An Arrival from Fort Hall--An Account from Oregon--Return
of two of my companions to the States--A startling
Condition--An Indian Guide--A Farewell--How a Horse
studies Geology--A Camp--Dog Mutton superseded--A
Scene--Sheetskadee--Butes--Desolation--Midnight Scene
in the Mountains--Indian Jim and the Buffalo--Hungry
Stomachs--A fat Shot--Fine Eyesight--An old Trapper picked
up--Beautiful Desert--"Hos, Hos"--Meek the Bear Killer--A wild
Vale--Steamboat Spring--Natural Soda Fountains--Neighbouring
Landscape--A hard Drive--Valley of Chasm--Nature's Vase--A
heavy March--Passing the Mountains--A charming Gorge--Entrance
into Oregon--The South Branch of the Columbia--Fort Hall and
its Hospitalities.
17th. An event of great interest occurred this day. It was the arrival
of Paul Richardson and three of his companions from Fort Hall. This old
Yankee woodsman had been upon one of his favourite summer trips from
St. Louis to the borders of Oregon. He had acted as guide and hunter
to a party of missionaries to the Oregon Indians. {49} Several other
persons from the western states had accompanied them: one with the
lofty intention of conquering California; and others with the intention
of trading, farming, &c., on the lower Columbia; and others to explore
the Rocky Mountains, and the wonders of nature along the shores of the
Pacific.[164] The events of their tour were freely discussed. They
had storms of hail and human wrath. The conqueror of California had
been disposed to act the general before he had received his epaulettes;
had proved to be so troublesome that he was expelled from camp a short
distance from the frontier, and obliged to ride, sleep, and eat, at a
comfortable distance from his companions, during the remainder of the
journey.
The missionaries, too, Messrs. Monger and Griffith,[165] and their
ladies, had had causes of irritability; so that between all the
conflicting feelings and opinions of the party, their little camp,
it was said, was frequently full of trouble. Oregon also came under
discussion. Mr. Richardson had travelled over the territory; knew it
well; it was not so productive as New England; fifteen bushels of
wheat to the acre was an extraordinary crop; corn and {50} potatoes
did not yield the seed planted; rain fell incessantly five months of
the year; the remainder was unblessed even with dew; the Indians and
whites residing there had the fever and ague, or bilious fever, the
year through; that what little of human life was left by these causes
of destruction, was consumed by musquitoes and fleas; that the Columbia
river was unfit for navigation--fit only for an Indian fish-pond. Such
a description of Oregon (the part of the American domain represented by
traders, trappers, and travellers, as most delightful, beautiful, and
productive) was astonishing, unlooked-for, and discouraging. And did I
not recollect that Mr. Richardson had reasons for desiring to increase
the strength of his party through the dangerous plains towards the
States, I should, after having seen Oregon, be at a loss to divine the
purpose of such a representation of it.
18th. Mr. Richardson's description of Oregon had the effect of
drawing off two of my companions. They had no evidence to oppose to
his account; he had resided two years in the Territory, and on the
knowledge acquired by that means, had represented it to be in no sense
a desirable place of abode. They therefore forsook the chase after a
{51} desert, and joined him for the green glades of the valley States.
On the morning of the 18th, they left me. It was the most disheartening
event which had befallen me on the journey. Oakley and Wood had stood
by me in the trials and storms of the plains; had evinced a firmness of
purpose equal to every emergency that had occurred, were men on whom
reliance could be placed; humane men, always ready to do their duty
promptly and cheerfully. It was painful therefore to part with them
at a time when their services were most needed. Alone in the heart of
the Rocky Mountains, a traveller through the range of the Blackfeet war
parties, in bad health, no men save poor old Blair, and the worse than
useless vagabond Smith, alias Carroll, to aid me in resisting these
savages: I felt alone.
I was indeed kindly offered quarters for the winter at Brown's Hole;
but if I accepted them, I should find it impossible to return to the
States the next year. I determined therefore to reach the Columbia
river that season, be the risk and manner what it might. Accordingly I
engaged a Snake Indian, whom the whites called "Jim," to pilot me to
Fort Hall, the march to commence on the morning of the 19th--distance
two {52} hundred miles, compensation fifty loads of ammunition, and
three bunches of beads.
There is in this valley, and in some other parts of the mountains,
a fruit called bulberry.[166] It is the most delightful acid in the
vegetable kingdom; of the size of the common red currant, with larger
seeds than are found in that fruit; colour deep red. It grows upon
bushes eight or ten feet high, which in general appearance resemble a
young beech tree. Of these berries I obtained a small quantity, had a
dog butchered, took a pound or two of dried buffalo meat which Mr. St.
Clair kindly gave me, purchased a horse of Mr. Robinson for the use of
Blair, and on the morning of the 19th of August left the hospitalities
of Fort David Crockett for the dreary waste and starving plains between
it and Fort Hall. Blair, Smith, and my guide Jim, constituted my whole
force. Numerous war-parties of Blackfeet and Sioux were hovering
over my trail. If discovered by them, death was certain; if not, and
starvation did not assail us, we might reach the waters of Snake river.
At all events the trial was to be made; and at ten o'clock, A. M., we
were winding our way up the Sheetskadee.
Of the regrets at leaving this beautiful {53} little valley, there
was no one that I remember more vividly than that of parting with my
old guide. Kelly was a man of many excellent qualities. He was brave
without ostentation, kind without making you feel an obligation; and
preferred on all occasions the happiness of others to his own ease or
safety. The river during the twelve miles' travel of the day, appeared
to be about one hundred yards wide, a rapid current two feet deep,
water limpid. The mountains on either side rose half a mile from the
river in dark stratified masses, one thousand feet above the level of
the stream. On their sides were a few shrub cedars. The lower hills
were covered with the hated wild wormwood and prickly pear. The banks
were of white clay, alternated with the loose light coloured sandy soil
of the mountain districts. The rocks were quartz, red sand-stone, and
limestone. Our camp was pitched at night on the high bank of the stream
among the bushes; and a supper of stewed dog-meat prepared us for sleep.
