166 NARRATIVE OF 1853. 
Kooskooskia and a more southern branch of the Snake, as streams flowed from among them 
both to the north and the south. This course is, as usual with the Indians in travelling through 
a wooded country, selected to save themselves the labor of cutting a road through the wooded 
valleys. As they journey on horseback, and have no regard for the labor performed by their 
horses, this becomes their favorite plan, while white men would prefer to clear a way up the 
valley. The want of grass for their horses in the valley may be another reason for following 
the ridges. 
The little streams crossed, though mere brooks, had each a valley sometimes a quarter of a 
mile wide, flat and grassy, which must of course expand further down their course; and on the 
Kooskooskia, which was left many miles to the north, a valley approaching to that of the Bitter 
Root may be expected, probably more thickly wooded, and perhaps interrupted by narrow 
defiles through some of the ridges which cross its course. 
On December 17, after fifteen days of laborious travel, his little party emerged into the 
unwooded valley of the Clearwater, a few miles above its junction with the Kooskooskia, where 
they met with a party of the Nez Регебв Indians, and remained with them nearly a week. 
Their horses and cattle, with some young calves, were grazing in the valley, where the grass 
was bright and green; and young pea-vines were several inches high, the whole valley being 
strongly contrasted with the mountains he had just passed over. А slight fall of snow occurred 
while he was there. 
Going on westward, he reached Walla-Walla December 30. The country appeared to con- 
tain much excellent land along this part of the route which lay south of the Snake river which 
he crossed at the mouth of the Kooskooskia. The corn and wheat raised by the Indians were 
of good quality; and Mr. Craig, who has a farm at Lapwai, on the Kooskooskia, about forty- 
five miles from the mountains, raises also peas, squashes, onions, potatoes, melons, &c. 
Similar fine valleys exist on the Tukanon, Touchet, and smaller streams running in on the 
south side of the Snake. The weather continued mild up to the time he reached Walla-Walla. 
The day after his arrival he received my instructions directing him to proceed to the sound 
by way of the Snoqualmoo Pass, and though just after his severe hardships in the Bitter Root 
range, he immediately made preparations to carry them out. He reached Olympia on Feb- 
ruary 1, after a journey of twenty-four days, and thus gives the result of his observations: 
On the Tth of January, with two Walla-Walla Indians, he proceeded up the Columbia till it 
receives the waters of the Yakima river, and then, taking the latter stream, turned westwardly 
to trace its waters to their source in the close vicinity of the waters flowing into Puget Sound. 
Passing over the intermediate portion of the route, on the 17th of January he arrived within 
three or four miles of the Kle-allum lake, the source of one of the principal forks of the 
Yakima river. To this point he had travelled without difficulty with horses, and here 
commenced the most laborious part of the exploration. The snow was now about two feet 
deep, and the weather for several days had been intensely cold, although not colder than is 
experienced in all our northern States at this season. No grass could be obtained near here, 
, and the few Indians residing in the vicinity of the lake were without animals; but thirty miles 
lower down the river the snow was very light, not over three or four inches deep. The grass 
was good and exposed, and the Indian horses were in good condition. 
Although, with the disadvantages under which he was placed, he was satisfied that it d 
fair facilities both in ascent and descent for a wagon and railroad, either with the use of eighty 
