The fleas, with whom we had contracted an intimacy at the falls, are so unwilling to leave us, that the men are obliged to throw off all their clothes, in order to relieve themselves from their persecution. Sunday 27. The wind was high from the westward during last night and this morning, but the weather being fair we continued our celestial observations. The two chiefs who remained with us, were joined by seven Indians, who came in a canoe from below. To these men we were very particular in our attentions; we smoked and eat with them; but some of them who were tempted by the sight of our goods exposed to dry, wished to take liberties with them; to which we were under the necessity of putting an immediate check: this restraint displeased them so much, that they returned down the river in a very ill humour. The two chiefs however remained with us till the evening, when they crossed the river to their party. Before they went we procured from them a vocabulary of the Echeloot, their native language, and on comparison were surprised at its difference from that of the Eneeshur tongue. In fact although the Echeloots, who live at the great narrows, are not more than six miles from the Eneeshurs or residents at and above the great falls, the two people are separated by a broad distinction of language. The Eneeshurs are understood by all the tribes residing on the Columbia, above the falls; but at that place they meet with the unintelligible language of the Echeloots, which then descends the river to a considerable distance. Yet the variation may possibly be rather a deep shade of dialect than a radical difference, since among both many words are the same, and the identity cannot be accounted for by supposing that their neighbourhood has interwoven them into their daily conversations, because the same words are equally familiar among all the Flathead bands which we have passed. To all these tribes too the strange clucking or guttural noise which first struck us is common. They also flatten the heads of the children in nearly the same manner, but we now begin to observe that the heads of the males, as well as of the other sex, are subjected to this operation, whereas among the mountains the custom has confined it almost to the females. The hunters brought home four deer, one grouse, and a squirrel.