North-West Comment of America, 



175 



river. He no sooner saw us than he gave the whoop, to 

 alarm his friends, who immediately appeared on the 

 bank, armed with bows and arrows, and spears. They 

 were thinly habited, and displayed the most outrageous 

 antics. Though they were certainly in a state of great 

 apprehension, they manifested by their gestures that they 

 were resolved to attack us, if we should venture to land. 

 I therefore ordered the men to stop the way of the canoe, 

 and even to check her drifting with the current, as it 

 would have been extreme folly to have approached these 

 savages before their, fury had in some degree subsided. 

 My interpreters, who understood their language, inform- 

 ed me that they threatened us with instant death if we 

 drew nigh the shore ; and they followed the menace by 

 discharging a volley of arrows, some of which fell short of 

 the canoe, and others passed over it, so that they fortu- 

 nately did us no injury. As we had been carried by the 

 current below the spot where the Indians were, I ordered 

 my people to paddle to the opposite side of the river, 

 without the least appearance of confusion, so that they 

 brought me abreast of them. My interpreters, while we 

 were within hearing, had done every thing in their power 

 to pacify them, but in vain. We also observed that they 

 had sent off a canoe with two men, down the river, as we 

 concluded, to communicate their alarm, and procure assist- 

 ance. This circumstance determined me to leave no means 

 untried, that might engage us in a friendly intercourse 

 with them, before they acquired additional security and 

 confidence, by the arrival of their relations and neigh- 

 bours, to whom their situation would be shortly notified. 



I therefore formed the following adventurous project, 

 which was happily crowned with success. I left the ca- 

 noe, and walked by myself along the beach, in order to 

 induce some of the natives to come to me, which I ima- 

 gined they might be disposed to do, when they saw me 

 alone, without any apparent possibility of receiving assist- 

 ance from my people, and would consequently imagine 

 that a communication with me was not a service of danger. 

 At the same time, in order to possess the utmost security 

 of which my situation was susceptible, I directed one of 

 the Indians to slip into the woods, with my gun and his 

 own, and to conceal himself from their discovery ; he also 

 had orders to keep as near me as possible, without being 

 seen \ and if any of the natives should venture across, and 



