"Bonneville's Adventures") that the Indians regard this ridge of
mountains as the crest of the world, and that among the Blackfeet there
is a fable that he who attains its summit catches a view of the "Land of
Souls" and beholds the "Happy Hunting Grounds" spread out below him,
brightening with the abodes of the free and generous spirits.
Lieutenant Doane and I were somewhat fatigued with our climb of four
hours' duration, and we refreshed ourselves with such creature comforts
as we found on the summit; but, although we attained the "crest," we did
not discern any "free and generous spirit," save that which we saw
"through a glass darkly."
At the point where we left our horses there was, on the east slope of
the mountain, a body of snow, the surface of which was nearly
horizontal, and the outer edge of which was thirty feet in perpendicular
height. This body of snow is perpetual. At this point the elevation, as
indicated by our aneroid barometer, was 9,476 feet, while at the summit
it was 10,327 feet, a difference of 581 feet, which was the broken
granite summit.
The descent occupied an hour and a quarter, when we struck the trail of
the pack train near the base of the mountain, which we followed until we
found three poles placed in the form of a tripod, the longer pole
pointing to the right to indicate that at this point the party had
changed its course.
[Illustration: Marker made of sticks.]
Obeying this Indian sign, we descended the bank bordering the valley and
traversed the bottom lands to the river, which we forded at a point
where it was about ninety feet wide and three feet deep, with a current
of about six miles an hour. This was about six or seven miles from the
mouth of the river. We followed the trail of the advance party through a
beautiful pine forest, free from underbrush, for the distance of two
miles, passing two beautiful lakes. By this time night had overtaken us,
and it was with difficulty that we could follow the trail, the tracks of
the horses' shoes, which were our sole guide, being hardly discernible.
But we pressed on, following the dark, serpentine line of freshly
disturbed earth till it turned up the side of the mountain, where we
followed it for upwards of a mile. Fearing lest we were not upon the
right trail, we dismounted, and, placing our faces close to the ground,
examined it carefully, but could not discover the impression of a single
horseshoe. Gathering a few dry branches of pine, we kindled a fire upon
the trail, when we discovered that we had been following, from the base
of the mountain, the trail of a band of elk that had crossed the line of
travel of the pack train at a point near the base of the mountain, and
in the dim twilight we had not discovered the mistake.
[Illustration: MAP OF YELLOWSTONE LAKE, AS KNOWN BETWEEN 1860 AND 1870.
FROM THE MAP OF RAYNOLDS' EXPEDITION OF 1860.]
The prospect for a night on the mountain, without blankets or supper,
seemed now very good; but we retraced our steps as rapidly as possible,
and on reaching the base of the mountain, struck out for the lake,
resolving to follow the beach, trusting that our party had made their
camp on the shore of the lake, in which case we should find them; but
if camped at any considerable distance from the shore, we should not
find them. Our ride over fallen timber and through morass for the
distance of about two miles to the shore of the lake was probably
performed more skillfully in the darkness of the night than if we had
seen the obstacles in our path, and as we rounded a point on the smooth
beach we saw at a distance of a little over a mile the welcome watch
fire of our comrades. When we arrived within hailing distance we gave a
loud halloo, and the ready response by a dozen sympathetic voices of our
companions-in-arms showed that our own anxiety had been shared by them.
Our camp to-night is on the westerly side of the most southeasterly bay
of the lake. These bays are separated by long points of land extending
far out into the lake. From our camp of two days ago some of these
points seemed to be islands. From the top of the mountain, which Doane
and I ascended to-day, I made an outline map of the north and east sides
of the lake and part of the south side; but on account of the heavy
timber on the promontories I could not make a correct outline of the
south and west shores. General Washburn and Hauser, as well as myself,
have thus far made outlines of the lake shore as best we could from
points on a level with the lake, but these have been unsatisfactory and
have lacked completeness, and Washburn and Hauser have both expressed
their satisfaction with the sketch of the lake shore I made to-day from
the top of the mountain; and Washburn has just told me that Lieutenant
Doane has suggested that, as I was the first to reach the summit of the
mountain, the peak should be named for me. I shall be gratified if this
is done.[P]
[Illustration: MAP OF YELLOWSTONE LAKE. COPY OF THE ORIGINAL OUTLINE
SKETCHED BY NATHANIEL P. LANGFORD FROM THE TOP OF MOUNT LANGFORD, SEPT.
