Lewis: March 28, 1806

Friday, March 28th, 1806. This morning we set out very early, and at 9 A.M. we arrived at the old Indian village on the larboard side of Deer Island, where we found that our hunters had stopped and left one man with the two canoes at their camp. They had arrived last evening at this place, and six of them set out to hunt very early this morning. By 10 A.M. they had all returned to camp, having killed seven deer. These were all of the common fallow deer with the long tail. I measured the tail of one of these bucks, which was upwards of 17 inches long. They are very poor, though they are better than the black-tailed fallow deer of the coast. These are two very distinct species of deer. The Indians call this large island E-lal-lar, or Deer Island, which is a very appropriate name. The hunters informed us that they had seen upwards of a hundred deer this morning on this island. The interior part of the island is prairies and ponds, with a heavy growth of cottonwood, ash, and willow near the river.

We have seen more waterfowl on this island than we have previously seen since we left Fort Clatsop, consisting of geese, ducks, large swan, and sandhill cranes. I saw a few of the canvasback duck. The mallards are the most abundant. One of the hunters killed a duck which appeared to be the male; it was a size smaller than the mallard. The head and neck, as low as the crop, and the back, tail, and coverts of the wings were of a fine black with a small admixture of purple about the head and neck. The belly and breast were white. Some long feathers which lie underneath the wings and cover the thigh were of a pale dove color with fine black specks. The large feathers of the wings are of a dove color. The legs are dark, and the feet are composed of 4 toes each, of which there are three in front connected by a web; the 4th is short, flat, and placed high on the heel behind the leg. The tail is composed of 14 short pointed feathers. The beak of this duck is remarkably wide, and is 2 inches in length. The upper mandible exceeds the lower one in both length and width, so much so that when the beak is closed the lower is entirely concealed by the upper. The tongue, the indentation of the margin of the mandibles, etc., are like those of the mallard. The nostrils are large, longitudinal, and connected. A narrow strip of white garnishes the upper part or base of the upper mandible; this is followed by a pale sky-blue color which occupies about one inch of the mandible, is again followed by a transverse stripe of white, and the extremity is of a pure black. The eye is moderately large; the pupil is black and the iris is a fine orange yellow. The feathers on the crown of the head are longer than those on the upper part of the neck and other parts of the head; these feathers give it the appearance of being crested.

At half after ten A.M. it became fair, and we had the canoes that needed repair hauled out, and with the assistance of fires which we had kindled for the purpose, we dried them sufficiently to receive the pitch, which was immediately put on them. At 3 in the evening we had them complete and again launched and reloaded. We should have set out, but as some of the party whom we had permitted to hunt since we arrived have not yet returned, we determined to remain this evening and dry our bedding, baggage, etc., the weather being fair.

Since we landed here we were visited by a large canoe with ten natives of the Quathlahpahtle nation, who are numerous and reside about seventeen miles above us on the larboard side of the Columbia, at the entrance of a small river. They do not differ much in their dress from those lower down and speak nearly the same language; it is in fact the same with a small difference of accent.

We saw a great number of snakes on this island. They were about the size and much the form of the common garter snake of the Atlantic coast, and like that snake, are not poisonous. They have 160 scuta on the abdomen and 71 on the tail. The abdomen near the head, and the jaws as high as the eyes, are of a bluish white, which as it recedes from the head becomes a dark brown. The field of the back and sides is black. A narrow stripe of light yellow runs along the center of the back, and on each side of this stripe there is a range of small transverse oblong spots of a pale brick red, which gradually diminish as they recede from the head and disappear at the beginning of the tail. The pupil of the eye is black, with a narrow ring of white bordering its edge; the balance of the iris is of a dark yellowish brown.

The men who had been sent after the deer returned and brought in the remnant which the vultures and eagles had left us; these birds had devoured 4 deer in the course of a few hours. The party killed and brought in three other deer, a goose, some ducks, and an eagle. Drewyer also killed a tiger cat. Joseph Fields informed me that the vultures had dragged a large buck which he had killed about 30 yards, had skinned it, and had broken the backbone. We came only five miles today.