In the
meantime, in order to lighten our burdens as much as possible, we
determined to deposit here one of the pirogues, and all the heavy
baggage which we could possibly spare, as well as some provision, salt,
powder, and tools. This would at once lighten the other boats, and give
them the crew which had been employed on board the pirogue."
On the tenth of June, the weather being fair and pleasant, they dried
all their baggage and merchandise and secreted them in places of
deposits, called caches, as follows:--
"These deposits--or caches, as they are called by the Missouri
traders--are very common, particularly among those who deal with the
Sioux, as the skins and merchandise will keep perfectly sound for years,
and are protected from robbery. Our cache was built in the usual manner.
In the high plain on the north side of the Missouri, and forty yards
from a steep bluff, we chose a dry situation, and then, describing a
small circle of about twenty inches diameter, removed the sod as gently
and carefully as possible: the hole was then sunk perpendicularly for
a foot deep. It was now worked gradually wider as it descended, till at
length it became six or seven feet deep, shaped nearly like a kettle,
or the lower part of a large still with the bottom somewhat sunk at the
centre. As the earth was dug it was handed up in a vessel, and carefully
laid on a skin or cloth, in which it was carried away and thrown into
the river, so as to leave no trace of it.
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