7, 1870, AND COMPLETED SEPT. 10 AND 13.]
We have traveled from our morning camp about twelve miles, but we are
not more than four miles from it in a straight line.
Thursday, September 8.--Travel to-day has led us in zigzag directions
over fallen timber some twelve miles. We have halted on a small creek
about one mile from the most southerly arm of the lake and about seven
miles in a straight line from our morning camp.
This has been a terrible day for both men and horses. The standing trees
are so thick that we often found it impossible to find a space wide
enough for the pack animals to squeeze through, and we were frequently
separated from each other in a search for a route. Hedges and Stickney,
in this way, became separated from the rest of the party, and after
suffering all the feelings of desolation at being lost in this
wilderness, accidentally stumbled upon our camp, and they freely
expressed their joy at their good fortune in being restored to the
party. I fully sympathized with them, for, speaking from a personal
experience of a similar character which I had in 1862, I can say that a
man can have no more complete sense of utter desolation than that which
overwhelms him when he realizes that he is lost.
At one point while they were seeking some sign of the trail made by the
rest of the party, a huge grizzly bear dashed by them, frightening
Hedges' horse, which broke his bridle and ran away.
After supper Washburn and Hauser went up on the ridge back of the camp
to reconnoiter and ran across a she grizzly and her two cubs. Being
unarmed, they hastily returned to camp for their guns, and five or six
of us joined them in a bear hunt. The members of this hunting party were
all elated at the thought of bagging a fine grizzly, which seemed an
easy prey. What could one grizzly do against six hunters when her
instinctive duty would lead her to hurry her little ones to a place of
safety!
While putting our guns in order and making other preparations for the
attack, an animated discussion took place concerning a proper
disposition of the two cubs which were to be captured alive. Some of our
party thought that they ought to be carried home to Helena, but Bean and
Reynolds, our packers, being appealed to, thought the plan not feasible
unless they could be utilized as pack animals. When we reached the spot
where Washburn and Hauser had last seen the bear, we traced her into a
dense thicket, which, owing to the darkness, we did not care to
penetrate, for not one of us felt that we had lost that particular bear.
Jake Smith, with more of good sense than usual, but with his usual lack
of scriptural accuracy, remarked, "I always considered Daniel a great
fool to go into a den of bears."[Q]
Our journey for the entire day has been most trying, leading us through
a trackless forest of pines encumbered on all sides by prostrate trunks
of trees. The difficulty of urging forward our pack train, making choice
of routes, extricating the horses when wedged between the trees, and
re-adjusting the packs so that they would not project beyond the
sides of the horses, required constant patience and untiring toil,
and the struggle between our own docility and the obstacles in our way,
not unfrequently resulted in fits of sullenness or explosions of wrath
which bore no slight resemblance to the volcanic forces of the country
itself.
[Illustration: Benj. Stickney]
On one of these occasions when we were in a vast net of down timber and
brush, and each man was insisting upon his own particular mode of
extrication, and when our tempers had been sorely tried and we were in
the most unsocial of humors, speaking only in half angry expletives, I
recalled that beautiful line in Byron's "Childe Harold," "There is a
pleasure in the pathless woods," which I recited with all the "ore
rotundo" I could command, which struck the ludicrous vein of the company
and produced an instantaneous response of uproarious laughter, which, so
sudden is the transition between extremes, had the effect to restore
harmony and sociability, and, in fact, to create a pleasure in the
pathless wilderness we were traveling.
