for food: the cold season coming on, a flannel shirt was given to each
man, and fresh powder to those who had exhausted their supply.

Monday, September 16. Whilst some of the party were engaged in the same
way as yesterday, others were employed in examining the surrounding
country. About a quarter of a mile behind our camp, and at an elevation
of twenty feet above it, a plain extends nearly three miles parallel to
the river, and about a mile back to the hills, towards which it
gradually ascends. Here we saw a grove of plum-trees loaded with fruit,
now ripe, and differing in nothing from those of the Atlantic states,
except that the tree is smaller and more thickly set. The ground of the
plain is occupied by the burrows of multitudes of barking squirrels, who
entice hither the wolves of a small kind, hawks, and polecats, all of
which animals we saw, and presumed that they fed on the squirrel. This
plain is intersected nearly in its whole extent by deep ravines and
steep irregular rising grounds from one to two hundred feet. On
ascending the range of hills which border the plain, we saw a second
high level plain stretching to the south as far as the eye could reach.
To the westward, a high range of hills about twenty miles distant runs
nearly north and south, but not to any great extent, as their rise and
termination is embraced by one view, and they seemed covered with a
verdure similar to that of the plains. The same view extended over the
irregular hills which border the northern side of the Missouri; all
around the country had been recently burnt, and a young green grass
about four inches high covered the ground, which was enlivened by herds
of antelopes and buffaloe; the last of which were in such multitudes,
that we cannot exaggerate in saying that at a single glance we saw three
thousand of them before us. Of all the animals we had seen the antelope
seems to possess the most wonderful fleetness: shy and timorous they
generally repose only on the ridges, which command a view of all the