20th. At seven o'clock in the morning we had breakfasted and were on
our way. We travelled three miles up the east bank of the river, and
came to a mountain, through which it broke its way with a noise which
indicated the fall to be great, and the {54} channel to be a deep
rugged chasm.[167] Near the place where it leaves the chasm, we turned
to the right, and followed up a rough, deep gorge, the distance of five
miles, and emerged into a plain. This gorge had been formed by the
action of a tributary of Green River, upon the soft red sand-stone that
formed the precipices around. It winds in the distance of five miles to
every point of the compass. Along much of its course also the cliffs
hang over the stream in such a manner as to render it impossible to
travel the water-side. Hence the necessity, in ascending the gorge, of
clambering over immense precipices, along brinks of yawning caverns, on
paths twelve or fourteen inches in width, with not a bush to cling to
in the event of a false step. And yet our Indian horses were so well
used to passes of the kind, that they travelled them without fear or
accident till the worst were behind us.
How delusive the past as a test of the future! I was felicitating
myself upon our good fortune, as the caravan wound its way slowly over
a sharp cliff before me, when the shout from the men in advance, "Well
done, Puebla," made me hasten to the top of the ridge. My Puebla mare
had left the track. Instead of following a wide, {55} well-beaten way
down the mountain, she in her wisdom had chosen to tread the shelf of
a cliff, which, wide at the place where it sprang from the pathway,
gradually became narrower, till it was lost in the perpendicular face
of the mountain. She was under a high bulky back at the time, and
before she had quite explored the nethermost inch of the interesting
stratum which she was disposed to trace to its lowest dip, the centre
of gravity was suddenly thrown without the base, and over she reeled,
and fell ten or twelve feet among broken rocks, then rolled and tumbled
six hundred feet more of short perpendicular descents and inclined
plains, into the stream below. On descending and examining her, I found
her horribly mangled, the blood running from the nostrils, ears, and
other parts of the body. As it was apparent she would soon die, I
stripped her of her packs and gear, drove her to a plat of grass where
she could find food, should she need it, and left her to her fate.
This accident being disposed of, we emerged from this gorge, travelled
over barren gravelly plains, dotted with pyramidal hills of the same
material, whose {56} sides were belted with strata of coarse grey
sand-stone. About four o'clock P. M., Jim halted beside a little
brook, and pointing ahead, said, "Wat, ugh, u--gh;" by which I
understood that the next water on our way was too far distant to be
reached that night; and we encamped. The scenery to the west was very
beautiful. A hundred rods from our camp, in that direction, rose an
apparently perfect pyramid of regular stratified black rocks, about
six hundred feet in height, with a basilar diameter of about eight
hundred feet, and partially covered with bushes. Beyond it, some five
hundred yards, crept away a circling ridge of the same kind of rocks,
leaving a beautiful lawn between. And still beyond, sixty miles to the
south-west, through a break in the hills that lay in clusters over the
intervening country, a portion of the Anahuac range was seen, sweeping
away in the direction of the Great Salt Lake.
Jim had turned his horse loose as soon as he saw we were disposed to
encamp according to his wishes, and was away with his rifle to the
hills. In an instant he was on their heights, creeping stealthily among
the bushes and rocks; and the crack of {57} his rifle, and the tumbling
of some kind of game over the cliffs, immediately succeeded. More
nimble and sure of step than the mountain goat, he sprang down again
from cliff to cliff, reached the plain, and the next moment was in
camp, crying "hos, ugh, yes." I sent my horse and brought in his game;
a noble buck antelope, of about forty pounds weight. In consequence of
this windfall, our dog meat was thrown among the willows for the behoof
of the wolves. My guide, poor fellow, had eaten nothing since we left
the Fort. His tribe have a superstition of some kind which forbids them
the use of such meat. A dog-eater is a term of reproach among them. If
one of their number incurs the displeasure of another, he is called
"Arrapahoe," the name of the tribe previously described, who fatten
these animals for some great annual feast. Jim's creed, however, raised
no objections to the flesh of the antelope. He ate enormously, washed
himself neatly, combed his long dark hair, pulled out his beard with
his right thumb and left forefinger nails, and "turned in."
21st. Twenty miles to-day. The ride of the forenoon was over plains
and hills of coarse gravel, destitute of grass, timber, {58} or brush,
the everywhere present wild wormwood excepted; that of the afternoon
was among broken hills, alternately of gravel and brown sand, here and
there dotted with a tuft of bunch grass. From some few of the hills
protruded strata of beautiful slate. The bottom lands of the river,
even, were as barren as Sahara. The only living things seen, were the
small prairie wolf, and flocks of magpie. This bird inhabits the most
dreary portions of the mountains, and seems to delight in making the
parched and silent deserts more lonely by its ominous croak of welcome
to its desolate habitation.
The raven indeed was about us, throwing his funeral wing upon the light
of the setting sun. In fine, to-day, as often before, I found nothing
in nature from which to derive a single pulse of pleasure, save the
vastness of desolate wastes, the tombs of the washing of the flood!
Towards night, however, we were gratified by finding a few decrepid
old cotton-wood trees, on the bank of the Sheetskadee, among which to
encamp. Our horses having had little food for the last forty-eight
hours, devoured with eager appetite the dry grass along the banks.
Since {59} leaving Brown's Hole, our course had been nearly due north.
22nd. Travelled up Green River about three miles, crossed it three
times, and took to the hills on its western side. The course of the
river, as far as seen in this valley, is nearly south; the bottom
and banks generally of gravel; the face of the country a dry,
barren, undulating plain.[168] Our course, after leaving the river,
was north-west by north. About two o'clock, we struck Ham's Fork,
a tributary of Green River, and encamped near the water-side.[169]
This stream probably pours down immense bodies of water when the snow
melts upon the neighbouring highlands; for its channel, at the place
where we struck it, was half a mile in width, and two hundred feet
deep. Very little water is said to run in it during July, August and
September. The current was three or four inches in depth, a rod wide,
and sluggish. Three butes appeared in the north-east, about twelve
o'clock, fifteen miles distant. One of them resembled a vast church,
surmounted by a perpendicular shaft of rock, probably three hundred
feet in height. The swelling base resembled in colour the sands of this
region. The rock shaft was dark, probably basalt.
