On the 22nd Major Biddle experienced a severe attack of cramp in the stomach, but soon found some relief from swallowing a quantity of ginger, the only medicine with which they were provided. On the following day they entered the forests of the Missouri bottom, and soon after crossed the Tabeau, where a town of the same name, at that time containing two houses, had been established. Tabeau is the name of a Canadian hunter, who formerly frequented this region.[131] The creek is navigable to the site of the projected town, about one mile from the Missouri, having for this distance about six feet of water. Four miles from this place they crossed the Little Tabeau, and at evening pitched their tent on a stream called the Little Chenal au Barre, about a mile and a half from the Missouri. Here is a good mill seat. The Great and Little Chenal au Barre, are two creeks entering the Missouri about a mile and a half from each other. Before the mouths of these two creeks is a large island, the slough or Chenal dividing this island from the shore, received the additional name of Au Barre from a hunter known by that appellation, who was lost here for some time, successively ascending the two creeks, which he mistook for the Missouri; hence the name of Chenal au Barre island, Great and Little Chenal au Barre Creek, &c.[132] In the afternoon they halted to rest at the cabin of a hunter on Fire Prairie Creek, so called from the circumstance of three or four Indians having been burned to death by the sudden conflagration of the dry grass in the meadows at its source.[133] Here Mr. Say had an opportunity to examine a young black wolf, which was confined by a chain at the door of the hut. These animals are common in this part of the country. This individual was one of five that had been taken from the same den. It had become {96} familiar with the hunter and his family, but was shy towards strangers. When fed on meat the ferocity of his disposition manifested itself in attempts to bite the children. It was ordinarily fed on bread and milk. This man had been settled here two years, but had not "made a crop," having subsisted himself and his family by hunting, wherein he had been very successful. In the preceding autumn he had killed seventy deer and fifty bears. He took great pleasure in relating his hunting adventures, particularly his engagements with bears. One bear which he had killed, he said, weighed seven hundred pounds; but in this instance he was probably mistaken. He had seen in the winter of 1818, a large herd of bisons near the Grand Pass; but they had been driven down by the severity of the weather, and were not ordinarily to be found within the limits of his hunting excursions. During the severe wintry weather, he affirmed that bears make for themselves a shelter of brushwood, into which they creep to secure themselves from the cold.