map, there on the sand at the Boat Encampment, showed me that he was
perfectly accurate, and that he knew the places of all the streams and
rapids. So I feel no fear about our getting down the Big Bend from
here with him as our guide. I'll warrant that Leo can draw a map of
the river from here to Revelstoke as accurately as any professional
map-maker, and name every stream and tell every rapid all the way
down. In short, we furnish the grub and Leo furnishes the experience."
"We'll not furnish grub much longer," said Moise. "The flour she's
getting mighty low, and not much pork now, and the tea she's 'bout
gone."
"Well, what could you expect?" said Uncle Dick. "With three Injuns and
an engineer to eat, we ought to have an extra boat to carry the
grub--not to mention John, here, who is hungry all the time. We may
have to eat our moccasins yet, young men."
"Leo says we can't get any fish yet," said John, "and we're not to
stop for any more bear meat, even if we could eat it. We're not apt to
get any grub right along the river either. I don't see how any one can
hunt in this awful forest. It's always cold and dark, and there
doesn't seem to be anything to eat there. Rob and I measured some
trees by stretching out our arms, and we figured that they were thirty
feet or more around, some of them. And one log we walked which paced
over three hundred feet--it was so thick we couldn't crawl over it at
all. That's no sort of place to hunt."
"No, not for anything unless it was a porcupine," said Uncle Dick. "We
may have to come to that. But even with a little grub we can last for
a hundred miles or so, can't we? Can't we make forty or fifty miles a
day, Leo?"
Leo laughed and shook his head. "Some day not make more than ten or
twelve mile," said he.
"Well, I know that there's a good deal of slack water for quite a way
below here. At least, I have heard that that is the case. So for a
time, if we don't meet bad head-winds, we can put a good deal of this
country back of us."
"Could any one walk along these banks and get out to the settlements
at all if he were left alone in here?" inquired Rob.
"One can do a great deal if he has to," said Uncle Dick. "But I hope
none of us will ever have to try to make the railroad on foot from
here. There isn't any trail, and very often the banks are sheer rock
faces running into the river. Get behind such a hill, and you're on
another slope, and the first thing you know you're clear away from the
river and all tangled up. But, still, men have come up here one way
or another. On the other side, there used to be a sort of pack-horse
trail from Revelstoke up to the Selkirk gold-mines. There are two or
three creeks which are still worked along the Big Bend of the
Columbia. When we engineers have all done our work it will be easier
to get in here than it is to-day."
"Well, I'm going to be an engineer some day," said Rob, firmly, once
more. "I like this work."
"Well, you're all going to bed now at once," said Uncle Dick. "We must
hurry on down to-morrow, for, unless I am mistaken, this roily water
of the Canoe means that the spring rise has begun earlier than it
should."
XXVI
DOWN THE COLUMBIA
They did hurry to embark on the next morning, and, as Uncle Dick had
predicted, for many miles the river was much more mild, although the
current was steady and strong. They had run perhaps four hours when
they came to the mouth of a creek which Leo and George said was called
either Nagel Creek or End Creek, they did not know which. They went
ashore for a time at a little unfinished log cabin which had been
started perhaps two years before by some unknown person or persons.
"That way," said Leo, "up creek ten mile, fine bear country; plenty
caribou too. S'pose we hunt?"
"Certainly not," said Uncle Dick. "It would take us a day to hunt and
another day to get back. What do you say about that, boys?"
"Well," said Rob, "of course we'd like to hunt a little more, but I
don't myself much like the thought of walking out of this country with
a pack on my back and nothing to eat but a little flour. Besides, I've
a feeling that this river is rising all the time now."
"She'll rise five inch last night," said Moise. "I'll mark heem on the
stick."
"Yes," said Uncle Dick, "the June rise is going to chase us out,
that's sure. All those great snow-fields which you see up there on the
Selkirks and the Rockies have got to melt and come right down here
where our boat is now. So, Leo, you and George go on ahead--we'll run
late to-night and make forty miles to-day, at least, if we can. How
far are we from Revelstoke?"
"S'pose 'bout hunderd mile," said Leo. "Long way."
"Not long if it was all clear water like this. But it isn't. A
pack-train on an unknown trail is one thing, but a boat on an unknown
river is something mighty different. As I've told you, every foot of
rise changes the river absolutely in the narrows. Therefore all I can
allow you for lunch to-day is a piece of bannock--and we'll eat that
as we run."
