mention in our volume xxiii, chapter xxiii.—Ed.

[338] See article by O. D. Wheeler, in Wonderland (1904), on the recent development of the lignite coal area of North Dakota.—Ed.

[339] It was a custom of the Minitaree, maintained until 1866, to leave their permanent village each winter for a spot where fuel was convenient, and there build log-cabins, very warm and secure, as winter quarters. They thus preserved both the fuel supply, and the game in the neighborhood of their summer home.—Ed.

[340] Miry Creek appears to be the present Snake Creek, in McLean County, North Dakota, the one which Maximilian designates as Snake being a small run from a cliff which was known as Snake den. See Original Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, i, p. 291.—Ed.

[341] See description of bear-dance, with illustration, in Catlin, North American Indians, i, pp. 242-245.—Ed.

[342] These stones are generally granite, not sharp, but rounded in front; are used by the Indians to break the large bones of the buffaloes, of the marrow of which they are very fond. Stones closely resembling these are found among the Blackfoot Indians.—Maximilian.

[343] See p. 361, for illustration of a stone battle-axe.—Ed.

[344] The Little Missouri is the most important North Dakota affluent of the Missouri, above the Cannonball. It rises on the northwestern slopes of the Black Hills and flows north for some distance, thence turning northeast and east to enter the main river in Williams County. It is a broad but shallow stream, impregnated with alkali.—Ed.

[345] Wild Onion Creek was so named by Lewis and Clark because of the quantity of that plant growing upon its bordering plains. Within Garfield County, North Dakota, it is now denominated Pride Creek.—Ed.

[346] Goose Egg Lake, so named by the explorers "from the circumstance of my [Clark] shooting a goose on her nest on some sticks in the top of a high cotton wood tree in which there was one egg," is now Cold Spring Lake (Original Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, i, pp. 304, 305). The great bend (Grand Detour) is still so named, but is much wider than the lower bend, being nearly ten miles across, and over twenty around the curve.—Ed.

[347] Coues, Lewis and Clark Expedition, i, p. 274, identifies Goat Pen Creek with Upper Knife River. Maximilian's identification of this stream as the present White Earth River appears to accord better with the Original Journals (i, p. 313). The White Earth rises in Coteau des Prairies, and flows directly south into the Missouri. Lewis and Clark applied the name to a river farther up, near the forks of the Yellowstone. See note 348, post, p. 372.—Ed.

[348] For the Assiniboin see our volume ii, p. 168, note 75. They separated from the Wazikute gens of the Yanktonnai Sioux before the middle of the seventeenth century. The Dakota stigmatize them as "Hohe" (rebels). Lewis and Clark name three bands of these people, of whom they heard along the Missouri—Gens de Canoe, Gens des Filles, and Gens des Grand Diables. The Gens des Filles (girl band) was composed of about sixty tents, its head chief being Les Yeux Gris (Grey Eyes). See United States Bureau of Ethnology Report, 1894-95, p. 223.—Ed.

[349] See p. 287, for illustration of bows, arrows, and quiver.—Ed.

[350] The White Earth River of Lewis and Clark, now Muddy River, is a northern affluent of the Missouri, taking its name from the mud by which its mouth is choked. Above the mouth it is a clear and partly navigable stream, flowing through a valley nearly five miles wide, fertile although treeless. It enters the Missouri in Buford County, having the town of Williston at its mouth.—Ed.

[351] Fort Union was the most important post of the American Fur Company on the upper Missouri. It was commenced in the autumn of 1828 (Maximilian says 1829), being at first known as Fort Floyd—another Fort Union existing higher up the river, which was abandoned, and the property transferred to the fort at the mouth of the Yellowstone. The actual site was five miles above the meeting of the rivers, on the north bank of the Missouri; see Larpenteur's Journal, i, pp. 50, 68. The fort was injured by fire in 1832, but substantially rebuilt, Wyeth (1833) pronouncing it superior to the Oregon forts of the British companies. Maintained until 1867, it was finally abandoned, part of its effects being transferred to the government post Fort Buford, some miles below.—Ed.

[352] Our knowledge of Hamilton is chiefly derived from the pages of Larpenteur, who says that the former was an English nobleman, whose real name was Archibald Palmer. Having become involved in some difficulties, he assumed the name James Archdale Hamilton, and having formed acquaintance with Kenneth McKenzie was sent by the latter as book-keeper to Fort Union, where he took full command during McKenzie's frequent absences. Hamilton was at this time about fifty years of age, punctilious in manner, particular in dress, and both respected and feared by his subordinates. Later he reverted to his own name and returned to St. Louis, becoming cashier for the American Fur Company, and dying in that city.—Ed.

[353] The French form for the name of this great river (Roche Jaune) was in early use; Chittenden (Yellowstone National Park (Cincinnati, 1895), pp. 1-7) thinks it a translation of the Indian term, derived from the predominant color of Yellowstone Cañon. The first use of the English form appears to be in the writings of David Thompson, the English explorer (1798). See Elliott Coues, New Light on the Early History of the Greater Northwest (New York, 1897), i, p. 302. The Crow Indians had a name for this stream, signifying "Elk."