{60} By the side of this, springing immediately from the plain, rose
another shaft of rock, about one hundred and fifty feet high, of
regular outline, and about fifteen feet in diameter. Seven or eight
miles to the north, rose another bute, a perpendicular shaft, fifty or
sixty feet in height, resting upon a base of hills which rise about
three hundred feet above the plain. Beyond these butes, to the east,
the country seemed to be an open plain. To the south of them extends
a range of dark mountains, reaching far into the dimly-discerned
neighbourhood of Long's Peak.[170] The whole circle of vision presented
no other means of life for man or beast than a few small patches of
dry grass, and the water of the stream. Many of the sandy bluffs were
covered with the prickly pear and wild wormwood. Generally, however,
nothing green, nothing but the burnt, unproductive waste appeared,
which no art of man can reclaim. Yet far in the north, the snowy peaks
of Wind River Mountains, and to the south-west, a portion of the
Anahuac ridge indicated that it might be possible to find along the
borders of this great grave of vegetation, green vales and purling
brooks to alleviate the desolation of the scene.
We travelled fifteen miles to-day, and {61} encamped upon the bank of
the stream; cooked supper, and wrapping ourselves in our blankets,
with saddles for pillows, and curtained by the starry firmament, slept
sweetly among the overhanging willows. Near midnight, the light of
the moon aroused me. It was a lovely night. The stars seemed smaller
than they do in less elevated situations, but not less beautiful. For,
although they are not so brilliant, they burn steadily, brightly on the
hours of night in these magnificent wastes. It was midnight. The wolves
are correct time-keepers.
I had scarcely viewed the delightful scene around me, when these
sleepless sentinels of the deserts raised their midnight howl. It
rung along the chambers of the mountains, was, at intervals, taken
up by kennel after kennel, till, in the deep and distant vales, it
yielded again to the all-pervading silence of night. This is one of
the habits that instinct has taught their race. As soon as the first
light of morning appears in the east, they raise a _reveille_ howl in
the prairies of the Western States which, keeping company with the
hours, swells along the vast plains from Texas to the sources of the
Mississippi, and from Missouri to the depths of the Rocky Mountains.
All day {62} they lurk in silence. At midnight, another howl awakens
the sleeping wilderness--more horrible and prolonged; and it is
remarkable with what exactness they hit the hour.
23rd. We were up this morning before the light; and while the sun rose
in the Great Gap, mounted our jaded horses for the day's ride. As we
moved onward upon the elevated bluffs which border the river, the
light of the morning showed the butes clearly on the eastern horizon.
Jim paid little regard to the course of the stream to-day; but struck
a bee line for some object, unseen by us, across the hills--at times
among wild wormwood, at others among sharp, flinty stones, so thickly
laid over the ground that none but an Indian horse would travel over
them. We occasionally approached the stream, and were gratified with
the appearance of a few solitary old cotton-wood trees on its banks. A
poor, stinted shrub willow, too, made great effort here and there to
prolong existence, but with little success. Even in one little nook,
the wild rose, currant, and bulberry bushes had the effrontery to bear
leaves.
About four o'clock, P. M., small patches of dry grass were seen
in the ravines. On one {63} of these were five buffalo; but they
proved to us more delightful to the sight than to any other sense,
since I was unable to induce my guide to halt and hunt them. This
apparently unpardonable stubbornness was afterward explained. He had
the only animal which could run fast enough to approach them--he alone
could ride him--and having lost his right thumb, protested that he
could not discharge his piece from a running horse. But having no
interpreter with us to render his furious protestations intelligible,
I attributed his unwillingness to lay in a supply of good meat here to
mere malicious indifference. At five o'clock, we came upon a plat of
excellent grass, around a clump of yellow pines. Near this, weary and
hungry, we made our camp for the night; ate the half of the meat in our
possession--a mere mite--and gorged ourselves with wild currants, which
grew plentifully among the pines, until the darkness bade us cease.
Course as yesterday: the butes out of sight during the afternoon. We
supposed we had travelled twenty miles; weather exceedingly warm.
24th. Rode on a fast trot till about three o'clock, P. M., made about
twenty-five miles. Our route lay over sandy and gravelly {64} swells,
and the bottom lands of Ham's Fork; the latter, like the former, were
well nigh destitute of vegetation.[171] When about to encamp, we had
the excellent fortune to espy an antelope on a bluff hard by. He fell
before the well levelled rifle of our one-thumbed guide. A fat one he
was too; just such an one as the imaginations of our hungry stomachs
had all the day been figuring to themselves would afford a pleasant
variety in the matter of starvation. The circle of vision, the last
day or two, had been very much circumscribed by the increasing size
of the undulating bluffs, among which our way usually ran. And from
their tops, whenever we chanced to go over them, neither the Wind River
Mountains nor the Anahuac range were visible. In all directions, to
the limit of sight, rolled away the dead, leafless, thirsty swells.
Wolves and ravens live among them; but whence they derive subsistence
is a difficult problem even for themselves to solve. Their howlings and
croakings evidently came from famished mouths.
25th. Fifteen miles to-day along the river; course as on the 24th, N.
W. by W., among the bluffs that border the stream; or if that were
tortuous, we travelled from bend {65} to bend, over the table lands on
either side. In the valley of the stream, small groves of young and
thrifty cotton-wood trees, currant bushes, and the black alder, gave
us hopes of soon seeing the grasses and flowers, and the cool springs
of the highlands, between us and the Great Beaver [Bear] River. The
day, however, was sultry; scarcely a breath of wind moved; the dust
that rose from our track lay on the air as the smoke of a village
does on a still May morning. So that these occasional appearances of
vegetable life imparted less pleasure than they would have done if we
had been able to see them through another medium than the dripping mud,
manufactured from dust and perspiration.
