appear, victims of vice and malady, tinder the rapacious influence of modern civilization.
route from the great Kalispel lake to the `lot country is across dense forests and much obstructed by fallen trees, morasses, frightful sloughs, from which the poor horses with mach difficulty extricate themselves; but having finally surmounted all these obstacles, we contemplate from an eminence a smiling and accessible valley, whose mellow and abundant verdure is nourished by two lovely lakes, where the graceful Kootenai river winds in such fantastic beauty, that it serves, to make the weary traveler not only forget his past dangers, but amply compensates him for the fatigues of a long and tiresome journey.
This section of the valley of Arcs-A-plats greatly resembles the two valleys of the Cceur d'Alenes; same fertility of soil, lakes, pastures, willow and pine groves; elevated mountains covered to the very summit with dense forests of trees, low rinds, in which this towering cedar displays all its majesty and splendid foliage; and, as Racine says :
" Elevent aux cieux
Leurs fronts audacieuxl ! »
The river is, in this place, deep and tranquil moving along with a tardy pace until aroused from its in ertness by the universal thaw; it then descends with such astounding impetuosity that it destroys the banks, and in its furious course uproots and bears along trees, fragments of rocks, ctc., which vainly oppose its passage. In a few days the entire valley is overflows lakes and morasses,
tl it presents to view immense by borders of trees. Thus
dj>es tl e kind Providence of Cod assist his poor creatures Nvlio inhabit these reuions. by the liberality with ,vlncli lie ministers to their wants. These lakes and morasses, formed in tltc spring, are filled with fish; they retnaiti there inclosed 'is in natural reservoirs, for the use of the hthabitants. The fish sivarni in such abundance that the Indians, have no other labor than to take them from the water and prepare thern