Weippe Prairie



When they came out of the Lolo Pass to open country they found a camp of Nez Perce Indians collecting Camas roots, a staple of their diet. The Nez Perce welcomed the near starved explorers with a feast of fish, bison meat, dried berries and camas roots, cooked various ways

		A field of Camas - Weippe Prairie
	There is a tradition among the Nez Perce Indians that when Lewis and Clark first visited, the Indians were inclined to kill the white men, -- a catastrophe which was averted by the influence of a woman in that tribe. She had been captured by hostile Indians, and carried into Manitoba, where some white people enabled her to escape; and finally she returned to her own tribe, although nearly dead from fatigue and privations. Hearing her people talk of killing the explorers, she urged them to do no harm to the white men, but to treat them with kindness and hospitality -- counsel which they followed.