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A “Lussious” Fish
 n February 25, 1806, Meriwether Lewis recorded that the Clatsop Indian chief, Coboway, came to the fort to sell some hats, some sturgeon, and "a [species of small fish which now begin to run, and are taken in great quantities . . . by means of skiming or scooping nets." On the same page, he wrote, "I have drawn the likeness of them as large as life." His specimen, then, was approximately 8-1/8 inches long — average for eulachons, which seldom exceed 10 inches. He modestly added, "It [is] as perfect as I can make it with my pen," Lewis protested modestly, "and will serve to give a general idea of the fish."
Eulachon
Thaleichthys pacificus 
Drawing by Meriwether Lewis
Codex J, p. 93, February 24, 1806
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Perfect enough, it seems, for an amateur! Of course, in those days long before the camera took over the responsibility for illustration, every gentleman's education included at least the rudiments of freehand drawing. Lewis, it appears, was rather skillful at it when he wanted to be. Lewis places each stroke with an unerring sense of weight, shading, spacing, boundary, and proportion. There is scarcely a blemish, nary a blotch. Notice the three-dimensional quality of the body, the details of the gill, and the textures in the tailfins. Patience, patience! Lewis's words paint the colors that elude his pen. | . . . the back is of a bluish duskey colour and that of the lower part of the sides and belley is of a silvery white. . . . the first bone of the gills next behind the eye is of a bluish cast, and the second of a light goald colour nearly white. |
Of course, he tastes it, too. "I find them best when cooked in Indian stile," wrote Lewis, | which is by roasting a number of them together on a wooden spit without any previous preperation whatever. They are so fat they require no additional sauce, and I think them superior to any fish I ever tasted, even more delicate and lussious than the white fish of the [Great?] lakes which have heretofore formed my standart of excellence among the fishes. |
"The natives," Lewis sniffed, "do not appear to be very scrupelous about eating them when a little feated." He meant fetid — rotten-smelling. --Joseph Mussulman 1. Lewis and Clark may also have used quill pens, carved from the wing feathers of geese. Metal nibs for pen shafts of wood were introduced in the early 18th century, although they did not become widely used until around the middle of the nineteenth century. The earliest. made of steel, were short-lived because they rusted quickly. Lewis purchased a supply of brass nibs, which served well. Funded in part by a grant from the National Park Service's Challenge Cost Share Program.
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