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made available by the Canadian Institute for Historical
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A WOMAN TENDERFOOT
By Grace Gallatin Seton-Thompson
1900
In this Book the full-page Drawings were made by Ernest Seton-Thompson,
G. Wright and E.M. Ashe, and the Marginals by S.N. Abbott. The cover,
title-page and general make-up were designed by the Author. Thanks are
due to Miller Christy for proof revision, and to A.A. Anderson for
valuable suggestions on camp outfitting. (No illustrations are included
in this file.)
THIS BOOK IS A TRIBUTE TO THE WEST.
I have used many Western phrases as necessary to the Western setting.
I can only add that the events related really happened in the Rocky
Mountains of the United States and Canada; and this is why, being a
woman, I wanted to tell about them, in the hope that some
going-to-Europe-in-the-summer-woman may be tempted to go West instead.
G.G.S.-T.
New York City, September 1st, 1900.
CONTENTS
I The Why of It
II Outfit and Advice for the Woman-who-goes-hunting-with-her-husband
III The First Plunge of the Woman Tenderfoot
IV Which Treats of the Imps and My Elk
V Lost in the Mountains
VI The Cook
VII Among the Clouds
VIII At Yeddars
IX My Antelope
X A Mountain Drama
XI What I Know about Wahb of the Bighorn Basin
XII The Dead Hunt
XIII Just Rattlesnakes
XIV As Cowgirl
XV The Sweet Pea Lady Someone Else's Mountain Sheep
XVI In which the Tenderfoot Learns a New Trick
XVII _Our_ Mine
XVIII The Last Word
A LIST OF FULL-PAGE DRAWINGS.
Costume for cross saddle riding
Tears starting from your smoke-inflamed eyes
Saddle cover for wet weather Policeman's equestrian rain coat
She was postmistress twice a week
The trail was lost in a gully
Whetted one to a razor edge and threw it into a tree where it stuck
quivering
Not three hundred yards away ... were two bull elk in deadly combat
Down the path came two of the prettiest Blacktails
A misstep would have sent us flying over the cliff
Thus I fought through the afternoon
We whizzed across the railroad track in front of the Day Express
Five feet full in front of us, they pulled their horses to a dead stop
The coyotes made savage music
The horrid thing was ready for me I started on a gallop, swinging one
arm
The warm beating heart of a mountain sheep
I could not keep away from his hoofs
We started forward, just as the rear wheels were hovering over the edge
"You better not sit down on that kaig ... It's nitroglycerine"
The tunnel caused its roof to cave in close behind me
A mountain lion sneaked past my saddle-pillowed head
I.
THE WHY OF IT.
Theoretically, I have always agreed with the Quaker wife who reformed her
husband--"Whither thou goest, I go also, Dicky dear." What thou doest, I
do also, Dicky dear. So when, the year after our marriage, Nimrod
announced that the mountain madness was again working in his blood, and
that he must go West and take up the trail for his holiday, I tucked my
summer-watering-place-and-Europe-flying-trip mind away (not without
regret, I confess) and cautiously tried to acquire a new vocabulary and
some new ideas.
Of course, plenty of women have handled guns and have gone to the Rocky
Mountains on hunting trips--but they were not among my friends. However,
my imagination was good, and the outfit I got together for my first trip
appalled that good man, my husband, while the number of things I had to
learn appalled me.
In fact, the first four months spent 'Out West' were taken up in
learning how to ride, how to dress for it, how to shoot, and how
to philosophise, each of which lessons is a story in itself. But briefly,
in order to come to this story, I must have a side talk with the
Woman-who-goes-hunting-with-her-husband. Those not interested please omit
the next chapter.
II.
OUTFIT AND ADVICE FOR THE WOMAN-WHO-GOES-HUNTING-WITH-HER-HUSBAND.
Is it really so that most women say no to camp life because they are
afraid of being uncomfortable and looking unbeautiful? There is no reason
why a woman should make a freak of herself even if she is going to rough
it; as a matter of fact I do not rough it, I go for enjoyment and leave
out all possible discomforts. There is no reason why a woman should be
more uncomfortable out in the mountains, with the wild west wind for
companion and the big blue sky for a roof, than sitting in a 10 by 12
whitewashed bedroom of the summer hotel variety, with the tin roof to
keep out what air might be passing. A possible mosquito or gnat in the
mountains is no more irritating than the objectionable personality that
is sure to be forced upon you every hour at the summer hotel. The usual
walk, the usual drive, the usual hop, the usual novel, the usual
scandal,--in a word, the continual consciousness of self as related to
dress, to manners, to position, which the gregarious living of a hotel
enforces--are all right enough once in a while; but do you not get enough
of such life in the winter to last for all the year?