Near mid-day, we crossed the river from its northern to its southern
side, and were emerging from the bushes which entangled our egress,
when Jim, uttering a shrill whoop, pointing to a solitary horseman
urging his horse up the bluff a half mile below us. Beckoning him
to us, we dismounted to allow our jaded animals to feed until he
should arrive. In the style of a true mountaineer, he dashed up to
us on a rapid gallop, greeting us with as hearty a shake of the hand
as he could have bestowed {66} upon a brother, and asked our names
and destination; said his name was "Midison Gordon, an independent
trapper, that he was bound to Brown's Hole for his squaw and
'possibles,' and was glad to see us," in less time than is usually
employed in saying half as much; and accepting an invitation to encamp
with us, he continued to express his pleasure at seeing us, till our
attention was diverted from him by a halt for the night.
These remnants of the great trapping parties of the American Fur
Company,[172] commonly make Brown's Hole their winter quarters. Indeed,
I believe the owners of that post to be old trappers of the Company,
who, having lost all their relish for former habits of life, by a long
residence in the mountains, have established themselves there in order
to bring around them, not only the means of subsistence according to
their taste, but their merry old companions with their tales, jests,
and songs, and honest and brave hearts. Gordon, like all other trappers
whom I saw in the mountains, was convinced that there were so few
beaver, so little meat, and so many dangers among them, that "a white
man had no business there." He, therefore, was going for his {67} squaw
and "possibles," preparatory to descending the Columbia to open a farm
in the valley of the Willamette. He said that was also the intention of
nearly all his fellow-trappers. They proposed to take with them their
Indian wives and children, settle in one neighbourhood, and cultivate
the earth, or hunt, as inclination or necessity might suggest, and
thus pass the evening of their days among the wild pleasures of that
delightful wilderness.
26th. Course north-west; distance twenty miles; sometimes on the banks
of the river, and again over the swells, to avoid its windings. The
country through which we passed to-day, was in some respects more
interesting than any we had seen since leaving Brown's Hole. Instead
of plateaux, baked and flinty, or hills of loose unproductive loam and
sand, shorn by perpetual drought of flower, shrub, and tree, a journey
of twenty miles over which would hardly cross grass enough to feed a
dozen horses a single day, the slopes of a thousand spherical hills,
as green as the fields of the States in May, sent forth the sweet
fragrance of teeming vegetation; little streams ran away among the
black, white, and orange pebbles; and the dandelion, {68} anemone, and
other flowers rejoiced in the spring-day breezes which crept over them.
It was May indeed here. The snow had lately disappeared, and the rains
had still later been falling, as they do in April in other places. The
insects were piping the note of an opening year.
It was the dividing ridge between the tributaries of the Sheetskadee
and Great Bear River; and yet not a ridge.[173] When viewed from
its highest points, it appeared an elevated plateau of slightly
conical swells, so raised above the vast deserts on the east of it,
as to attract the moisture of the clouds. The soil of this region
is, however, poor,--not sufficient to bear timber. The grasses grow
rankly over most of its surface; and those parts which are barren are
covered with red or white sand, that contrasts beautifully with the
matted green of other portions. In a word, it was one of those places
among the mountains where all is pure. There the air is dense--the
water cold--the vegetation fresh; there the snow lies nine months
of the year, and when it eventually melts before the warm suns of
June and July, the earth is clothed with vegetation almost in a day.
About sunset, we descended a sharp declivity of broken {69} rocks,
and encamped on a small stream running north. My indefatigable Jim
Shoshonie killed an antelope for our suppers. An unexpected favour
this; for, from the representations given me of this part of my route,
I expected to commence here a long-consuming fast, which would not be
broken till I reached Fort Hall, or my grave.
27th. Our last night's encampment proved to have been on a branch of
the Great Bear River--the principal, if not the only feeder of the
Great Salt Lake.[174] We started down along its verdant little valley
about seven o'clock in the morning, and reached the main river about
twelve at noon. It was twenty yards wide--water two feet deep, and
transparent, current four miles per hour, bottom of brown sand and
gravel. After feeding our animals, we descended the river till four
o'clock, and halted on its banks for the night. We had travelled
thirty miles. The mountains which hemmed in the valley were generally
of a conical form, primitive, and often verdant. Their height varied
from five hundred to two thousand five hundred feet above the level
of the stream. The bottom lands were from one to three miles wide, of
a {70} loose, dry, gravelly soil, covered with withered bunch grass.
By the water side grew various kinds of trees, as quaking-asp, black
birch, and willows; also shrubs of various kinds, as the black alder,
small willow, wild wormwood, black currant, and service berry. In the
ravines of the mountains, groves of trees sometimes appeared peering up
luxuriantly among the black projecting cliffs.
28th. An early rising, a hurried meal, and a rapid saddling and packing
of horses, started us from camp at six o'clock. While girding our
saddle animals, the last act done in breaking up camp in mountain life,
Jim's eagle eye discerned in the distance down the river, "hos, hos."
Indian like, for we had become such in our habits, we put new caps on
our rifles, mounted quickly, and circled out behind a barricade of
brushwood, in order to ascertain the number, colour, and purpose of
such unceremonious intruders upon the territories of our solitude. Jim
peered through the leaves with the utmost intensity of an Indian's
vision. It was the place for war-parties of the Crows, Sioux, and
Blackfeet; and this early appearance of individuals approaching our
camp was a circumstance that scented strongly of bows {71} and arrows.
But suspense became certainty, a pleasant certainty, as Jim reined his
horse from concealment, and galloped away to the stranger, now within
rifle-shot of us.
A strong and warm shake of the hand, and various contortions of the
face, and uncouth gestures of recognition between them, completed their
interview, and the swarthy old trapper approached myself and men. He
was no less a personage than the bear-killer, Meek, who figures in
the St. Louis Museum, with the paws of an immense grisly bear upon his
shoulders in front, the fingers and thumb of his left hand bitten off,
while with his right hand he holds the hunter's knife, plunged deeply
in the animal's jugular vein.[175] He accosted me with, "Good morning,
how are ye?--stranger in the mountains, eh?" And before I could make a
monosyllabic reply, he continued, "Have you any meat? Come, I've got
the shoulder of a goat, (antelope); let us go back to your camp, and
cook, and eat, and talk awhile." We were harnessed for the day's ride,
and felt unwilling to lose the cool hours of the morning, and much more
so to consume the generous man's last pound of meat. Thanking him, {72}
therefore, for his honest kindness, we satisfied him with our refusal,
by the assurance that we had meat, and had already breakfasted. On
hearing that we were travelling to the Columbia river, he informed us
that we might probably go down with the Nez Percés Indians, who, he
stated, were encamped at the time on Salmon river, one day's journey
from Fort Hall. He was on his way to Brown's Hole for his squaw and
"possibles," with the design of joining their camp. These Indians would
leave their hunting grounds for their homes about ten days from that
date.
