Volume 1

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SOUTH TO THE COTEAU DU MISSOURI. 315
the high banks of the river, directing our course S. My
horse had made so many blisters under my thighs that I
was obliged to exchange with one of my people for one that
would carry me more easily. Soon after getting up the
high banks we fell into a rougher country than we had seen
before, up steep hills and down low valleys in continual
succession. We crossed three small rivers^' that came
from the S. W. and emptied into Riviere la Souris ; along
those rivers we saw fresh vestiges of beaver, and I suppose
they are numerous. The hills are covered with huge stones
there is no wood of any kind. We passed several lakes
among the hills, from one to five miles in circumference,
with gravelly and sandy shores.
At one of these delightful lakes we stopped a couple of
hours, but found the water very bad, of a sulphurous taste
and smell. Here we killed a very fat bull ; the back-fat
or depouille was two inches thick. The cows often have
depouille of this thickness, and some even three inches
but this is rare, the common condition being from one to
two inches. Bulls seldom have much depouille
;
their fat
is principally inside the animal. The one we killed would
have produced nearly a hundredweight of tallow from his
inside alone.
At one o'clock we saddled and proceeded.
Soon coming
to the top of a high hill, we perceived a long lake to the
S. W., running N. and S., with a cluster of wood at the N.
extremity ; this surprised our guide, who said he never
^' The largest of these being Riviere des Lacs, already noted, and the others
being two of the numerous coulees or washes which make down from the
Coteau du Missouri to Des Lacs and Mouse rs., from the W. and S. \V.
These may be perfectly dry, but in such a wet season as Henry's was would
run water. In striking southward for the Coteau Henry crosses the line of the
Grt. Nor. Ry. in the vicinity of Des Lacs sta., or rather a little W. of this,
nearer Lone Tree and Berthold sta. He at once gets into rough, hilly country,
the beginning of the higher ground which forms the ridge of the Coteau
and bluffs back of Mouse r. from its southerly course, causing this stream
to loop E. and then N., and thus forming that bight which is so remarkable a
feature of the stream. Henry continues in Ward Co. until he is fairly over the
Coteau, and then enters Stevens Co.