One of our pack horses is at once a source of anxiety and amusement to
us all. He is a remarkable animal owned by Judge Hedges, who, however,
makes no pretentious to being a good judge of horses. Mr. Hedges says
that the man from whom he purchased the animal, in descanting upon his
many excellent qualities, said: "He is that kind of an animal that
drives the whole herd before him." The man spoke truly, but Mr. Hedges
did not properly interpret the encomium, nor did he realize that the
seller meant to declare that the animal, from sheer exhaustion, would
always be lagging behind the others of the herd. From the start, and
especially during our journey through the forest, this pony, by his
acrobatic performances and mishaps, has furnished much amusement for us
all. Progress to-day could only be accomplished by leaping our animals
over the fallen trunks of trees. Our little broncho, with all the
spirit necessary, lacks oftentimes the power to scale the tree trunks.
As a consequence, he is frequently found resting upon his midriff with
his fore and hind feet suspended over the opposite sides of some huge
log. "The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." He has an
ambitious spirit, which is exceeded only by his patience. He has had
many mishaps, any one of which would have permanently disabled a larger
animal, and we have dubbed him "Little Invulnerable." One of the
soldiers of our escort, Private Moore, has made a sketch of him as he
appeared to-day lying across a log, of which I am to have a copy.
[Illustration: LITTLE INVULNERABLE.]
I growled at Hauser and scolded him a little in camp to-night because of
some exasperating action of his. I here record the fact without going
into details. I think that I must try to be more patient. But I am
feeling somewhat the fatigue of our journey. However, there is something
to be said on the other hand, and that is that there is no one of the
party better able to bear its labors and anxieties than I, and therefore
I should be the last man to lose my patience.
I know of nothing that can try one's patience more than a trip of any
considerable length by wagon train or pack train through an uninhabited
region, and the most amiable of our race cannot pass this ordeal
entirely unscathed. Persons who are not blessed with uncommon equanimity
never get through such a journey without frequent explosions of temper,
and seldom without violence. Even education, gentle training and the
sharpest of mental discipline do not always so effectually subdue the
passions that they may not be aroused into unwonted fury during a long
journey through a country filled with obstructions. Philosophy has never
found a fitter subject for its exercise than that afforded by the
journey we are now making, which obliges the members of our party to
strive to relieve each other's burdens.
Friday, September 9.--Last night there occurred an incident which I
would gladly blot from these pages, but a faithful record of all the
events of camp life in connection with this expedition demands that I
omit nothing of interest, nor set down "aught in malice."
Mr. Hedges and I were on guard during the last relief of the night,
which extends from the "Wee sma' hours ayont the twal" to daybreak. The
night was wearing on when Hedges, being tempted of one of the Devils
which doubtless roam around this sulphurous region, or that perhaps
followed Lieutenant Doane and myself down from that "high mountain
apart" where the spirits roam, asked me if I was hungry. I replied that
such had been my normal condition ever since our larder had perceptibly
declined. Mr. Hedges then suggested that, as there was no food already
cooked in the camp, we take each a wing of one of the partridges and
broil it over our small fire. It was a "beautiful thought," as Judge
Bradford of Colorado used to say from the bench when some knotty legal
problem relating to a case he was trying had been solved, and was
speedily acted upon by both of us. But I was disappointed in finding so
little meat on a partridge wing, and believed that Hedges would have
chosen a leg instead of a wing, if he had pondered a moment, so I
remedied the omission, and, as a result, each roasted a leg of the bird.
Soon increase of appetite grew by what it fed on, and the breast of the
bird was soon on the broiler.
In the meantime our consciences were not idle, and we were "pricked in
our hearts." The result was that we had a vision of the disappointment
of our comrades, as each should receive at our morning breakfast his
small allotment of but one partridge distributed among so many, and it
did not take us long to send the remaining bird to join its mate. Taking
into consideration the welfare of our comrades, it seemed the best thing
for us to do, and we debated between ourselves whether the birds would
be missed in the morning, Hedges taking the affirmative and I the
negative side of the question.