This was another remnant of the American Fur Company's trapping
parties. He came to the mountains many years ago, and has so long
associated with Indians that his manners much resemble theirs. The same
wild, unsettled, watchful expression of the eye, the same unnatural
gesticulation in conversation, the same unwillingness to use words when
a sign, a contortion of the face or body, or movement of the hand will
manifest thought; in standing, walking, riding, in all but complexion,
he was an Indian. Bidding us good morning, and wheeling away to the
day's ride, he said, "Keep your eye shining for the Blackfeet. {73}
They are about the 'Beer Springs'; and stay, my white horse tired, one
camp down the river; was obliged to '_cache_' my pack and leave him;
use him if you can, and take him on to the Fort; and look here, I have
told you I am Meek, the bear-killer, and so I am. But I think the boys
at the museum in St. Louis might have done me up as it really was. The
beast only jumped on my back, and stripped off my blanket; scratched
some, but didn't pull my shoulder blade off. Well, after he had robbed
me of my blanket, I shoved my rifle against him, and blew out his
heart. That's all--no fingers bitten off, no knifing; I merely drove a
little lead into his palpitator."
So saying, he spurred his weary animal to a trot, and was soon hidden
among the underbrush of the intervales. Meek was evidently very
poor. He had scarcely clothing enough to cover his body; and while
talking with us, the frosty winds which sucked up the valley, made him
shiver like an aspen leaf. He reverted to his destitute situation,
and complained of the injustice of his former employers, the little
remuneration he had received for the toils and dangers he had endured
on their account, &c., a complaint which I had {74} heard from every
trapper whom I had met on my journey. The valley opened wider as we
pursued our way along its northern side; the soil, the water, and
vegetation much the same in quantity and quality as those which we
had passed on the 27th. The mountains on either hand spread into
rocky precipitous ridges, piled confusedly one above another in dark
threatening masses. Among them hung, in beautiful wildness from the
crevices of the cliffs, numerous shrub cedars.
The mountain flax was very abundant and ripe. The root resembled that
of perennial plants, the fibres that of the annual blue-bowl of the
States, the flower the same, the seed vessel the same; but the seeds
themselves were much smaller, and of a very dark brown colour. This
valley is the grain-field and root-garden of the Shoshonie Indians;
for there grow in it a number of kinds of edible roots, which they dig
in August, and dry for winter use. There is also here a kind of grass,
bearing a seed of half the size of the common rye, and similar in form.
This they also gather, and parch and store away in leather sacks, for
the season of want. These Indians had been gathering in their roots,
&c., a few {75} days previous to our arrival. I was informed, however,
that the crop was barely sufficient to subsist them while harvesting
it. But, in order to prevent their enemies from finding whatever might
have escaped their own search, they had burned over large sections
of the most productive part. This day's ride was estimated at thirty
miles. Our camp at night was in a dense copse of black alders by the
water-side. Ate our last meat for supper--no prospect of getting more
until we should arrive at Fort Hall, four days' ride.
29th. Up with the sun and on march. After an hour's ride, we came upon
Meek's white horse. He came to us on as fast a gallop, and with as
noisy a neighing as if Zimmerman had never dipt his quill in solitude,
and wrote the laws for destroying nature, for nature's good. Jim now
put spur to his noble animal, with the regularity of the march of
the tread-mill. And, by way of apology for his haste, pointed to the
ground, and laying his head on one shoulder, and snoring, said, "u--gh,
ugh," which being interpreted, meant that our next snoring place was
a very, very long day's journey away. And one acquainted with Indian
firmness, would have read in {76} his countenance, while making this
communication, a determination to reach it before nightfall, whatever
might be the consequences. And so we did. At sunset our camp kettle
was bubbling over the bones of a pelican at the "Steamboat spring."
The part of the valley seen to-day was generally covered with a stout
coat of bunch grass. This, and other indications, led me to suppose it
fertile. Yet it appeared questionable if it would yield the ordinary
fruits of agriculture without being irrigated.[176]
I noticed, however, during the day's ride, a number of points at which
the waters of the river might be conducted over very large tracts of
excellent soil. The scarcity of fencing timber appeared an obstacle,
certainly; but other than this, there seemed to me no considerable
cause of doubt that the valley of the Great Bear River will, in the
course of time, become one of the most prosperous abodes of cultivated
life. Its situation, so remote from either ocean, only increases our
expectation of such an event, when it is recollected that the most
practicable waggon route between the States and Oregon Territory and
the Californias, runs through it.
The north end of the Great Salt Lake is {77} thirty miles from our
present encampment, and the mountains on the borders of the valley are
more abrupt and craggy, the water of the stream more abundant, and the
soil more productive, than in the part already described. A number of
creeks also entering the main stream from the East, open up among the
black heights a number of lesser and charming vales; and around the
union of the river with the Lake are excellent water, soil and timber,
under skies of perpetual spring. Of the Lake itself I heard much from
different individuals who had visited different portions of its coast.