Is one never to forget that it is not proper to wear gold beads with
crape? Understand, I am not to be set down as having any charity for the
ignoramus who would wear that combination, but I wish to record the fact
that there are times, under the spell of the West, when I simply do not
_care_ whether there are such things as gold beads and crape; when the
whole business of city life, the music, arts, drama, the pleasant
friends, equally with the platitudes of things and people you care not
about--civilization, in a word--when all these fade away from my thoughts
as far as geographically they are, and in their place comes the joy of
being at least a healthy, if not an intelligent, animal. It is a pleasure
to eat when the time comes around, a good old-fashioned pleasure, and you
need no dainty serving to tempt you. It is another pleasure to use your
muscles, to buffet with the elements, to endure long hours of riding, to
run where walking would do, to jump an obstacle instead of going around
it, to return, physically at least, to your pinafore days when you
played with your brother Willie. Red blood means a rose-colored world.
Did you feel like that last summer at Newport or Narragansett?
So enough; come with me and learn how to be vulgarly robust.
Of course one must have clothes and personal comforts, so, while we are
still in the city humor, let us order a habit suitable for riding
astride. Whipcord, or a closely woven homespun, in some shade of grayish
brown that harmonizes with the landscape, is best. Corduroy is pretty, if
you like it, but rather clumsy. Denham will do, but it wrinkles and
becomes untidy. Indeed it has been my experience that it is economy to
buy the best quality of cloth you can afford, for then the garment always
keeps its shape, even after hard wear, and can be cleaned and made ready
for another year, and another, and another. You will need it, never
fear. Once you have opened your ears, "the Red Gods" will not cease to
"call for you."
In Western life you are on and off your horse at the change of a thought.
Your horse is not an animate exercise-maker that John brings around for a
couple of hours each morning; he is your companion, and shares the
vicissitudes of your life. You even consult him on occasion, especially
on matters relating to the road. Therefore your costume must look equally
well on and off the horse. In meeting this requirement, my woes were
many. I struggled valiantly with everything in the market, and finally,
from five varieties of divided skirts and bloomers, the following
practical and becoming habit was evolved.
I speak thus modestly, as there is now a trail of patterns of this habit
from the Atlantic to the Pacific coast. Wherever it goes, it makes
converts, especially among the wives of army officers at the various
Western posts where we have been--for the majority of women in the West,
and I nearly said all the sensible ones, now ride astride.
When off the horse, there is nothing about this habit to distinguish it
from any trim golf suit, with the stitching up the left front which is
now so popular. When on the horse, it looks, as some one phrased it, as
though one were riding side saddle on both sides. This is accomplished by
having the fronts of the skirt double, free nearly to the waist, and,
when off the horse, fastened by patent hooks. The back seam is also open,
faced for several inches, stitched and closed by patent fasteners. Snug
bloomers of the same material are worn underneath. The simplicity of
this habit is its chief charm; there is no superfluous material to sit
upon--oh, the torture of wrinkled cloth in the divided skirt!--and it
does not fly up even in a strong wind, if one knows how to ride. The
skirt is four inches from the ground--it should not bell much on the
sides--and about three and a half yards at the bottom, which is finished
with a five-inch stitched hem.
[Illustration: COSTUME FOR CROSS SADDLE RIDING. Designed by the Author.]
Any style of jacket is of course suitable. One that looks well on the
horse is tight fitting, with postilion back, short on hips, sharp pointed
in front, with single-breasted vest of reddish leather (the habit
material of brown whipcord), fastened by brass buttons, leather collar
and revers, and a narrow leather band on the close-fitting sleeves. A
touch of leather on the skirt in the form of a patch pocket is
harmonious, but any extensive leather trimming on the skirt makes it
unnecessarily heavy.
A suit of this kind should be as irreproachable in fit and finish as a
tailor can make it. This is true economy, for when you return in the
autumn it is ready for use as a rainy-day costume.
