The Journals
of Lewis and Clark: Dates February 15, 1805 - February 21,
1805
The following
excerpts are taken from entries of the Journals of Lewis
and Clark. Dates: February 15, 1805 - February 21, 1805
February 15,
1805
Friday 15, at sunrise with twenty-four men. The morning
was fine and cool, the thermometer being at 16° below 0.
In the course of the day one of the Mandan chiefs returned
from Captain Lewis's party, his eye-sight having become
so bad that he could not proceed. At this season of the
year the reflexion from the ice and snow is so intense as
to occasion almost total blindness. This complaint is very
common, and the general remedy is to sweat the part affected
by holding the face over a hot stone, and receiving the
fumes from snow thrown on it. A large red fox was killed
to-day.
February
16, 1805
Saturday 16. The
morning was warm, mercury at 32° above 0, the weather cloudy:
several of the Indians who went with Captain Lewis returned,
as did also one of our men, whose feet had been frostbitten.
February
17, 1805
Sunday 17. The
weather continued as yesterday, though in the afternoon
it became fair. Shotawhorora and his son came to see us,
with about thirty pounds of dried buffalo meat and some
tallow.
February
18, 1805
Monday 18. The
morning was cloudy with some snow, but in the latter part
of the day it cleared up. Mr. M‘Kenzie who had spent yesterday
at the fort now left us. Our stock of meat is exhausted,
so that we must confine ourselves to vegetable diet, at
least till the return of the party: for this, however, we
are at no loss, since both on this and the following day,
February
19, 1805
Tuesday 19, our
blacksmith got large quantities of corn from the Indians
who came in great numbers to see us. The weather was fair
and warm, the wind from the south.
February
20, 1805
Wednesday, 20th.
The day was delightfully fine; the mercury being at sunrise
2° and in the course of the day 22° above 0, the wind southerly.
Kagohami came down to see us early: his village is afflicted
by the death of one of their eldest men, who from his account
to us must have seen one hundred and twenty winters. Just
as he was dying, he requested his grandchildren to dress
him in his best robe when he was dead, and then carry him
on a hill and seat him on a stone, with his face down the
river towards their old villages, that he might go straight
to his brother who had passed before him to the ancient
village under ground. We have seen a number of Mandans who
have lived to a great age; chiefly however the men, whose
robust exercises fortify the body, while the laborious occupations
of the women shorten their existence.
February
21, 1805
Thursday 21. We
had a continuation of the same pleasant weather. Oheenaw
and Shahaka came down to see us, and mentioned that several
of their countrymen had gone to consult their medicine stone
as to the prospects of the following year. This medicine
stone is the great oracle of the Mandans, and whatever it
announces is believed with implicit confidence. Every spring,
and on some occasions during the summer, a deputation visits
the sacred spot, where there is a thick porous stone twenty-feet
in circumference, with a smooth surface. Having reached
the place the ceremony of smoking to it is performed by
the deputies, who alternately take a whiff themselves and
then present the pipe to the stone; after this they retire
to an adjoining wood for the night, during which it may
be safely presumed that all the embassy do not sleep; and
in the morning they read the destinies of the nation in
the white marks on the stone, which those who made them
are at no loss to decypher. The Minnetarees have a stone
of a similar kind, which has the same qualities and the
same influence over the nation.
Captain
Lewis returned from his excursion in pursuit of the Indians.
On reaching the place where the Sioux had stolen our horses,
they found only one sled, and several pair of moccasins
which were recognised to be those of the Sioux. The party
then followed the Indian tracks till they reached two old
lodges where they slept, and the next morning pursued the
course of the river till they reached some Indian camps,
where captain Clarke passed the night some time ago, and
which the Sioux had now set on fire, leaving a little corn
near the place in order to induce a belief that they were
Ricaras. From this point the Sioux tracks left the river
abruptly and crossed into the plains; but perceiving that
there was no chance of overtaking them, Captain Lewis went
down to the pen where captain Clarke had left some meat,
which he found untouched by the Indians, and then hunted
in the low grounds on the river, till he returned with about
three thousand pounds of meat, some drawn in a sled by fifteen
of the men, and the rest on horseback; having killed thirty-six
deer, fourteen elk, and one wolf.
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