The substance of their statements, in which they all agree, is that it
is about two hundred miles long, eighty or one hundred wide; the water
exceedingly heavy; and so salt, say they in their simple way, that
pieces of wood dipped in it and dried in the sun are thickly frosted
with pure white salt; that its coasts are generally composed of swells
of sand and barren brown loam, on which sufficient moisture does not
fall to sustain any other vegetation than the wild wormwood and prickly
pear; that all attempts to go round it in canoes have, after a day
or two of trial, been abandoned {78} for want of fresh water; that
the Great Bear River is the only considerable stream putting into it;
that high land is seen near the centre of it;--but whether this be an
island or a long peninsula there was a difference of opinion among my
informants. The valleys of the Great Bear River and its tributaries, as
well as the northern portion of the Lake, are supposed to be within the
territory of the States.[177]
The immediate neighbourhood of our encampment is one of the most
remarkable in the Rocky Mountains. The facts that the trail to Oregon
and California will for ever of necessity, pass within three hundred
yards of the place where our camp fire is burning; that near this spot
must be erected a resting-place for the long lines of caravans between
the harbours of the Pacific and the waters of the Missouri, would of
themselves interest all who are witnessing the irresistible movements
of civilization upon the American continent. But this spot has other
objects of interest: its Geology and its Mineralogy, and I might well
say the Chemistry of it, (for there are laboratories and gases here
in the greatest profusion), will hereafter occupy the attention of
the lovers of these sciences. The Soda Springs, called {79} by the
fur traders Beer Springs, are the most remarkable objects of the kind
within my knowledge. They are situated on the north-west side of the
river, a few rods below a grove of shrub cedars, and about two hundred
yards from the shore. There are six groups of them; or in other words,
there are six small hollows sunken about two feet below the ground
around, of circular form, seven or eight feet in diameter, in which are
a number of fountains sending up large quantities of gas and water, and
emitting a noise resembling the boiling of immense cauldrons. These
pools are usually clear, with a gravelly bottom. In some of them,
however, grow bogs or hassocks of coarse grass, among which are many
little wells, where the water bubbled so merrily that I was tempted
to drink at one of them. But as I proceeded to do so, the suffocating
properties of the gas instantly drove me from my purpose. After this
rebuff, however, I made another attempt at a more open fountain, and
drank with little difficulty.
The waters appeared to be more highly impregnated with soda and acid
than those of Saratoga; were extremely pleasant to the taste, and fumed
from the {80} stomach like the soda water of the shops. Some of them
threw off at least four gallons of gas a second. And although they
cast up large masses of water continually, for which there appeared
no outlet, yet at different times of observation I could perceive no
increase or diminution of the quantity visible. There are five or six
other springs in the bank of the river just below, the waters of which
resemble those I have described. One of them discharges about forty
gallons a minute.
One fourth of a mile down stream from the Soda Spring, is what is
called "The Steamboat Spring." The orifice from which it casts its
water is in the face of a perpendicular rock on the brink of the
stream, which seems to have been formed by the depositions of the
fountain. It is eight inches in diameter. Six feet from this, and on
the horizontal plane of the rock, is another orifice in the cavern
below. On approaching the spring, a deep gurgling, hissing sound is
heard underground. It appears to be produced by the generating of gas
in a cavernous receiver. This, when the chamber is filled, bursts
through another cavern filled with water, which it thrusts frothing
and foaming into the stream. In {81} passing the smaller orifice, the
pent gas escapes with very much the same sound as steam makes in the
escape-pipe of a steamboat. Hence the name. The periods of discharge
are very irregular. At times, they occur once in two, at others, once
in three, four or five minutes. The force of its action also is subject
to great variation. Those who have been there, often say that its noise
has been heard to echo far among the hills. When I visited it I could
not hear it at the distance of two hundred yards. There is also said
to be a difference at different times in the temperature of the water.
When I examined it, it was a little above blood heat. Others have seen
it much higher.
The most remarkable phenomenon connected with these springs, remains
yet to be noticed. The whole river, from the Steamboat spring to the
Soda Springs, (a distance of more than a fourth of a mile), is a sheet
of springs, thousands in number, which bursting through two feet of
superincumbent running water, throw their foaming jets, some six
inches, and some less, above the surface. The water is much the same in
its constituent qualities, as that of the Soda springs.[178]
{82} There are in the immediate vicinity of the Steamboat Spring, and
on the opposite side of the river numerous rocks with orifices in their
centres, and other evidences of having been formed by intermittent
springs that have long ago ceased to act.
The scenery around these wonderful fountains, is very wild. To the east
north-east, opens up the upper valley of Great Bear River, walled in
on either side by dark primitive mountains, beetling over the vale,
and towering on the sky. To the south south-west sweeps away the lower
valley.--On either side of it rise lofty mountains of naked rocks, the
wild sublimity of which contrasts strikingly with the sweet beauty of
the stream and vale below.
Although statements in regard to what shall transpire in the future,
are always a work more befitting a seer than a journalist, yet I cannot
forbear expressing the belief that the healthiness and beauty of their
locality--the magnificence of the scenery on the best routes to them
from the States and from the Pacific, the manifest superiority of these
waters over any others, will cause "The Soda Springs" to be thronged
with the gay and fashionable of both sides of the continent.
{83} 30th. Our sleep had been interrupted at midnight by the blazing
fires of an Indian encampment on a neighbouring hill. And once awakened
by such a cause, the tracks of a war party, probably of Blackfeet,
which we had crossed during the day, were sufficient to put us on duty
the remainder of the night. At early dawn, we saddled and moved in
silence a few hundred yards down the river, turned to the right around
the Bute in the rear of the Steamboat spring, entered the "Valley
of chasms," and soon brought the mountains on its northern border,
between us and our suspicious neighbours.
This valley derives its name from the numerous cracks or chasms in the
volcanic rocks on which it rests. They are so wide and deep that the
natives, for many miles at the lower part of it, have been obliged to
run their trail over the lower swells of the hills on its north-western
side. Up this trail Jim rode on a brisk trot, beckoning us, in an
ominous manner to follow, and keep in a body near him. The "cut rock"
and scoriæ lay every where, and crippled the poor animals at almost
every step. Onward he led us, with all the speed which the severest
inflictions of spur and whip could {84} produce, till the shutting in
of night deposited us among the willows on the stream of the valley,
forty miles from our last night's encampment. The rapidity of our
travelling to-day, allowed me little time to examine this singular
valley. I noticed merely that it was, like the intervales of Bear
River, covered with bunch-grass, which the thirsty suns of summer had
dried to hay. A curious gas spring also attracted my attention about
nine o'clock in the morning. Its bubbling and its beautiful reservoir
appeared to arouse the admiration even of my dogged guide Jim: he
halted to look at it. Jim, for the first time since I had had the
honour of his acquaintance, absolutely stopped to look at, and admire a
portion of the earth. It was a fine specimen of Nature's masonry. The
basin was about six feet in diameter; the bottom a circular horizontal
plane; around the edge rose a rim or flanche, eight inches in height;
all one solid rock. In the centre of the bottom arose the gas and
water: the latter was six inches deep, limpid, and slightly acid. This
fountain was situated a few rods to the right of the trail.
