November 4, 1833
Early, gray sky, strong wind, not cold. We continued sailing until eight o’clock and then lay to on the Assiniboine, or left, bank to prepare our breakfast. The forest was dense here, full of rose underbrush. I went into it with Morrin, and we soon saw six game animals (Cervus virginianus,) whose white tails were visible only in the dense bushes, as usual in an upright position. Here I saw Picus pubescens [and] magpies, as well as a few small birds. We finished with breakfast at nine thirty, but Morrin did not want to leave, on account of the wind.
On the heights of the banks, the black coal layers appeared again in the walls of clay—[also] yellowish rounded-off spheres of sandstone, although most [were] not entirely round here as [they were] in other places; [they were] less regular, often pressed more flat. On the headland to the left, the forest in which we had seen the game stretched far [away]. The hills to the right were raw and barren—on their ridges, brown spots: Juniperus prostrata.
At eleven thirty the mouth of the White Earth River (rivière Blanche, [the] Goat Pen River [of] Lewis and Clark) was situated to our left beyond a sandbar. Here there had been a fort, abandoned (1829) when Fort Union was built. About half an hour later, we stopped at the left bank, because the men maintained that the wind was too strong.
We went out with guns. In the tall forest [there were] a few open areas with high grass; Artemisia and other herbs extended upward, now all yellow and reddish brown colored. Tracks of buffalo and deer led in all directions back and forth. I followed one of them through the dense rose bushes, walked [around] and stepped over fallen trees, found shed deer antlers [and] the tracks of large bears, saw prairie hens, some blackbirds that had not migrated, and a small flock of Fringilla linaria americana, which frequently sit in the grass to pick seeds. We sensed game everywhere but did not see anything. After we had roamed around a lot and had gotten hot, we left this place [and] after two o’clock sailed on. The mountains on both sides were not significant here; much forest and willow [thickets lined] the river. Sandbars and points of land were frequently covered with driftwood.
Indians seemed to have been at the river not too long ago, since we found fresh manure from their horses. [We saw] individual eagles as well as prairie hens. We saw no little squirrels today; they are said to also occur in Mandan territory. Neither wild geese, ducks, nor other waterfowl appeared. They were without doubt on the ponds and lakes, because these [were] still open [water]. We saw no buffalo until Fort Clark, not a single one. After four fifteen we stopped on the right bank; again [there were] a few [singular] clay tops or cones atop the moderately high range of hills. About four isolated tops were partially coned; two of those rose isolated from the ridges upward. In this place strong, raw wind blew again, and the air was full of sand from the sandbars. Slightly farther on and a little to the right in front of us rose the Butte Carrée—magnificently blue. It offered a beautiful view with several cone-shaped tops and some mesas. To the left and the right on the bank were smooth, grayish green elevations with low, palmate bushes that together created an original view. The bushes were round, triangular, or various other shapes. They were located on the slopes and often in the gentle ravines. To the right on the river, a sandbar; behind it, strips of willows [and] trees; on the left, a more narrow strip of forest and willows and devastated banks [strewn chaotically] with driftwood.
If one looked at the smaller ravines of the hills close by, it became evident that their thickets consisted of roses, Cornus, Prunus padus (chokecherry), and a few other leafless, dark violet-brown or violet-gray [bushes], among them individual, dark green cedars (Juniperus virginiana). The Artemisia columbiensis (sage) and a few other plants grow singly [and] bushlike on these dry barren hills. In many places, the slopes or more level areas of the hills are covered with small, basin-shaped indentations, each strangely individual, filled in a curious way with bushes and shrubbery.
The day came to an end; the sky was very gray and dreary and seemed to announce bad weather. To the right on the bank, a broad area stretched [and] rose gently a few miles toward low hills. Crows and magpies were the only creatures visible on the elevations to the left and above the river. We sailed until dusk and put ashore on the right in the forest upriver [from] a high, steep bank. The forest was not deep; behind it [stretched] a prairie and hills. At midnight the sky became clear and the wind cold. At twelve o’clock the moon rose. Mr. Bodmer drew our bivouac yesterday.