Once you have your habit, the next purchase should be stout, heavy soled
boots, 13 or 14 inches high, which will protect the leg in walking and
from the stirrup leather while riding. One needs two felt hats (never
straw), one of good quality for sun or rain, with large firm brim. This
is important, for if the brim be not firm the elements will soon reduce
it to raglike limpness and it will flap up and down in your face as you
ride. This can be borne with composure for five or ten minutes, but not
for days and weeks at a time. The other felt hat may be as small and as
cheap as you like. Only see that it combines the graces of comfort and
becomingness. It is for evenings, and sunless rainless days. A small
brown felt, with a narrow leather band, gilt buckle, and a twist of
orange veiling around the crown, is pretty for the whipcord costume.
One can do a wonderful amount of smartening up with tulle, hat pins,
belts, and fancy neck ribbons, all of which comparatively take up no room
and add no weight, always the first consideration. Be sure you supply
yourself with a reserve of hat pins. Two devices by which they may be
made to stay in the hat are here shown. The spiral can be given to any
hat pin. The chain and small brooch should be used if the hat pin is of
much value.
At this point, if any man, a reviewer perhaps, has delved thus far into
the mysteries of feminine outfit, he will probably remark, "Why take a
hat pin of much value?" to which I reply; "Why not? Can you suggest any
more harmless or useful vent for woman's desire to ornament herself? And
unless you want her to be that horror of horrors, a strong-minded woman,
do you think you can strip her for three months of all her gewgaws and
still have her filled with the proper desire to be pleasing in your eyes?
No; better let her have the hat pins--and you know they really are
useful--and then she will dress up to those hat pins, if it is only with
a fresh neck ribbon and a daisy at her belt."
I had a man's saddle, with a narrow tree and high pommel and cantle, such
as is used out West, and as I had not ridden a horse since the hazy days
of my infancy, I got on the huge creature's back with everything to
learn. Fear enveloped me as in a cloud during my first ride, and the
possibilities of the little cow pony they put me on seemed more
awe-inspiring than those of a locomotive. But I have been reading
Professor William James and acquired from him the idea (I hope I do not
malign him) that the accomplishment of a thing depends largely upon one's
mental attitude, and this was mine all nicely taken--in New York:--
"This thing has been done before, and done well. Good; then I can do it,
and _enjoy_ it too."
I particularly insisted upon the latter clause--in the East. This
formula is applicable in any situation. I never should have gotten
through my Western experiences without it, and I advise you, my dear
Woman-who-goes-hunting-with-her-husband, to take a large stock of it made
up and ready for use. There is one other rule for your conduct, if you
want to be a success: think what you like, but unless it is pleasant,
_don't say it_.
Is it better to ride astride? I will not carry the battle ground into the
East, although even here I have my opinion; but in the West, in the
mountains, there can be no question that it is the _only way_. Here is an
example to illustrate: Two New York women, mother and daughter, took a
trip of some three hundred miles over the pathless Wind River Mountains.
The mother rode astride, but the daughter preferred to exhibit her
Durland Academy accomplishment, and rode sidesaddle, according to the
fashion set by an artful queen to hide her deformity. The advantages of
health, youth and strength were all with the daughter; yet in every case
on that long march it was the daughter who gave out first and compelled
the pack train to halt while she and her horse rested. And the daughter
was obliged to change from one horse to another, while the same horse was
able to carry the mother, a slightly heavier woman, through the trip. And
the back of the horse which the daughter had ridden chiefly was in such a
condition from saddle galls that the animal, two months before a
magnificent creature, had to be shot.
I hear you say, "But that was an extreme case." Perhaps it was, but it
supports the verdict of the old mountaineers who refuse to let any horse
they prize be saddled with "those gol-darned woman fripperies."
