526 
FROM BITTER ROOT VALLEY TO FLATHEAD LAKE AND KOOTENAY RIVER. 
us and our shore of destination, and two miles from the point whence we started. We fired our 
pistols to let the remainder of the party know that we were still alive, who having already become 
alarmed for our safety, had ridden many miles down the stream in quest of us, but could not find 
us. Here Mr. Adams swam the stream, and, naked and barefooted as he was, made his way 
through bushes, briars, and fallen timber to our camp, a mile distant. In two hours, with the aid of 
horses, we were relieved from our most unenviable situation, but succeeded in having everything 
that was saved thoroughly wet. We wrnre rejoiced at finding the whole party thus saved from 
an untimely end, and with one accord were willing to remember the crossing of the Hell Gate 
river. 
Early on the morning of the fifth of May we resumed our march for the Cantonment, where 
we arrived during the evening, thus completing a short but eventful trip. 
Taking now a retrospective view of the country travelled over towards the north, from the 
Flathead lake, we see that, with but few spots, the country is an immense, dense pine forest, soil 
exceedingly poor ; nothing growing, save a small running vine called “ scole-say.” This charac¬ 
terizes the country to the summit of the ridge of mountains dividing the waters of the Clark’s 
fork from those of the Kootenay river. Here the character of the Kootenay is materially changed; 
the timber that is found being much larger, consequently is more scattered, and the section 
immediately bordering the river being a rolling prairie, soil fertile, and an abundance of rich and 
nutritious grass being found. 
Returning from the Kootenay river by a more western route, our road lay over a succession of 
mountain chains, which formed belts, or girdles, with small patches of prairie intervening. Being 
by nature thus formed, there is no possibility of any large tributary to either the Kootenay river 
or the Clark’s fork flowing from them ; but, on the contrary, the waters from the numerous springs, 
and the melting of the snows, are all received in small lakes at their bases. The soil in these 
prairies is very excellent, and they alone afford sufficient grass for the animals that travel over 
this secluded and little frequented region. These lakes abound in fish, and large flocks of water- 
fowl of every kind are here found. In the mountains are found game, and many roots, upon 
which the Indians subsist, so that this section has some redeeming characteristics, nevertheless. 
The mountains are all pine-clad, and many of the higher peaks are covered with snow throughout 
every season. Supposing for a moment that there existed a practicable pass through the mount¬ 
ains to the east of Clark’s fork, the natural formation here found would preclude the possibility of 
a road to the Pacific; for, from the Clark’s fork north of the Flathead lake, as far as I examined 
westward, the country is formed of one immense belt of mountains extending many miles in 
either direction, compelling a detour to be made along the Clark’s fork. A detour from the route 
along the high table-land north of the Missouri is, therefore, inevitable; but the section already 
examined to the east of the main chain of the Rocky mountains is by far more feasible, by far 
more practicable, than that to the west of the mountains along the Clark’s fork. This is only on 
the supposition that a practicable route exists across the range of mountains to the east of Clark’s 
fork; but this chain having already been examined by one of the civil engineers of the expedition, 
and pronounced impracticable, loses all of its worth. 
Having now examined the mountains from the 43d to the 49th parallel of latitude, extending 
from Fort Hall to our northern boundary, I can most unhesitatingly affirm, that the Hell Gate 
defile is the only one in this section that leads to the passes in the main chain of the mountains 
that are practicable either for a railroad or wagon route. This defile leads to six passes in the 
mountains; four of which have already been examined by your parties, and the remaining two yet 
remain to be examined—one with a view to shorten a route already known to be practicable, and 
the second the solving of a new problem of a route the eastern portions of which must necessarily 
lie more to the south than that already known to exist, from the head of steam navigation on the 
Mississippi to this defile. The connecting links to either one of these chains, westward, must, 
