THE MISSOURI RIVER JOURNALS 457 



at every village we have passed. However, we now find 

 them passably good, quiet, and regularly sobered men. 

 We have of course a motley set, even to Italians. We 

 passed the mouth of the Missouri, and moved very slowly 

 against the current, for it was not less than twenty minutes 

 after four the next morning, when we reached St. Charles,^ 

 distant forty-two miles. Here we stopped till half-past 

 five, when Mr. Sarpy, to whom I gave my letters home, 

 left us in a wagon. 



April 26. A rainy day, and the heat we had experi- 

 enced yesterday was now all gone. We saw a Wild Goose 

 running on the shore, and it was killed by Bell ; but our 

 captain did not stop to pick it up, and I was sorry to see 

 the poor bird dead, uselessly. We now had found out 

 that our berths were too thickly inhabited for us to sleep 

 in ; so I rolled myself in my blanket, lay down on deck, 

 and slept very sound. 



27th. A fine clear day, cool this morning. Cleaned 

 our boilers last night, landing where the " Emily Christian " 

 is sunk, for a few moments ; saw a few Gray Squirrels, and 

 an abundance of our common Partridges in flocks of fif- 

 teen to twenty, very gentle indeed. About four this after- 

 noon we passed the mouth of the Gasconade River, a 

 stream coming from the westward, valuable for its yellow- 

 pine lumber. At a woodyard above us we saw a White 

 Pelican 2 that had been captured there, and which, had it 

 been clean, I should have bought. I saw that its legs and 



i One of the oldest settlements in Missouri, on the left bank of the river, 

 still known by the same name, and giving name to St. Charles County, Mo. 

 It was once called Petite Cote, from the range of small hills at the foot of 

 which it is situated. When Lewis and Clark were here, in May, 1804, the 

 town had nearly 100 small wooden houses, including a chapel, and a popu- 

 lation of about 450, chiefly of Canadian French origin. See " Lewis and 

 Clark," Coues' ed., 1893, p. 5. — E. C. 



2 The species which Audubon described and figured as new under the 

 name of Pelecanus amerkamis : Ornith. Biogr. iv., 1838, p. 88, pi. 311 ; Birds 

 of Amer. vii., 1844, p. 20, pi. 422. This is P. erythrorhynchus of Gmelin, 

 17S8, and P. trachyrhynchus of Latham, 1790. — E. C. 