They found milder water now for twenty-five miles, and made steady
progress. The wind had shifted a little bit, and Rob managed to get
assistance out of it by rigging a sail from a corner of the tent. This
brought the lead-boat ahead so steadily that Leo and George protested
and made Rob take down his sail. But soon the long reach of slack
water was passed. More and more they could hear, coming up-stream from
perhaps a mile ahead, the low, sullen roar of rapids.
The water began to set faster and faster, and seemed each mile to
assume more and more malicious habits. Great boils, coming up from
some mysterious depth, would strike the boat as though with a mighty
hammer so hard as to make the boys look around in consternation. At
times they could see the river sink before them in a great slide, or
basin, a depression perhaps two hundred feet across, with white water
at its edges. Deep boils and eddies came up every now and then without
warning, and sometimes the boat would feel a wrench, as though with
some mighty hand thrust up from the water. Their course was hardly
steady for more than a moment or so at a time, and the boats required
continual steering. In fact, it seemed to them that never was there a
stream so variable and so unaccountable as this they were now
descending.
"She's worse than the Peace River, a whole lot," said Rob; and all the
boys agreed with him. In fact, by this time all of them were pretty
well sobered down now, for they could see that it was serious work
which lay ahead of them. Now and again Uncle Dick would see the boys
looking at the black forests which covered these slopes on each side
of the river, foaming down between the Selkirks and the Rockies.
Late in the afternoon they passed a little settlement of a few cabins,
where a discolored stream came down into the river through a long
sluice-box whose end was visible.
"This Howard's camp," shouted Leo. "Them mans wash gold here. Some
mans live there now."
Two or three men indeed did come to the bank and wave an excited
greeting as the boats swept by. But there was no going ashore, for
directly at this place a stretch of rapids demanded the attention of
every one in the boats.
And still Uncle Dick urged the Indians of the first boat to go on as
far as they could that night. They ran until almost dark, and made
camp on the top of a high bank on the left side of the river where
once an old lumber camp had been. Here they found the breeze good and
the mosquito nuisance much diminished.
"How far now to Revelstoke, Leo?" inquired Uncle Dick, as they sat at
their frugal supper that night.
"Maybe-so forty mile, maybe-so sixty," said Leo.
"Can we make it in one day?"
Leo shook his head soberly.
"Two days?"
Leo shook his head.
"Three days?"
"Maybe-so," said he, at last. "Plenty bad water below here," said he.
"Well, I haven't seen any of these awful canyons yet that you've been
telling about," said John.
Leo smiled. "To-morrow see 'um plenty," said he. "Pretty soon come
Death Eddy, then Death Canyon, then Death Rapids, then Priest Rapids.
All them bad places. Maybe-so can't run, water too high."
"We'll not get out of here any too soon, that's sure," said Uncle
Dick. "The best time to run any of these mountain rivers is in the
fall, for then the water is lowest. But a day or two more will tell
the tale for us. So, Moise, please don't starve us any more than you
have to--I could eat a whole porcupine now myself if I had one."
That night at the fireside Uncle Dick saw the boys bending over close
together, and looked at them curiously, for they seemed to be writing.
"What's up, young men?" said he.
"Well, we're making our wills," said Rob. "We haven't got much to give
to anybody, of course, but you know, in case of any accident, we
thought the folks ought to know about it. Not that we're afraid. I was
just thinking that so many people were lost here that never were heard
of again."
Uncle Dick did not smile at Rob's frank confession, but liked the boys
all the more for it.
"Well," said he, "that's all right, too. I'm willing to admit that
when I ran the Rock Canyon above the Boat Encampment last year I did a
little writing myself and put it in my pocket, and I tied one leg to
the boat with a rope, too. But please don't be too much alarmed over
anything we've said, for if the canyons should prove too bad we will
line down with the boat; and if we can't line down, then we will all
take to the woods."
None the less, the boys were all very quiet that night and slept but
little.
"I don't like that water at all," whispered Jesse to John. "You can
hear it growling and groaning all night long, as though it were
gnashing its teeth--I don't like it at all."