There is also another side. A woman at best is physically handicapped
when roughing it with husband or brother. Then why increase that handicap
by wearing trailing skirts that catch on every log and bramble, and which
demand the services of at least one hand to hold up (fortunately this
battle is already won), and by choosing to ride side-saddle, thus making
it twice as difficult to mount and dismount by yourself, which in fact
compels you to seek the assistance of a log, or stone, or a friendly hand
for a lift? Western riding is not Central Park riding, nor is it Rotten
Row riding. The cowboy's, or military, seat is much simpler and easier
for both man and beast than the Park seat--though, of course, less
stylish. That is the glory of it; you can go galloping over the prairie
and uplands with never a thought that the trot is more proper, and your
course, untrammelled by fenced-in roads, is straight to the setting sun
or to yonder butte. And if you want a spice of danger, it is there,
sometimes more than you want, in the presence of badger and gopher holes,
to step into which while at high speed may mean a broken leg for your
horse, perhaps a broken neck for yourself. But to return to the
independence of riding astride:
One day I was following a game trail along a very steep bank which ended
a hundred feet below in a granite precipice. It had been raining and
snowing in a fitful fashion, and the clay ground was slippery, making a
most treacherous footing. One of the pack animals just ahead of my horse
slipped, fell to his knees, the heavy pack overbalanced him, and away he
rolled over and over down the slope, to be stopped from the precipice
only by the happy accident of a scrub tree in the way. Frightened by this
sight, my animal plunged, and he, too, lost his footing. Had I been
riding side-saddle, nothing could have saved me, for the downhill was on
the near side; but instead I swung out of the saddle on the off side and
landed in a heap on the uphill, still clutching the bridle. That act
saved my horse's life, probably, as well as my own. For the sudden weight
I put on the upper side as I swung off enabled him to recover his balance
just in time. I do not pretend to say that I can dismount from the off
side as easily as from the near, because I am not accustomed to it. But I
have frequently done it in emergencies, while a side-saddle leaves one
helpless in this case as in many others.
Besides being unable to mount and dismount without assistance it is very
difficult to get side-saddle broken horses, and it usually means a horse
so broken in health and spirits that he does not care what is being
strapped on his back and dangling on one side of him only. And to be on
such an animal means that you are on the worst mount of the outfit, and I
am sure that it requires little imagination on any one's part to know
therein lies misery. Oh! the weariness of being the weakest of the party
and the worst mounted--to be always at the tail end of the line, never to
be able to keep up with the saddle horses when they start off for a
canter, to expend your stock of vitality, which you should husband for
larger matters, in urging your beast by voice and quirt to further
exertion! Never place yourself in such a position. The former you cannot
help, but you can lessen it by making use of such aids to greater
independence as wearing short skirts and riding astride, and having at
least as good a horse as there is in the outfit. Then you will get the
pleasure from your outing that you have the right to expect--that is, if
you adhere to one other bit of advice, or rather two.
The first is: See that for your camping trip is provided a man cook.
I wish that I could put a charm over the next few words so that only the
woman reader could understand, but as I cannot I must repeat boldly: Dear
woman who goes hunting with her husband, be sure that you have it
understood that you do no cooking, or dishwashing. I think that the
reason women so often dislike camping out is because the only really
disagreeable part of it is left to them as a matter of course. Cooking
out of doors at best is trying, and certainly you cannot be care free,
camp-life's greatest charm, when you have on your mind the boiling of
prunes and beans, or when tears are starting from your smoke-inflamed
eyes as you broil the elk steak for dinner. No, indeed! See that your
guide or your horse wrangler knows how to cook, and expects to do it.
He is used to it, and, anyway, is paid for it. He is earning his living,
you are taking a vacation.
Now for the second advice, which is a codicil to the above: In return for
not having to potter with the food and tinware, _never complain about
it_. Eat everything that is set before you, shut your eyes to possible
dirt, or, if you cannot, leave the particular horror in question
untouched, but without comment. Perhaps in desperation you may assume the
role of cook yourself. Oh, foolish woman, if you do, you only exchange
your woes for worse ones.
If you provide yourself with the following articles and insist upon
having them reserved for you, and then let the cook furnish everything
else, you will be all right:--
_An aluminum plate made double for hot water_. This is a very little
trouble to fill, and insures a comfortable meal; otherwise, your meat and
vegetables will be cold before you can eat them, and the gravy will have
a thin coating of ice on it. It is always cold night and morning in the
mountains. And if you do not need the plate heated you do not have to
fill it; that's all. I am sure my hot-water plate often saved me from
indigestion and made my meals things to enjoy instead of to endure.
_Two cups and saucers of white enamel ware_. They always look clean and
do not break.
_One silver-plated knife and fork and two teaspoons_.
_One folding camp chair_.
N.B.--Provide your husband or brother or sister precisely the same; no
more, no less.
_Japanese napkins_, enough to provide two a day for the party.
_Two white enamel vegetable dishes_.
_One folding camp table_.
