JOURNAL OF A VOYAGE THROUGH THE

We landed fhortly after where there were two more lodges, which

Les were full of fifth, but without any inhabitants, who were probably with

the natives whom we had juft left. My Indians, in rummaging thefe
‘places, found feveral articles which they propofed to take; I therefore
gave beads and awls, to be left as the purchafe of them; but this
aét of juftice they were not able to comprehend, as the people them-
felves were not prefent. I took up a net and left a large knife in the
place of it. It was about four fathoms long, and thirty-two mefhes in
depth: thefe nets are much more convenient to fet in the eddy current
than our long ones. This is the place that the Indians call a rapid
though we went up it all the way with the paddle; fo that the current
could not be fo {trong here, as in many other parts of the river; indeed
if it were fo, the difficulty of towing would be almoft infuperable, as in
many parts the rocks, which are of a great height and rather proje&
over the water, leave no fhore between them and the ftream. Thefe
precipices abound in fwallows’ nefts. The weather was now very |
fultry, and at eleven we were under the neceflity of landing to gum our

canoe.

In about an hour we fet forward, and at one in the afternoon,
went on fhore at a fire, which we fuppofed to have been kindled by the
young men, who, as we had been already informed, were hunting geele.
Our hunters found their canoe and the fowl they had got, fecreted in
the woods ; and foon after, the people themfelves, whom they brought to
the waterfide. Out of two hundred geéfe we picked thirty-fix which
-were eatable; the reft were putrid and emitted an horrid ftench. They .

-had been killed fome time without having been gutted, and in this ftate

of