The reference is to D. B. Warden, Statistical, Political, and Historical Account of the United States of North America (Edinburgh, 1819), i, p. 93.—Ed.

[354] For a view of this fort see Plate 61, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.

[355] This is the distance by water; on horseback, the journey has been accomplished in ten days.—Maximilian.

[356] On this subject see "Astoria," and "Adventures of Captain Bonneville," also "Ross Cox's Adventures on the Columbia River," p. 198. The dress of the white agents of the Company is made of cloth, like our own; but the hunters often wear a leather dress, ornamented, for the most part, in the Indian fashion, while the common engagés wear white blanket coats, such as I have described when speaking of the inhabitants of Indiana, on the Wabash. They are mostly shod in Indian mocassins, a dozen pair of which may be purchased from the Indian women for one dollar, when they are not ornamented. The hunters, here, maintain that these Indian shoes are better adapted to the prairies than our European ones, as they do not become so slippery. They are frequently soled with elk hide, or parchment. The worst is, that they are easily penetrated by the prickles of the cactus, and on this account we greatly preferred our European shoes. At Fort Union, artisans of almost every description are to be met with, such as smiths, masons, carpenters, joiners, coopers, tailors, shoemakers, hatters, &c.—Maximilian.

[357] Some idea may be formed of the enormous quantity of beavers killed every year, from the circumstance that the Hudson's Bay Company sends to London alone 50,000, this animal being found as far as the coasts of the Frozen Ocean.—Maximilian.

[358] At Rock River, which falls into the Mississippi, the Indians caught, in 1825, about 130,000 musk-rats; in the following year, about half the number; and, in about two years after, these animals were scarcely to be met with. Previous to this time, an Indian caught, in thirty days, as many as 1,600 of them. In South America, there is only one species of wild animal, known to me, whose skins are collected in large quantities. According to D'Orbigny, in the first six months of 1828, above 150,000 dozen Quiyaa were sold, in Corrientes, at from fifteen to eighteen francs the dozen. The Indians hunt this animal, which lives in the morasses, with dogs, and shoot it with arrows.—Maximilian.

[359] See Plate 62, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.

[360] See Plate 15, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.

[361] Unfortunately, all these interesting specimens were destroyed in the fire on board the steam-boat.—Maximilian.

Comment by Ed. Reference is made to the burning of the "Assiniboine." See note 179, ante, p. 240.

[362] William Keating, Narrative of an Expedition to the source of St. Peter's River, performed in the year 1823, under command of Stephen H. Long (Philadelphia, 1824).—Ed.

[363] Sir John Franklin, Narrative of a Journey to the shores of the Polar Sea in the years 1819, 1820, 1821, and 1822 (London, 1823), p. 104.—Ed.

[364] Fort des Prairies was at different periods applied to various Hudson's Bay Company posts. Apparently this was the fort on the site of Edmonton, for which see Franchère's Narrative, in our volume vi, p. 364, note 177.—Ed.

[365] The word osayes is one of the many Canadian terms which are mixed with the French of that country, and means bones.—Maximilian.

[366] Consult on the bands or gentes of the Assiniboin, J. O. Dorsey, "Siouan Sociology," in Bureau of Ethnology Report, 1893-94, pp. 222, 223.—Ed.

[367] The common Mackinaw guns, which the Fur Company obtain from England at the rate of eight dollars a-piece, and which are sold to the Indians for the value of thirty dollars.—Maximilian.

[368] Op. cit. in note 361, [ante] p. 112.—Maximilian.

[369] The reference is to Edwin James (editor) Narrative of Captivity and Adventures during thirty years' residence among the Indians in the interior of North America by John Tanner (New York, 1830). John Tanner, a boy of nine years, was captured in Kentucky about 1790. He passed the larger part of his life in the northern woods. In 1818 he sought his relatives in Kentucky while his brother Edward was searching for him near Mackinac. For some years he was employed as interpreter at Sault Ste. Marie, but having become an Indian in habit he shot (1836) and killed James L. Schoolcraft and fled to the wilderness where he died about 1847 (but see Minnesota Historical Collections, vi, p. 114). His Narrative was much quoted by contemporary writers.—Ed.

[370] See p. 361, for illustration of Assiniboin pipes.—Ed.

[371] The Indians on the Upper Missouri have another kind of tobacco pipe, the bowl of which is in the same line as the tube, and which they use only on their warlike expeditions. As the aperture of the pipe is more inclined downwards than usual, the fire can never be seen, so as to betray the smoker, who lies on the ground, and holds the pipe on one side.—Maximilian.

Comment by Ed. See p. 361, for illustration of pipe for warlike expeditions.

[372] See Plate 81, figure 11, in the accompanying atlas, our volume xxv.—Ed.