Three days were now spent in building canoes. On the twentieth the men had been two days without food, and the control that Clark maintained of these rude levies may be inferred from the fact that they still had the horses, which he did not propose to eat except in the last extremity. In the course of the day, they captured a boat containing five Frenchmen from Vincennes, and were cheered to learn that conditions in the town remained in the state described by the trader Vigo. In the evening a deer was caught, and the situation of the party was thereby materially improved. The following morning Clark ferried his troops across the river, but found it impossible to bring his horses any farther. The captive French were carried along, protesting that it was impossible for human beings to reach the town by way of the intervening submerged lands. But Clark was determined to go forward, and he led his men through the chill waters that often came up to their necks. Thus they advanced slowly and painfully for three miles, and at night camped upon a little knob of wet ground. The following morning the march was resumed, but some of the men had become too weak to walk and these were conveyed in the canoes. They now came to a stretch of land where the difficulties of wading were enhanced by the presence of thick bushes. This was passed after wearisome effort, but nightfall of the twenty-second found them still six miles from the fort. Most of the men had clearly approached the limits of their endurance, and it required all the encouragement of the leader to keep them up. In this he was materially aided by “a little antic drummer,” as he calls him in his memoir of the expedition. This youngster seemed to have the most buoyant spirits and with his merry quips and pranks made the men laugh in the midst of their misery. One of the officers closes the entry in his diary for this day with the words: “No provisions yet. Lord help us!” This night was bitterly cold. Half an inch of ice formed on the stagnant water. The miserable adventurers, with empty stomachs and drenched clothing, who cowered in the open, or moved about to keep their blood in circulation, suffered intensely. But the morning broke with a bright sun overhead, and with their leader’s assurance that the evening would see them at the goal for which they had striven so valiantly, the almost exhausted men steeled themselves to a final effort. And, indeed, they needed all the fortitude and determination that they could summon, for the final stage of the march proved to be the most trying of all.