His boat was made of three buffalo
skins, stretched on a light frame, stitched together, and the seams paid
with elk tallow and ashes. It was eighteen feet long, and about five
feet six inches wide, sharp at each end, with a round bottom, and drew
about a foot and a half of water-a depth too great for these upper
rivers, which abound with shallows and sand-bars. The crew consisted of
two half-breeds, who claimed to be white men, though a mixture of the
French creole and the Shawnee and Potawattomie. They claimed, moreover,
to be thorough mountaineers, and first-rate hunters--the common boast of
these vagabonds of the wilderness. Besides these, there was a Nez Perce
lad of eighteen years of age, a kind of servant of all work, whose great
aim, like all Indian servants, was to do as little work as possible;
there was, moreover, a half-breed boy, of thirteen, named Baptiste, son
of a Hudson's Bay trader by a Flathead beauty; who was travelling with
Wyeth to see the world and complete his education. Add to these, Mr.
Milton Sublette, who went as passenger, and we have the crew of the
little bull boat complete.
It certainly was a slight armament with which to run the gauntlet
through countries swarming with hostile hordes, and a slight bark to
navigate these endless rivers, tossing and pitching down rapids, running
on snags and bumping on sand-bars; such, however, are the cockle-shells
with which these hardy rovers of the wilderness will attempt the wildest
streams; and it is surprising what rough shocks and thumps these
boats will endure, and what vicissitudes they will live through.
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