This morning when our breakfast was well nigh finished, Mr. Hauser asked
"Newt," the head cook, why he had not prepared the partridges for
breakfast. "Newt" answered that when he opened the pan this morning the
birds had "done gone," and he thought that "Booby" (the dog) had eaten
them. Whereupon Hauser pelted the dog with stones and sticks. Hedges and
I, nearly bursting with our suppressed laughter, quietly exchanged
glances across the table, and the situation became quite intense for us,
as we strove to restrain our risibles while listening to the comments of
the party on the utter worthlessness of "that dog Booby." Suddenly the
camp was electrified by Gillette asking, "Who was on guard last night?"
"That's it," said one. "That's where the birds went," said another. This
denouement was too much for Hedges and myself, and amid uproarious
laughter we made confession, and "Booby" was relieved from his disgrace
and called back into the camp, and patted on the head as a "good dog,"
and he has now more friends in camp than ever before.
Mr. Hauser, who brought down the birds with two well directed shots with
his revolver, made from the back of his horse without halting the
animal, had expected to have a dainty breakfast, but he is himself too
fond of a practical joke to express any disappointment, and no one in
the party is more unconcerned at the outcome than he. He is a
philosopher, and, as I know from eight years' association with him, does
not worry over the evils which he can remedy, nor those which he cannot
remedy. There can be found no better man than he for such a trip as we
are making.
"Booby" is taking more kindly, day by day, to the buckskin moccasins
which "Newt" made and tied on his feet a few days ago. When he was first
shod with them he rebelled and tore them off with his teeth, but I think
he has discovered that they lessen his sufferings, which shows that he
has some good dog sense left, and that probably his name "Booby" is a
misnomer. I think there is a great deal of good in the animal. He is
ever on the alert for unusual noises or sounds, and the assurance which
I have that he will give the alarm in case any thieving Indians shall
approach our camp in the night is a great relief to my anxiety lest some
straggling band of the Crows may "set us afoot." Jake Smith was on guard
three nights ago, and he was so indifferent to the question of safety
from attack that he enjoyed a comfortable nap while doing guard duty,
and I have asked our artist, Private Moore, to make for me a sketch of
Smith as I found him sound asleep with his saddle for a pillow. Jake
might well adopt as a motto suitable for his guidance while doing guard
duty, "Requieseat in pace." Doubtless Jake thought, "Shall I not take
mine ease in mine inn?" I say _thought_ for I doubt if Jake can give a
correct verbal rendering of the sentence. A few evenings ago he jocosely
thought to establish, by a quotation from Shakespeare, the unreliability
of a member of our party who was telling what seemed a "fish story," and
he clinched his argument by adding that he would apply to the case the
words of the immortal Shakespeare, "Othello's _reputation's_ gone."
[Illustration: JAKE SMITH, GUARDING THE CAMP FROM HOSTILE INDIAN ATTACK.
"REQUIESCAT IN PACE."]
We broke camp this morning with the pack train at 10 o'clock, traveling
in a westerly course for about two miles, when we gradually veered
around to a nearly easterly direction, through fallen timber almost
impassable in the estimation of pilgrims, and indeed pretty severe on
our pack horses, for there was no trail, and, while our saddle horses
with their riders could manage to force their way through between the
trees, the packs on the pack animals would frequently strike the trees,
holding the animals fast or compelling them to seek some other passage.
Frequently, we were obliged to re-arrange the packs and narrow them, so
as to admit of their passage between the standing trees. At one point
the pack animals became separated, and with the riding animals of a
portion of the party were confronted with a prostrate trunk of a huge
tree, about four feet in diameter, around which it was impossible to
pass because of the obstructions of fallen timber. Yet pass it we must;
and the animals, one after another, were brought up to the log, their
breasts touching it, when Williamson and I, the two strongest men of the
party, on either side of an animal, stooped down, and, placing each a
shoulder back of a fore leg of a horse, rose to an erect position, while
others of the party placed his fore feet over the log, which he was thus
enabled to scale. In this way we lifted fifteen or twenty of our animals
over the log.