And, indeed, even on top of their high bank they could hear the
strange noises that come up always from the Columbia River when the
high water is on. The stream where they were encamped was several
hundred yards in width, but now the run-off waters of the mighty
snow-sheds were making the river each day more and more a torrent,
full of danger even for experienced men.
XXVII
ON THE RAPIDS
It was cool that night, almost cool enough for frost, and the morning
was chill when they rolled out of their blankets. A heavy mist rose
from over the river, and while this obtained Leo refused to attempt to
go on. So they lost a little time after breakfast before the sun had
broken up the mist enough to make it safe to venture on the river.
They were off at about nine o'clock perhaps, plunging at once into
three or four miles of very fast water.
The boats now kept close together, and at times they landed, so that
their leaders could go ahead and spy out the water around the bend. In
making these landings with heavy boats, as the boys observed, the men
would always let the stern swing around and then paddle up-stream, so
that the landing was made with the bow up-stream. The force of the
river would very likely have capsized the boat if a landing were
attempted with the bow down-stream. "Just like a steamboat-landing,"
said Jesse.
Leo himself was now very alert. He did not say a word to anybody, but
kept his eyes on ahead as though he felt himself to be the responsible
man of the party. Certainly he took every precaution and proved
himself a wonderful riverman. But he seemed puzzled at last as, when
they landed upon a beach, he turned toward Uncle Dick.
"Me no understand!" said he. "Death Eddy up there, but no see 'um!"
"What do you mean, Leo?"
"Well, Death Eddy up there, and we come through, but no see 'um! I
s'pose maybe high water has change'. I go look ahead."
He went down the stream for a little way until he could see into the
next bend, but came back shaking his head.
"No can make that canyon," said he. "Water she's too high--bad, very
bad in there now. Must line down."
"What place did you call this, Leo?" inquired Uncle Dick.
"Call 'um Methodist Canyon. Low water she's all right, now she's bad."
"Out you go, boys," said Uncle Dick. "We've got to line through. How
far, Leo?"
"Maybe-so one mile," rejoined the Indian. "S'pose low water, we paddle
through here all right!"
Uncle Dick sighed. "Well, I hate to take the time, but I suppose
that's what we'll have to do. You boys go on along the shore the best
you can, while we let the boats down."
The boys struggled up now on the side of the shelving beach, which was
nothing but a mass of heavy rock that had rolled down from the
mountainsides. It was a wild scene enough, and the roar of the waters
as they crashed through this narrow pass added to the oppressive
quality of it.
After a time the water became so bad even close to shore that it was
impossible to let the boat down on the line without danger of swamping
it. So each boat was lifted out bodily and carried out along the beach
for two or three hundred yards until it was safe to launch it again.
Part of the time the men were in and part of the time out of the
water, guiding the boats among the boulders which lay along the edge.
To make a mile at this work took as much time as twenty miles had the
day before, and they were glad enough when Moise proposed to boil the
kettle. They did this just above the head of Death Rapids, in a very
wild and beautiful spot. Just across the river from them they could
see a beautiful cascade some two or three hundred feet in height, and
they christened this the Lottie Falls, after a sister of Uncle Dick,
which name it has to-day. Now and again the boys would look down the
raging stream ahead of them, wondering that any man should ever have
tried to run such a rapid.
"Hunderd sixty men drown right here, so they say," commented Leo. He
pointed out to them the most dangerous part of the Death Rapids, where
the strong current, running down in a long V, ended at the foot of the
rapids in a deep, back-curving roller or "cellar-door" wave, sure to
swamp any boat or to sweep over any raft.
"S'pose raft go through there, round bend," said Leo, "it must go down
there in that big wave. Then her nose go under wave, and raft she
sink, and all mans come off in the water. No can swim. No can hang on
raft. Many men drowned there. Plenty Chinaman he'll get drowned there,
time my father was young man. Chinaman no can swim, no can paddle, no
can ron on land--no good. All he do is drown."
"Well, one thing is sure," said Uncle Dick. "I'll not try that rapid,
even with our boats, to-day. We'll just line on down past here."
"Plenty glad we didn't stop hunt grizzlum no more," said Leo. "She's
come up all day long."
Soon they resumed their slow progress, letting the boats down, foot by
foot, along the shore, usually three or four men holding to the one
line, and then returning for the other boat after a time. Moise did
not like this heavy work at all.
