Lewis: May 11, 1805

Saturday May 11th 1805. Set out this morning at an early hour, the courant
strong; and river very crooked; the banks are falling in very fast; I
sometimes wonder that some of our canoes or perogues are not swallowed up
by means of these immence masses of earth which are eternally
precipitating themselves into the river; we have had many hair breadth
escapes from them but providence seems so to have ordered it that we have
as yet sustained no loss in consequence of them. The wind blue very hard
the forepart of last night but abated toward morning; it again arose in
the after part of this day and retarded our progress very much. the high
lands are broken, the hills higher and approach nearer the river, tho the
soil of both hills and bottoms appear equally as furtile as below; it
consists of a black looking tome with a moderate portion of sand; the
hills and bluffs to the debth of 20 or thirty feet, seemed to be composed
entirely of this loam; when thrown in the water it desolves as readily as
loaf sugar and effervesses like marle. great appearance of quarts and
mineral salts, the latter appears both on the hills and bottoms, in the
bottoms of the gullies which make down from the hills it lies incrusting
the earth to the debth of 2 or 3 inches, and may with a fether be swept up
and collected in large quantities, I preserved several specimines of this
salts. the quarts appears most commonly in the faces of the bluffs. no
coal, burnt hills, or pumice stone. saw today some high hills on the
Stard. whose summits were covered with pine. Capt Clark went on shore and
visited them; he brought with him on his return som of the boughs of this
pine it is of the pitch kind but I think the leaves somewhat longer than
ours in Virginia. Capt C. also in his walk killed 2 Mule deer a beaver and
two buffaloe; these last he killed about 3 miles above where we encamped
this evening in the expectation that we would reach that place, but we
were unable to do so from the adverse winds and other occurrences, and he
came down and joined us about dark. there is a dwarf cedar growing among
the pine on the hills; it rises to the hight thre sometimes 4 feet, but
most generally spreads itself like a vine along the surface of the earth,
which it covers very closely, puting out roots from the underside of the
limbs; the leaf is finer and more delicate than the common red ceader,
it’s fruit and smell are the same with the red ceader. the tops of these
hills which produce the pine and cedar is of a different soil from that
just described; it is a light coloured poor sterile sandy soil, the base
usually a yellow or white clay; it produces scarcely any grass, some
scattering tuffts of sedge constitutes the greater part of it’s grass.
About 5 P.M. my attention was struck by one of the Party runing at a
distance towards us and making signs and hollowing as if in distress, I
ordered the perogues to put too, and waited untill he arrived; I now found
that it was Bratton the man with the soar hand whom I had permitted to
walk on shore, he arrived so much out of breath that it was several
minutes before he could tell what had happened; at length he informed me
that in the woody bottom on the Lard. side about 11/2 below us he had shot
a brown bear which immediately turned on him and pursued him a
considerable distance but he had wounded it so badly that it could not
overtake him; I immediately turned out with seven of the party in quest of
this monster, we at length found his trale and persued him about a mile by
the blood through very thick brush of rosbushes and the large leafed
willow; we finally found him concealed in some very thick brush and shot
him through the skull with two balls; we proceeded dress him as soon as
possible, we found him in good order; it was a monstrous beast, not quite
so large as that we killed a few days past but in all other rispects much
the same the hair is remarkably long fine and rich tho he appears
parshally to have discharged his winter coat; we now found that Bratton
had shot him through the center of the lungs, notwithstanding which he had
pursued him near half a mile and had returned more than double that
distance and with his tallons had prepared himself a bed in the earth of
about 2 feet deep and five long and was perfectly alive when we found him
which could not have been less than 2 hours after he received the wound;
these bear being so hard to die reather intimedates us all; I must confess
that I do not like the gentlemen and had reather fight two Indians than
one bear; there is no other chance to conquer them by a single shot but by
shooting them through the brains, and this becomes difficult in
consequence of two large muscles which cover the sides of the forehead and
the sharp projection of the center of the frontal bone, which is also of a
pretty good thickness. the flece and skin were as much as two men could
possibly carry. by the time we returned the sun had set and I determined
to remain here all night, and directed the cooks to render the bear’s oil
and put it in the kegs which was done. there was about eight gallons of
it.

the wild Hysop grows here and in all the country through which we have
passed for many days past; tho from big Dry river to this place it has
been more abundant than below, and a smaller variety of it grows on the
hills, the leaves of which differ considerably being more deeply indented
near it’s extremity. the buffaloe deer and Elk feed on this herb in the
winter season as they do also on the small willow of the sandbars. there
is another growth that begins now to make it’s appearance in the bottom
lands and is becoming extreemly troublesome; it is a shrub which rises to
the hight of from two to four feet, much branched, the bark of the trunk
somewhat rough hard and of light grey colour; the wood is firm and stif,
the branches beset with a great number of long, shap, strong, wooddy
looking thorns; the leaf is about 3/4 or an inch long, and one 1/8 of an
inch wide, it is obtuse, absolutely entire, veinless fleshy and gibbose;
has no perceptable taste or smell, and no anamal appears to eat it. by way
of designating when I mention it hereafter I shall call it the fleshey
leafed thorn