Soon after leaving our camp this morning our "Little Invulnerable,"
while climbing a steep rocky ascent, missed his footing and turned three
back summersaults down into the bottom of the ravine. We assisted him to
his feet without removing his pack, and he seemed none the worse for his
adventure, and quickly regained the ridge from which he had fallen and
joined the rest of the herd.
At 3 o'clock in the afternoon we halted for the day, having traveled
about six miles, but our camp to-night is not more than three miles from
our morning camp.
Mr. Hedges' pack horse, "Little Invulnerable," was missing when we
camped; and, as I was one of the four men detailed for the day to take
charge of the pack train, I returned two miles on our trail with the two
packers, Reynolds and Bean, in search of him. We found him wedged
between two trees, evidently enjoying a rest, which he sorely needed
after his remarkable acrobatic feat of the morning. We are camped in a
basin not far from the lake, which surrounds us on three sides--east,
north and west. Mr. Everts has not yet come into camp, and we fear that
he is lost.
About noon we crossed a small stream that flows towards the southwest
arm of the lake, but which, I think, is one of the headwater streams of
Snake river. I think that we have crossed the main divide of the Rocky
Mountains twice to-day. We have certainly crossed it once, and if we
have not crossed it twice we are now camped on the western slope of the
main divide. If the creek we crossed about noon to-day continues to flow
in the direction it was running at the point where we crossed it, it
must discharge into the southwest arm of the lake, and it seems probable
that Mr. Everts has followed down this stream.
I have just had a little talk with Lieutenant Doane. He thinks that our
camp to-night is on the Snake river side of the main divide, and there
are many things that incline me to believe that he is correct in his
opinion.[R]
Last night we had a discussion, growing out of the fact that Hedges and
Stickney, for a brief time, were lost, for the purpose of deciding what
course we would adopt in case any other member of the party were lost,
and we agreed that in such case we would all move on as rapidly as
possible to the southwest arm of the lake, where there are hot springs
(the vapor of which we noticed from our camp of September 5th), and
there remain until all the party were united. Everts thought a better
way for a lost man would be to strike out nearly due west, hoping to
reach the headwaters of the Madison river, and follow that stream as his
guide to the settlements; but he finally abandoned this idea and adopted
that which has been approved by the rest of the party. So if Mr. Everts
does not come into camp to-night, we will to-morrow start for the
appointed rendezvous.
Saturday, September 10.--We broke camp about 10 o'clock this morning,
taking a course of about ten degrees north of west, traveling seven
miles, and coming to camp on the lake shore at about five miles in a
direct line from our morning camp at half past two p.m. No sign of Mr.
Everts has been seen to-day, and on our arrival in camp, Gillette and
Trumbull took the return track upon the shore of the lake, hoping to
find him, or discover some sign of him. A large fire was built on a high
ridge commanding all points on the beach, and we fired signal guns from
time to time throughout the night.
Mr. Hauser and I ascended a high point overlooking our camp, and about
eight hundred feet above it, where from the top of a tall tree I had a
fairly good view of the shore outline of the west and south shores of
the lake, with all the inlets, points and islands. We were also enabled
to mark out our course of travel which it would be necessary to follow
in order to reach the most southwesterly arm of the lake and take
advantage of openings in the timber to facilitate travel. On this high
point we built a large fire which could be seen for many miles in all
directions by any one not under the bank of the lake, and which we hoped
Mr. Everts might see, and so be directed to our camp.
In going to the summit we traveled several hundred feet on a rocky ridge
not wide enough for safe travel by a man on horseback. At an elevation
of about eight hundred feet above Yellowstone lake we found two small
lakes nestled in a deep recess in the mountain and surrounded by the
overturned rocks.
Our route to-day has been entirely through fallen timber, and it has
been a hard day of travel on our horses, necessitating jumping over logs
and dead branches of trees, and thus we have made very slow progress.
The map of Yellowstone lake which we will be enabled to complete from
the observations made to-day will show that its shape is very different
from that shown on Captain Raynolds' map. The lake has but three
islands.