"This boat she's too big," said he. "She pull like three, four oxens.
I like small little canoe more better, heem."
"Well," said Rob, "you can't get a boat that looks too big for me in
here. Look over there at that water--where would any canoe be out
there?"
Thus, with very little actual running, and with the boys on foot all
the way, they went on until at length they heard coming up from below
them the roar of a rapid which sounded especially threatening.
"Priest Rapids!" said Leo. "And he's bad this time too."
"Why do they call this the Priest Rapids, Leo?" inquired Rob.
"I don' know," said Leo.
"That's a fact," added uncle Dick. "No one seems to know why these
were called the Priest Rapids. Perhaps because a priest read the
burial service over some of the voyageurs here. Perhaps because a
priest was saved here, or drowned here--no one seems to know."
They had called a halt here while Leo and Moise walked up on the bank
to reach a higher point of view. The boys could see them now,
gesticulating and pointing out across the river. Presently they joined
the others.
"She's too bad for ron this side," said Moise, "but over on other
side, two-third way across, is place where mans can get through. No
can line on this side--rock, she come straight down on the river."
"Well," said Uncle Dick, "here is a pretty kettle of fish! I don't
like the looks of this in the least. I'm not going to try to take
these boys through that rapid over there. Are you sure you can't line
down on this side?"
"No can walk," said Leo, "no can ron this side. Other side only place
for to go through. She's pretty bad, but maybe-so make 'um."
"Well, I'm not going to let the boys try it," said Uncle Dick. "Now
see here, young men, I'll tell you what you have got to do. You see
that point below there about two miles, where the forest comes out?
Very well; you'll have to get around there somehow. Go back of that
shelving rock face the best you can, and come out on that point, and
wait for us."
The boys looked at him rather soberly. "Why can't we go with you,"
asked John, presently, who did not in the least fancy the look of
these dark woods and the heavy, frowning mountains that lay back of
them. Indeed, they all reflected that here they were many a day's
march from Revelstoke, over a country practically impassable.
"You couldn't go in the boats, boys, even if it were safe," said Uncle
Dick. "We want them light as we can have them. Go on now, and do as
you are told. This is a place where we all of us will have to take a
chance, and now your time has come to take your chances, for it's the
best that we can do. Each of you take a little pack--one rifle will do
for you, but each of you must have his ax and matches and compass and
a little something to eat--here, take all the bannocks we have cooked,
and this little bit of flour. When you get to the point make a smoke
to let us know you're there. If we don't get through you'll have to
get on the best way you can."
"Why can't one of you go with us?" inquired John, still anxiously.
"It wouldn't be right for the men left in the boat--it takes two men
to run a boat through water like that, my boy. Go on, now. I am sorry
to send you off, but this is the best that we can do, so you must
undertake it like men."
"It's all right, fellows," said Rob; "come on. We can get around
there, I'm sure, and I'm pretty sure too that these men, good boatmen
that they are, will run that chute. You're not afraid, are you, Leo?"
But if Leo heard him he said nothing in answer, although he made ready
by stripping off his coat and tightening his belt, in which Moise and
all the others followed him.
The boys turned for some time, looking back before they were lost to
view in the forest. The men were still sitting on the beach, calmly
smoking and giving them time to make their detour before they
themselves attempted the dangerous run of the rapids.
It was perhaps an hour before the three young adventurers were able to
climb the rugged slope which lay before them, and finally to descend a
bad rock wall which allowed them access to the long point which Uncle
Dick had pointed out to them, far below and at one side of the dreaded
Priest Rapids. Here they built their little fire of driftwood, as they
had been instructed; and, climbing up on another pile of driftwood
which was massed on the beach, they began eagerly to look up-stream.
"The worst waves are over on the other side," said Rob, after a time.
"Look, I can see them now--they look mighty little--that's the boats
angling across from where we left them! It'll soon be over now, one
way or the other."
They all stood looking anxiously. "They're out of sight!" exclaimed
Rob. And so, indeed, they were.
"That's only the dip they've taken," said Rob, after a time. "I see
them coming now. Look! _Look_ at them come! I believe they're
through."
