Eager to learn everything regarding what they may encounter upriver, Lewis and Clark took time to question the three Frenchmen they passed who were working their way back to the French settlements. The three unnamed boatmen had spent the previous twelve months trapping in the area of the 'River of the Sioux' north of the Omaha Indian’s territory where they had exhausted their supplies and gunpowder. There they had accumulated pelts and furs which the captains valued at about $900. They were traveling in two 'Cajaux' which had been lashed together. To protect their value and to ease handling, trappers often pressed their furs and bundled them in deerhides which were then stitched together. The trapper standing in the bow is wearing a shirt made of indienne fabric or cotton fabric printed in the East Indies fashion. He has a Sioux sheath knife thrust into his sash. One of his companions is wearing the ever present capote while the other sports a tall red wool hat. To the east, beyond the keelboat and pirogues, early summer thunderheads are gathering on the horizon. An indication of the rain that was to fall later that afternoon.
