Winter camp at the Portneuf--Fine springs--The Bannack Indians--Theirhonesty--Captain Bonneville prepares for an expedition--Christmas--The AmericanFalls--Wild scenery--Fishing Falls--Snake Indians--Scenery on the Bruneau--View ofvolcanic country from a mountain--Powder River-- Shoshokoes, or RootDiggers--Their character, habits, habitations, dogs--Vanity at its last shift IN ESTABLISHING his winter camp near the Portnenf, Captain Bonneville had drawnoff to some little distance from his Bannack friends, to avoid all annoyance from theirintimacy or intrusions. In so doing, however, he had been obliged to take up hisquarters on the extreme edge of the flat land, where he was encompassed with ice andsnow, and had nothing better for his horses to subsist on than wormwood. TheBannacks, on the contrary, were encamped among fine springs of water, where therewas grass in abundance. Some of these springs gush out of the earth in sufficientquantity to turn a mill; and furnish beautiful streams, clear as crystal, and full of trout ofa large size, which may be seen darting about the transparent water.
Winter now set in regularly. The snow had fallen frequently, and in large quantities, andcovered the ground to a depth of a foot; and the continued coldness of the weatherprevented any thaw.
By degrees, a distrust which at first subsisted between the Indians and the trappers,subsided, and gave way to mutual confidence and good will. A few presents convincedthe chiefs that the white men were their friends; nor were the white men wanting inproofs of the honesty and good faith of their savage neighbors. Occasionally, the deepsnow and the want of fodder obliged them to turn their weakest horses out to roam inquest of sustenance. If they at any time strayed to the camp of the Bannacks, they wereimmediately brought back. It must be confessed, however, that if the stray horsehappened, by any chance, to be in vigorous plight and good condition, though he wasequally sure to be returned by the honest Bannacks, yet it was always after the lapse ofseveral days, and in a very gaunt and jaded state; and always with the remark that theyhad found him a long way off. The uncharitable were apt to surmise that he had, in theinterim, been well used up in a buffalo hunt; but those accustomed to Indian morality inthe matter of horseflesh, considered it a singular evidence of honesty that he should bebrought back at all.
Being convinced, therefore, from these, and other circumstances, that his people wereencamped in the neighborhood of a tribe as honest as they were valiant, and satisfiedthat they would pass their winter unmolested, Captain Bonneville prepared for areconnoitring expedition of great extent and peril. This was, to penetrate to theHudson's Bay establishments on the banks of the Columbia, and to make himselfacquainted with the country and the Indian tribes; it being one part of his scheme toestablish a trading post somewhere on the lower part of the river, so as to participate inthe trade lost to the United States by the capture of Astoria. This expedition would, ofcourse, take him through the Snake River country, and across the Blue Mountains, thescenes of so much hardship and disaster to Hunt and Crooks, and their Astorian bands,who first explored it, and he would have to pass through it in the same frightful season,the depth of winter.
The idea of risk and hardship, however, only served to stimulate the adventurous spiritof the captain. He chose three companions for his journey, put up a small stock ofnecessaries in the most portable form, and selected five horses and mules forthemselves and their baggage. He proposed to rejoin his band in the early part ofMarch, at the winter encampment near the Portneuf. All these arrangements beingcompleted, he mounted his horse on Christmas morning, and set off with his threecomrades. They halted a little beyond the Bannack camp, and made their Christmasdinner, which, if not a very merry, was a very hearty one, after which they resumed theirjourney.
They were obliged to travel slowly, to spare their horses; for the snow had increased indepth to eighteen inches; and though somewhat packed and frozen, was not sufficientlyso to yield firm footing. Their route lay to the west, down along the left side of SnakeRiver; and they were several days in reaching the first, or American Falls. The banks ofthe river, for a considerable distance, both above and below the falls, have a volcaniccharacter: masses of basaltic rock are piled one upon another; the water makes its waythrough their broken chasms, boiling through narrow channels, or pitching in beautifulcascades over ridges of basaltic columns.
Beyond these falls, they came to a picturesque, but inconsiderable stream, called theCassie. It runs through a level valley, about four miles wide, where the soil is good; butthe prevalent coldness and dryness of the climate is unfavorable to vegetation. Near tothis stream there is a small mountain of mica slate, including garnets. Granite, in smallblocks, is likewise seen in this neighborhood, and white sandstone. From this river, thetravellers had a prospect of the snowy heights of the Salmon River Mountains to thenorth; the nearest, at least fifty miles distant.