31st. We took to our saddles, and in three hours reached the foot of
the mountains {85} which divide the "Valley of chasms" from Snake
River. There is a wide depression through the heights here of so gentle
a declination, that loaded waggons can pass from one valley to the
other without difficulty. Up this we turned. It was covered with green
grass and shrubs and trees, among which a little brook was whispering
to the solitude.[179]
The small birds, too, were chirping among the bright flowers and
bending boughs; and on either hand, as if to guard so much loveliness
from the winds of surrounding desolation, the black crags rose and
frowned one thousand five hundred feet in air. But hunger!! Every bud
was fed; every bird had its nourishment; the lizards even were not
starving. We were. When about half way up the gorge, one of Smith's
horses tired and refused to go farther. The fellow's wound, received in
the plains, had healed; and with strength from time to time, his petty
tyranny towards his animals increased till being entirely recovered,
he seemed to have resumed a degree of malignity towards them whenever
they did not chance to comprehend his wishes, or were unable to comply
with them, that would be incredible if described. In this case, he {86}
cut a strong goad; and following the slow steps of the worn-out animal,
struck her lengthwise over the almost denuded ribs as frequently and as
long as he had strength to do it; and then would rest and strike again
with renewed vengeance, until his beast dropped her head and received
his blows without a movement. Remonstrance, and the astonished gazing
of my savage guide, only increased his severity. And thus he continued
to beat the poor animal, till, being convinced against his will, that
he even could not make a dying horse heed his command, he bestowed upon
her a farewell kick and curse and left her.
About four o'clock we stood on the high ground which divides the
waters of the little brook which we had followed up, from a small
head stream of Portneuf. The valley of the great southern branch of
the Columbia, was spread out before us. Slaking our thirst at a cool
spring, we travelled five miles down the mountain, and encamped in
sight of the Trois Butes.[180] When we halted, I was too much exhausted
with hunger and fatigue to unsaddle my horse. We had been on short
allowance most of the time since leaving Fort David Crockett. The day
on which we arrived at the Soda Springs, I ate {87} the eighth part
of a pelican; the two last past days, nothing. But I suffered less
from the gnawings of hunger than I had on the previous night. A deadly
stupor pervaded the gastric and nervous systems; a sluggish action of
the heart, a dimness of vision and painful prostration of every energy
of life were creeping upon me. After a little rest, however, I crept to
the bushes, and after a long search, found two red rosebuds! These I
gladly ate, and went to my couch to dream of feasts.
The 1st of September was a fine day. The sun was bright and unclouded,
as he came in his strength over the eastern mountains, and awakened us
from our slumbers among the alders on the bank of Portneuf. Hunger,
indeed, was still gnawing at our vitals. But sleep had banished
weariness, and added something to the small stock of our remaining
strength; and the recollection of past perils--perils of floods, of
tempests, of Indian foes--death threatened at every step during a
journey of three months in the plains and mountains--the inspiring
view of the vale of the great southern branch of the Columbia, so
long promised us in hope along our weary way--the fact that we were
in Oregon, unmoored the mind from {88} its anxieties, and shed over
us a gladness which can only be comprehended by those who, having
suffered as we had, have viewed as we did, from some bright height,
their sufferings ended, in the rich, ripe possession of the objects so
ardently sought. We were in Oregon. Fort Hall lay in the plain before
us. Its hospitalities would be enjoyed ere sunset. Our wardrobes were
overhauled, our razors put on duty, our sunburnt frames bathed in the
Portneuf; and equipped in our best, our hearts beat joyfully back
the rapid clattering of our horses' hoofs on the pavements of the
mountains, as we rushed to the plains. An hour among the sands and wild
wormwood, an hour among the oozing springs, and green grass around
them, an hour along the banks of Saptin River, and we passed a line of
timber springing at right angles into the plain; and before us rose the
white battlements of Fort Hall![181]
As we emerged from this wood, Jim intimated that we should discharge
our rifles; and as we did so, a single armed horseman issued from the
gate of the Fort approached us warily, and skulking among the copses,
scanned us in the most inquisitive manner. Having satisfied himself
at {89} last that our skins were originally intended to be white, he
came alongside; and learning that we were from the States; that we had
no hostile intentions; that we knew Mr. Walker to be in the Fort, and
would be glad to have our compliments conveyed to him, he returned;
and Mr. Walker immediately appeared.[182] A friendly salutation was
followed by an invitation to enter the Fort; and a "welcome to Fort
Hall," was given in a manner so kind and obliging, that nothing seemed
wanting to make us feel that we were at home. A generous flagon of Old
Jamaica, wheaten bread, and butter newly churned, and buffalo tongues
fresh from the neighbouring mountains, made their appearance as soon
as we had rid ourselves of the equipage and dust of journeying, and
allayed the dreadful sense of starvation.
FOOTNOTES:
[164] This was the party of which Dr. Wislizenus of St. Louis was
a member (see _ante_, p. 173, note 108). They left the frontier in
a caravan of twenty-seven persons, of whom nine were employés of
Chouteau's fur company, and the others heterogeneous travellers and
immigrants. Wislizenus had intended to go on to Oregon and then to
California; but the divisions in the party, and the lateness of the
season, determined him to return from Fort Hall. Two of his companions
joined him, and they engaged Richardson, who had taken the outward
journey in the capacity of hunter, to guide them back, purposing to
take the southerly route on the return. Dr. Wislizenus had undertaken
this journey for the sake of his health, as well as in order to see
the marvels of the Western mountains. Richardson was chief hunter for
Wyeth's party in 1833. Townsend well describes him in his _Narrative_,
in our volume xxi, pp. 152-155; see also pp 171, 211, 255, 256,
264.--ED.
