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I deeply regret that I have had no opportunity of answering your very friendly letter in a manner that would be satisfactory to myself; neither can I now, owing to a want of time and a retired place, where I can write undisturbed.

You, no doubt, can fancy me seated in my small dwelling, at the dining table, attempting to write, while my youngest (sweet little urchin!) is pulling my pocket-handkerchief out of my pocket, and Henry Clay, my only son, is teasing me to pronounce a word he has found in his little spelling book. This done, a loud rap is heard at my door, and two or three of my Wyandott friends make their appearance, and are on some business. I drop my pen, dispatch the business, and resume it.

The country we explored is truly a land of savages. It is wild and romantic; it is a champaign, but beautifully undulated country. You can travel in some parts for whole days and not find timber enough to afford a riding swich, especially after you get off the Missouri and her principal tributary streams. The soil is generally a dark loam, but not of a durable kind for agriculture.--As a country for agricultural pursuits, it is far inferior to what it has been represented to be. It is deplorably defective in timber. There are millions of acres on which you cannot procure timber enough to make a chicken coop. Those parts that are timbered are on some of the principal streams emptying into the great Missouri, and are very broken, rough, and cut up with deep ravines; and the timber, what there is of it, is of an inferior quality, generally a small growth of white, black, and bur oaks; hickory, ash, buck-eye, mulberry, linwood, coffee bean, a low scrubby kind of birch, red and slippy elm, and a few scattering walnut trees. It is remarkable, in all our travels west of the Mississippi River, we never found even one solitary poplar, beech, pine, or sassafras tree, though we were informed that higher up the Missouri River, above Council Bluffs, pine trees abound to a great extent, especially the nearer you approach the Rocky Mountains. The immense country embraced between the western line of the state of Missouri, and the territory of Arkansas and the western base of the Rocky Mountains on the west, and Texas and Santafee on the south is inhabited by the Osage, Sioux (pronounced Sooz), Pawnees, Comanches, Pancahs, Arrapohoes, Assinaboins, Riccarees, Yanktons, Omahaws, Black-feet, Ottoes, Crow Indians, Sacs, Foxes, and Iowas; all a wild, fierce, and warlike people. West of the mountains reside the Flat-Heads, and many other tribes, whose names I do not now recollect.

I will here relate an anecdote, if I may so call it. Immediately after we landed in St. Louis, on our way to the west, I proceeded to Gen. Clark's, superintendent of Indian affairs, to present our letters of introduction from the secretary of war, and to receive the same from him to the different Indian agents in the upper country. While in his office and transacting business with him, he informed me that three chiefs from the Flat-Head nation were in his house, and were quite sick, and that one (the fourth) had died a few days ago. They were from the west of the Rocky Mountains. Couriosity prompted me to step into the adjoining room to see them, having never seen any, but often heard of them. I was struck by their appearance. They differ in appearance from any tribe of Indians I have ever seen: small in size, delicately formed, small limbs, and the most exact symmetry throughout, except the head. I had always supposed from their being called "Flat-Heads," that the head was actually flat on the top; but this is not the case. The head is flattened thus:

[In the article is a drawing submitted by Disoway of the "Flat-Head"].

From the point of the nose to the apex of the head, there is a perfect straight line, the protuberance of the forehead is flattened or levelled. You may form some idea of the shape of their heads from the rough sketch I have made with the pen, though I confess I have drawn most too long a proboscis for a flat-head. This is reproduced by a pressure upon the cranium while in infancy. The distance they had travelled on foot was nearly three thousand miles to see Gen. Clarke, their great father, as they called him, he being the first American officer they ever became acquainted with, and having much confidence in him, they had come to consult him as they said, upon very important matters. Gen. C. related to me the object of their mission, and, my dear friend, it is impossible for me to describe to you my feelings while listening to his narrative. I will here relate it as briefly as I well can. It appeared that some white man had penetrated into their country, and happened to be a spectator at one of their religious ceremonies, which they scrupulously perform at stated periods. He informed them that their mode of worshipping the supreme Being was radically wrong, and instead of being acceptable and pleasing, it was displeasing to him; he also informed them that the white people away toward the rising of the sun had been put in possession of the true mode of worshipping the great Spirit. They had a book containing directions how to conduct themselves in order to enjoy his favor and hold converse with him; and with this guide, no one need go astray, but every one that would follow the directions laid down there, could enjoy, in this life, his favor; and after death would be received into the country where the great Spirit resides, and live for ever with him.

Upon receiving this information, they called a national council to take this subject into consideration. Some said, if this be true, it is certainly high time we were put in possession of this mode, and if our mode of worshipping be wrong and displeasing to the great Spirit, it is time we had laid it aside, we must know something more about this, it is a matter that cannot be put off, the sooner we know it the better. They accordingly deputed four of their chiefs to proceed to St. Louis to see their great father, Gen. Clarke, to inquire of him, having no doubt but that he would tell them the whole truth about it.

They arrived at. St. Louis, and presented themselves to Gen. C. the latter was somewhat puzzled being sensible of the responsibility that rested on him; he however porceeded by informing them that what they had been told by the white man in their own country, was true. Then went into a succinct history of man, from his creation down to the advent of the Savioiur; explained to them all the moral precepts contained in the Bible, expounded to them the decalogue. Informed them of the advent of the Saviour, his life, precepts, his death, resurrection, ascension, and the relation he now stands to man as a mediator--that he will judge the world, & c.

Poor fellows, they were not all permitted to return hom to their people with the intelligence. Two died in St. Louis, and the remaining two, though somewhat indisposed, set out for their native land. Whether they reached home or not is not known. The change of climate and diet operated very severely upon their health. their diet when at home is chiefly vegetables and fish.

If they died on their way home, peace be to their manes (does it really say "manes?")! They died inquirers after the truth. I was informed that the Flat-Heads, as a nation, have the fewest vices of any tribe of Indians on the continent of America.

I had just concluded I would lay this rough and uncouth scroll aside and revise it before I owuld send it, but if I lay aside you will never receve it; so I will send it to you just as it is, 'with all its imperfections,' hoping that you may be able to decipher it. You are at liberty to make what use you please of it.

Yours in haste, Wm. Walker"

Wow! What a letter. We need to finish this set of essays with Disoway's interpretive letter "frame" which then appears after this letter of Walker. The next essay does that.

1990