Chapter 28 - Page 2

its waters, with as much eagerness as the Arab seeks

some famous well of the desert. Captain Bonneville describes it

as having the taste of beer. His men drank it with avidity, and

in copious draughts. It did not appear to him to possess any

medicinal properties, or to produce any peculiar effects. The

Indians, however, refuse to taste it, and endeavor to persuade

the white men from doing so.

We have heard this also called the Soda Spring, and described as

containing iron and sulphur. It probably possesses some of the

properties of the Ballston water.

The time had now arrived for Captain Bonneville to go in quest of

the party of free trappers, detached in the beginning of July,

under the command of Mr. Hodgkiss, to trap upon the head waters

of Salmon River. His intention was to unite them with the party

with which he was at present travelling, that all might go into

quarters together for the winter. Accordingly, on the 11th of

November, he took a temporary leave of his band, appointing a

rendezvous on Snake River, and, accompanied by three men, set out

upon his journey. His route lay across the plain of the Portneuf,

a tributary stream of Snake River, called after an unfortunate

Canadian trapper murdered by the Indians. The whole country

through which he passed bore evidence of volcanic convulsions and

conflagrations in the olden time. Great masses of lava lay

scattered about in every direction; the crags and cliffs had

apparently been under the action of fire; the rocks in some

places seemed to have been in a state of fusion; the plain was

rent and split with deep chasms and gullies, some of which were

partly filled with lava.

They had not proceeded far, however, before they saw a party of

horsemen, galloping full tilt toward them. They instantly turned,

and made full speed for the covert of a woody stream, to fortify

themselves among the trees. The Indians came to a halt, and one

of them came forward alone. He reached Captain Bonneville and his

men just as they were dismounting and about to post themselves. A

few words dispelled all uneasiness. It was a party of twenty-five

Bannack Indians, friendly to the whites, and they proposed,

through their envoy, that both parties should encamp together,

and hunt the buffalo, of which they had discovered several large

herds hard by. Captain Bonneville cheerfully assented to their

proposition, being curious to see their manner of hunting.

Both parties accordingly encamped together on a convenient spot,

and prepared for the hunt. The Indians first posted a boy on