[165] John S. Griffin (not Griffith) was a native (1807) of Castleton,
Vermont, educated in New England, but taking a theological course at
Oberlin, where he was graduated in 1838. He prepared to go out to
the Indians as an independent missionary, and was dispatched by the
Congregational church in Litchfield, Connecticut. Having engaged Asahel
Munger, a skilled mechanic, to accompany him, he stopped in St. Louis
long enough to marry, and left the frontier the last of April, 1839.
At Fort Hall, Griffin, because of some differences, left Munger and
pushed on to Lapwai, where he spent the winter, Munger having meanwhile
joined Dr. Whitman who gladly employed him at his mission for a year
and a half. In the spring of 1840 Griffin attempted a mission to the
Shoshoni; but becoming discouraged, pressed on to Fort Vancouver,
where he spent the second winter, establishing in 1841 a settlement
at Tualatin Plains, near the present Hillsboro. He was active in
establishing the provisional government, being suggested as candidate
for governor, but opposed on account of his profession. Griffin was the
editor of the first Oregon magazine, _Oregon American and Evangelical
Unionist_, eight numbers of which were published (1848-49). He
established a Congregational church, the first in Washington County,
and lived in Oregon until his death in February, 1899. Munger became
deranged, and as a religious test cast himself into fire, dying from
his injuries, near Salem, Oregon.--ED.
[166] Sometimes spoken of as the bilberry, but more commonly
as the service berry, the fruit of the shad-bush (_Amelanchier
canadensis_).--ED.
[167] What is now known as the Red Cañon, from the color of its
sand-stone walls. See Dellenbaugh, _Romance of the Colorado River_, p.
64.--ED.
[168] Farnham had now entered what is known as the Green River valley,
that portion of the river above the gorges (or cañons) where the banks
are comparatively level. He here joined the Oregon Trail from the
east, which came by way of the Sweetwater River and South Pass; see
Townsend's _Narrative_, in our volume xxi, pp. 183-195. This valley
was, in 1833-34 and later, the site of several famous rendezvous of
fur-traders. See Irving, _Rocky Mountains_, chapter xx.--ED.
[169] For Ham's Fork, which is an affluent of Black Fork of Green, see
Townsend's _Narrative_ in our volume xxi, p. 197, note 43.--ED.
[170] For Long's Peak see our volume xv, p. 271, note 126. It must have
been some nearer peak, however, which Farnham mistook for Long's; the
latter was over a hundred and fifty miles distant.--ED.
[171] The Oregon Short Line follows this route, up Ham's Fork.--ED.
[172] For the American Fur Company see Maximilian's _Travels_ in our
volume xxii, p. 232, note 159.--ED.
[173] Known as Bear River Divide, in Unita County, south-west
Wyoming.--ED.
[174] For a description see our volume xxi, p. 199, note 44.--ED.
[175] Col. Joseph L. Meek (1810-75) was one of the most picturesque
of the "mountain men" who settled in Oregon. An extended account of
his adventures was published by Frances Fuller Victor, under the title
_River of the West_ (Hartford, 1870). Born in Washington County,
Virginia, he left home while still a boy, and in 1829 joined Sublette's
caravan for the mountain trade. During eleven years he experienced
adventures similar to those of other hunters and trappers, in one of
which he killed a grizzly bear. The Englishman Stuart (see our volume
xxi, p. 197, note 42), coming up with his artist Miller, had a sketch
made of the beast which was afterwards elaborated into a picture, and
later a wax model for the St. Louis Museum (_River of the West_, pp.
220-223). Meek went out to Oregon in 1840, settling on Tualatin Plains,
where he was active in establishing the provisional government, of
which he was first sheriff. After the Whitman massacre of 1847 he was
the accredited messenger to Washington, D. C., to obtain consideration
for the condition of Oregon. His visit to the East was replete with
amusing adventures. Returning as United States marshal, he acted as
guide to the party sent to escort to his post the first American
governor of Oregon, General Joseph Lane. Meek was prominent in Oregon
throughout his later life, being generally known as "Uncle Joe," and
he aided in founding the Pioneer Association. See Oregon Pioneer
Association _Transactions_, 1875. His meeting with Farnham is mentioned
by Frances Fuller Victor in _River of the West_, p. 256. For a portrait
of Meek, see the frontispiece to that volume, also Lyman, _History of
Oregon_, iii, p. 66.--ED.
[176] Irrigation has made considerable progress in Bear River valley,
chiefly under the auspices of the settlers of that region.--ED.
[177] Great Salt Lake has one long promontory and several islands. By
his use of the term "territory of the States," Farnham assumes that
Bear valley and a portion of Great Salt Lake lie north of the 42nd
parallel of latitude, then the boundary with Mexico; see our volume
xix, p. 217, note 52. Actually, only a portion of Bear River and none
of Great Salt Lake are north of that latitude.--ED.
[178] See a previous description of this region in Townsend's
_Narrative_, our volume xxi, p. 200. See also Frémont's description,
_Senate Docs._, 28 Cong., 2 sess., 174, pp. 135-138.--ED.
[179] See De Smet's description of this defile in our volume xxvii, p.
248.--ED.
[180] See Townsend's _Narrative_ in our volume xxi, p. 209, note 49;
also p. 249, note 124, of De Smet's _Letters_ in our volume xxvii.--ED.
[181] See account of founding of Fort Hall in Townsend's _Narrative_,
our volume xxi, pp. 210, 211, with accompanying note.--ED.
[182] This may have been Courtney M. Walker, who came out with the Lees
in 1834. He had charge of much of Wyeth's business, and may have been
employed by the Hudson's Bay Company. Wislizenus and Robert Shortess,
both of whom were at Fort Hall in the same year, before and after
Farnham, speaks of Francis Ermatinger as factor in charge, although
Wislizenus also mentions Walker.--ED.