stoicism, they at least made them acquainted with the edible properties
of roots and wild rosebuds, and furnished them a supply from their
own store. The necessities of the camp at length became so urgent that
Captain Bonneville determined to dispatch a party to the Horse
Prairie, a plain to the north of his cantonment, to procure a supply of
provisions. When the men were about to depart, he proposed to the Nez
Perces that they, or some of them, should join the hunting-party. To
his surprise, they promptly declined. He inquired the reason for their
refusal, seeing that they were in nearly as starving a situation as his
own people. They replied that it was a sacred day with them, and the
Great Spirit would be angry should they devote it to hunting. They
offered, however, to accompany the party if it would delay its departure
until the following day; but this the pinching demands of hunger would
not permit, and the detachment proceeded.

A few days afterward, four of them signified to Captain Bonneville that
they were about to hunt. "What!" exclaimed he, "without guns or arrows;
and with only one old spear? What do you expect to kill?" They smiled
among themselves, but made no answer. Preparatory to the chase, they
performed some religious rites, and offered up to the Great Spirit a
few short prayers for safety and success; then, having received the
blessings of their wives, they leaped upon their horses and departed,
leaving the whole party of Christian spectators amazed and rebuked by
this lesson of faith and dependence on a supreme and benevolent Being.
"Accustomed," adds Captain Bonneville, "as I had heretofore been, to
find the wretched Indian revelling in blood, and stained by every vice
which can degrade human nature, I could scarcely realize the scene which
I had witnessed. Wonder at such unaffected tenderness and piety, where
it was least to have been sought, contended in all our bosoms with shame
and confusion, at receiving such pure and wholesome instructions from