ear this ridge of rocks, which serves as a
barrier to defend a small plain of about three acres, shaded with
cottonwood; at the lower extremity of which is a grove of the same
trees, where are several Indian cabins of sticks; below which the river
is divided by a large rock, several feet above the surface of the water,
and extending down the stream for twenty yards. At the distance of three
hundred yards from the same ridge is a second abutment of solid
perpendicular rock, about sixty feet high, projecting at right angles
from the small plain on the north for one hundred and thirty-four yards
into the river. After leaving this the Missouri again spreads itself to
its previous breadth of three hundred yards, though with more than its
ordinary rapidity....

_June 14._--This morning one of the men was sent to Captain Clarke with
an account of the discovery of the Falls; and, after employing the rest
in preserving the meat which had been killed yesterday, Captain Lewis
proceeded to examine the rapids above. From the Falls he directed his
course southwest up the river. After passing one continued rapid and
three cascades, each three or four feet high, he reached, at a distance
of five miles, a second fall. The river is here about four hundred yards
wide, and for the distance of three hundred rushes down to the depth of
nineteen feet, and so irregularly that he gave it the name of the
Crooked Falls. From the southern shore it extends obliquely upward about
one hundred and fifty yards, and then forms an acute angle downward
nearly to the commencement of four small islands close to the northern
side. From the perpendicular pitch to these islands, a distance of more
than one hundred yards, the water glides down a sloping rock with a
velocity almost equal to that of its fall; above this fall the river
bends suddenly to the northward.

While viewing this place, Captain Lewis heard a loud roar above him,
and, crossing the point of a hill a few hundred yards, he saw one of the
most beautiful objects in nature: the whole Missouri is suddenly stopped
by one shelving rock, which, without a single niche, and with an edge
as straight and regular as if formed by art, stretches itself from one
side of the river to the other for at least a quarter of a mile. Over
this it precipitates itself in an even, uninterrupted sheet, to the
perpendicular depth of fifty feet, whence, dashing against the rocky
bottom, it rushes rapidly down, leaving be