JOURNAL OF E. WILLARD SMITH 273
the South Fork of the Platte, was very shallow and we pro- ceeded with difficulty, getting on sand bars every few minutes. We were obliged to wade and push the boat along most of the way for about three hundred miles, which we were forty- nine days traveling. We had to unload the boat several times a day when it was aground, which was very hard work.
May 8th. We saw the body of a Shoshonie squaw which had been placed on a scaffold in the top of a large tree on the bank of the river. This is the usual manner of disposing of the dead among these Indians.
On the 9th, 10th and llth the wind blew violently, accom- panied with heavy rain. We were unable to proceed. On the eleventh three Shian Indians came to us. They belonged to a party which had been out catching wild horses. They had suc- ceeded in taking two hundred. One hundred of them had died in a very severe storm a few days previous. The method adopt- ed by the Indians for catching them is as follows : An Indian mounts a fleet horse, having a rope twenty feet long, with a noose at the end, fastened to his saddle. He rides close to the animal he wishes to catch, and throws the noose, or lasso, over its head. The horse rinding the noose over his head, jumps, which chokes him and causes him to stop. As we found no buffalo, we had eaten all of the four hundred tongues we had brought.
On the 12th we killed the first buffalo we had seen since we left the fort.
On the 13th we arrived at the camp of the Shian Indians, the party mentioned before. They consisted of twenty-five men and boys and one squaw. They were headed by a chief called the Yellow Wolf. His brother was of the party having a name which signified in the Indian language Many Crows. We gave them some spirits, in exchange for a little meat, on which they became very much intoxicated.
On the 14th and for many days after we saw a great many dead buffalo calves strewed along the banks of the river. They were about a week old and must have been killed by some dis-
