llages on the south and from the Omahas on the north and wept and wept there, until it came to be known as Nehawka, the Weeping Water.
July came and the waters were falling. With a fair wind, on the 21st they sailed past the mouth of the great river Platte. In the summer evening Lewis and Clark in their pirogue paddled up the Platte.
"Here I spen' two winter wit' de Otoe," said Drouillard the hunter. "De Otoe were great nation, but de Sioux an' de 'Maha drove dem back on de Pawnee."
"And the Pawnees?"
"Dey built villages an' plant corn an' wage war wid de Osage."
Ten days later preparations were made to meet the Otoes at Council Bluffs. On a cottonwood pole the flag was flying. A great feast was ready, when afar off, Drouillard and Cruzatte were seen approaching with their friends.
"Boom," went the blunderbuss, and the council smoke arose under an awning made of the mainsail of the bateau. Every man of the expedition, forty-five in all, paraded in his best uniform.
Lewis talked. Clark talked. All the six chiefs expressed satisfaction in the change of government. They begged to be remembered to their Great Father, the President, and asked for mediation between them and the Omahas.
"What is the cause of your war?"
"We have no horses," answered the childlike Otoes. "We borrow their horses. Then they scalp us. We fear the Pawnees also. We very hungry, come to their village when they are hunting, take a little corn!"
The Captains could scarce repress a smile, nor yet a tear. Thefts, reprisals, midnight burnings and slaughter, this was the reign immemorial in this land of anarchy. In vain the tribes might plant,—never could they reap. "We poor Indian," was the universal lament.
Severely solemn, Lewis and Clark hung medals on the neck of each chief, and gave him a paper with greetings from Thomas Jefferson with the seals of Lewis and