They stood looking for a little time, and then all took off their
hats and waved them with a yell. They could see the boats now plunging
on down, rising and falling, but growing larger and blacker every
instant. At last they could see them outlined against the distant
white, rolling waves, and knew that they were through the end of the
chute and practically safe.
In a few moments more the two boats came on, racing by their point,
all the men so busy that they had not time to catch the excited
greetings which the boys shouted to them. But once around the point
the boats swung in sharply, and soon, bow up-stream, made a landing
but a few hundred yards below where they stood. Soon they were all
united once more, shaking hands warmly with one another.
"That's great!" said Uncle Dick. "I'll warrant there was one swell
there over fifteen feet high--maybe twenty, for all we could tell. I
know it reared up clear above us, so that you had to lean your head to
see the top of it. If we'd hit it would have been all over with us."
"She's bad tam, young men," said Moise. "From where we see him she
don't look so bad, but once you get in there--poom! Well, anyway, here
we are. That's more better'n getting drowned, and more better'n walk,
too." And Moise, the light-hearted, used to taking chances, dismissed
the danger once it was past.
"Well, that's what I call good planning and good work," said Rob,
quietly, after a while. "To find the best thing to do and then to do
it--that seems to be the way for an engineer to work, isn't it, Uncle
Dick?"
"Yes, it is, and all's well that ends well," commented the other. "And
mighty glad I am to think that we are safe together again, and that
you don't have to try to make your way alone and on foot from this
part of the country. I wasn't happy at all when I thought of that."
"And we weren't happy at all until we saw you safely through that
chute, either," said Rob.
"Now," resumed the leader, "how far is it to a good camping-place,
Leo? We'll want to rest a while to-night."
"Good camp three mile down," said Leo, "on high bank."
"And how far have we come to-day, or will we have come by that time?"
"Not far," said Leo; "'bout ten mile all."
Uncle Dick sighed. "Well, we're all tired, so let's go into camp
early to-night, and hold ourselves lucky that we can camp together,
too. Maybe we'd better bail out first--it's lucky, for we only took in
three or four pails of water apiece."
"No man I ever know come through Priest Rapids on the high water like
this," said Leo. "That's good fun." And he and George grinned happily
at each other.
They pulled on in more leisurely fashion now, and soon reached the
foot of a high grassy bluff on the left-hand side of the river. They
climbed the steep slope here, and so weary were they that that night
they did not put up the tents at all, but lay down, each wrapped in
his blanket, as soon as they had completed their scanty supper.
"Better get home pretty soon now," said Moise. "No sugar no more. No
baking-powder no more. Pretty soon no pork, and flour, she's 'most
gone, too."
XXVIII
IN SIGHT OF SAFETY
Once more, as had now been their custom for several days, in their
anxiety to get as far forward as possible each day, our party arose
before dawn. If truth were told, perhaps few of them had slept soundly
the night through, and as they went about their morning duties they
spoke but little. They realized that, though many of their dangers now
might be called past, perhaps the worst of them, indeed, they still
were not quite out of the woods.
Moise, who had each night left a water-mark, reported that the river
during the night had risen nearly a foot. Even feeling as they did
that the worst of the rapids were passed, the leaders of the party
were a trifle anxious over this report, Leo not less than the others,
for he well remembered how the rising waters had wiped out such places
as the Death Eddy, which once he had known familiarly. They all knew
that the rise of a foot here in the broader parts of the river would
mean serious trouble in any canyon.
"How far now, Leo?" asked John once more of the Indian guide, on whom
they placed their main reliance.
"Maybe-so forty mile, maybe fifty," said Leo. "Maybe not run far now.
Down there ten mile, come Tom Boyd farm. Steamboat come there maybe.
Then can go home on steamboat, suppose our boat is bust."
"Well, the _Bronco_ isn't quite busted," said Uncle Dick, "but she has
sprung something of a leak, and we'll have to do a little calking
before we can start out with her this morning. Come on, Moise, let's
see what we can do."
So saying, they two went down to repair an injury which one of the
boats had sustained on a rock. Of course, in this lining down, with
the boats close inshore in the shallower water, they often came in
contact with the rocks, so that, although both the boats were
practically new, the bottom boards were now ragged and furry. A long
crack in the side of the _Bronco_ showed the force with which a boat
sometimes could be driven by the swift current, even when the men
were taking the best of care to keep it off the rocks.