478 AUDUBON 



on this side of the Missouri. We unloaded some freight, 

 and pushed off. We saw here the first ploughing of the 

 ground we have observ^ed since we left the lower settle- 

 ments near St. Louis. We very soon reached the post of 

 Fort Croghan,^ so called after my old friend of that name 

 with whom I hunted Raccoons on his father's plantation 

 in Kentucky some thirty-eight years ago, and whose 

 father and my own were well acquainted, and fought 

 together in conjunction with George Washington and 

 Lafayette, during the Revolutionary War, against " Merrie 

 England." Here we found only a few soldiers, dragoons; 

 their camp and officers having been forced to move across 

 the prairie to the Bluffs, five miles. After we had put 

 out some freight for the sutler, we proceeded on until we 

 stopped for the night a few miles above, on the same side 

 of .the river. The soldiers assured us that their parade 

 ground, and so-called barracks, had been four feet under 

 water, and we saw fair and sufficient evidence of this. At 

 this place our pilot saw the first Yellow-headed Troupial 

 we have met with. We landed for the night under 

 trees covered by muddy deposits from the great overflow 

 of this season. I slept soundly, and have this morning, 

 May lo, written this. 



May 10, Wednesday. The morning was fine, and we 

 were under way at daylight; but a party of dragoons, 

 headed by a lieutenant, had left their camp four miles 

 distant from our anchorage at the same time, and reached 

 the shore before we had proceeded far; they fired a couple 

 of rifle shots ahead of us, and we brought to at once. 

 The young officer came on board, and presented a letter 

 from his commander. Captain Burgwin, from which we 

 found that we had to have our cargo examined. Our cap- 



^ Vicinity of present Omaha, Neb., and Council Bluffs, la., but somewhat 

 above these places. The present Council Bluffs, in Iowa, is considerably 

 below the position of the original Council Bluff of Lewis and Clark, which 

 Audubon presently notices. See " Lewis and Clark," ed. of 1893, p. 66. 

 — E. C. 



