A large double "steel trap" was next tried; this was profusely baited, and the whole, with the exception of the bait, was carefully concealed beneath the fallen leaves. This was also unsuccessful. Tracks of the anticipated victims were next day observed to be impressed in numbers on the earth near the spot, but still the trap, with its seductive charge, remained untouched. The bait was then removed from the trap, and suspended over it from the branch of a tree; several pieces of meat were also suspended in a similar manner, from trees in the vicinity; the following morning the bait over the trap alone remained. Supposing that their exquisite sense of smell warned them of the position of the trap, it was removed, and again covered with leaves, and the baits being disposed as before, the leaves to a considerable distance around were burned, and the trap remained perfectly concealed by ashes; still the bait over the trap was avoided. Once only this trap was sprung, and had fastened for a short time upon the foot of a species, which was shot the following day at no great distance; it proved to be a species distinct from the {155} prairie wolf, and we have described it under the name of C. nubilus. In no respect disheartened by these futile attempts, many times repeated, and varied in every obvious manner, another scheme was executed, which eventuated in complete success. This was the log trap, in which one log is elevated above another at one end, by means of an upright stick, which rests upon a rounded horizontal trigger stick, on the inferior log. The latrans does not diffuse the offensive odour, so remarkable in the two species of jackalls, (C. aureus and C. anthus) though in many respects it resembles those animals. Like the Mexicanus, the hair on the vertebral line is elongated; and we should be disposed to regard it as the same animal, but it differs from the description of that species, both in colour and physiognomy. The ears are proportionally longer than those of C. cancrivorus, and, as well as the tail, shorter than the corresponding parts of C. mesomelas. This animal, which does not seem to be known to naturalists, unless it should prove to be the Mexicanus, is most probably the original of the domestic dog, so common in the villages of the Indians of this region, some of the varieties of which still retain much of the habit and manners of this species. On the 14th of October, four hundred Omawhaw Indians assembled at Camp Missouri. Major O'Fallon addressed them in an appropriate speech, stating the reasons for their being called to council; upon which Ong-pa-ton-ga, the Big Elk,[191] arose, and after shaking by the hand each of the whites present, placed his robe of otter skins, and his mockasins under the feet of the agent, whom he addressed to the following effect, as his language was interpreted by Mr. Dougherty.