It was bound on a visit to the Arrapahoes,
a tribe inhabiting the banks of the Nebraska. They were armed to
the best of their scanty means, and some of the Shoshonies had
bucklers of buffalo hide, adorned with feathers and leathern
fringes, and which have a charmed virtue in their eyes, from
having been prepared, with mystic ceremonies, by their conjurers.
In company with this wandering band our travellers proceeded all
day. In the evening they encamped near to each other in a defile
of the mountains, on the borders of a stream running north, and
falling into Bighorn River. In the vicinity of the camp, they
found gooseberries, strawberries, and currants in great
abundance. The defile bore traces of having been a thoroughfare
for countless herds of buffaloes, though not one was to be seen.
The hunters succeeded in killing an elk and several black-tailed
deer.
They were now in the bosom of the second Bighorn ridge, with
another lofty and snow-crowned mountain full in view to the west.
Fifteen miles of western course brought them, on the following
day, down into an intervening plain, well stocked with buffalo.
Here the Snakes and Flatheads joined with the white hunters in a
successful hunt, that soon filled the camp with provisions.
On the morning of the 9th of September, the travellers parted
company with their Indian friends, and continued on their course
to the west. A march of thirty miles brought them, in the
evening, to the banks of a rapid and beautifully clear stream
about a hundred yards wide. It is the north fork or branch of the
Bighorn River, but bears its peculiar name of the Wind River,
from being subject in the winter season to a continued blast
which sweeps its banks and prevents the snow from lying on them.
This blast is said to be caused by a narrow gap or funnel in the
mountains, through which the river forces its way between
perpendicular precipices, resembling cut rocks.
This river gives its name to a whole range of mountains
consisting of three parallel chains, eighty miles in length, and
about twenty or twenty-five broad. One of its peaks is probably
fifteen thousand feet above the level of the sea, being one of
the highest of the Rocky Sierra. These mountains give rise, not
merely to the Wind or Bighorn River, but to several branches of
the Yellowstone and the Missouri on the east, and of the Columbia
and Colorado on the west; thus dividing the sources of these
mighty streams.
For five succeeding days, Mr. Hunt and his party continued up the
course of the Wind River, to the distance of about eighty miles,
crossing and recrossing it, according to its windings, and the
nature of its banks; sometimes passing through valleys, at other
times scrambling over rocks and hills.