_One candle lamp, with enough candles_. Then leave all the rest of the
cooking outfit to your cook and trust in Providence. (If you do not
approve of Providence, a full aluminum cooking outfit can be bought so
that one pot or pan nests in the other, the whole very complete, compact
and light.)
Come what may, you have your own particular clean hot plate, cup and
saucer, knife, fork, spoon and napkin, with a table to eat from and a
chair to sit on and a lamp to see by, if you are eating after dark--which
often happens--and nothing else matters, but food.
If you want to be canny you will have somewhere in your own pack a modest
supply of condensed soups and vegetables, a box or two of meat crackers,
and three or four bottles of bouillon, to be brought out on occasions of
famine. Anyway it is a comfort to know that you have provided against the
wolf. So much for your part of the eating; now for the sleeping. If you
do not sleep warm and comfortable at night, the joys of camping are as
dust in the mouth. The most glorious morning that Nature ever produced is
a weariness to the flesh of the owl-eyed. So whatever else you leave
behind, be sure your sleeping arrangements are comfortable. The following
is the result of three years' experience:--
_A piece of waterproof brown canvas_, 7 by 10 feet, bound with tape
and supplied with two heavy leather straps nine feet long, with strong
buckles at one end and fastened to the canvas by means of canvas
loops, and one leather strap six feet long that crosses the other two
at right angles.
_One rubber air bed_, 36 by 76 inches (don't take a narrower size or you
will be uncomfortable), fitted with large size double valve at each end.
This bed is six inches thick when blown full of air. Be sure that sides
are inserted, thus making two seams to join together the top and bottom
six inches apart. If the top and bottom are fastened directly together,
your bed slopes down at the sides, which is always disagreeable.
_A sleeping bag_, with the canvas cover made the full 36 inches wide.
This cover should hold two blanket bags of different weight, and if you
are wise you will have made an eider-down bag to fit inside all of these
for very cold weather. The eider bag costs about $16.00 or $18.00, but
is worth it if you are going to camp out in the mountains after August.
Do without one or two summer hats, but get it, for it is the keynote of
camp comfort.
Then you want a lamb's wool night wrapper, a neutral grey or brown in
color, a set of heavy night flannels, some heavy woollen stockings and a
woollen tam o' shanter large enough to pull down over the ears. A
hot-water bag, also, takes up no room and is heavenly on a freezing
night when the wind is howling through the trees and snow threatens.
N.B.--See that your husband or brother has a similar outfit, or he will
borrow yours.
The sleeping bags should be separated and dried either by sun or fire
every other day.
_Always keep all your sleeping things together in your bed roll_, and
your husband's things together in his bed bundle. It will save you many a
sigh and weary hunt in the dark and cold. The tent and such things, you
can afford to leave to your guide or to luck. If one wishes to provide a
tent, brown canvas is far preferable to white. It does not make a glare
of light, nor does it stand out aggressively in the landscape. You have
your little nightly kingdom waiting for you and can sleep cosily if
nothing else is provided. Whenever possible, get your bed blown up and
your sleeping bags in order on top and your sleeping things together
where you can put your hands on them during the daylight, or if that is
impossible, make it the first thing you do when you make camp, while the
cook is getting supper. Then, as you eat supper and sit near the camp
fire to keep warm, you have the sweet consciousness that over there, in
the blackness is a snug little nest all ready to receive your tired self.
And if some morning you want to see what you have escaped, just unscrew
the air valve to your bed before you rise, and when you come down on the
hard, bumpy ground, in less time than it takes to tell, you will agree
with me that there is nothing so rare as resting on air. Nimrod used to
play this trick on me occasionally when it was time to get up--it is more
efficacious than any alarm clock--but somehow he never seemed to enjoy it
when I did it to him.
For riding, it is better to carry your own saddle and bridle and to buy a
saddle horse upon leaving the railroad. You can look to the guides for
all the rest, such as pack saddles, pack animals, etc.
My saddle is a strong but light-weight California model; that is, with
pommel and cantle on a Whitman tree. It is fitted with gun-carrying case
of the same leather and saddle-bag on the skirt of each side, and has a
leather roll at the back strapped on to carry an extra jacket and a
slicker. (A rain-coat is most important. I use a small size of the New
York mounted policemen's mackintosh, made by Goodyear. It opens front and
back and has a protecting cape for the hands.) The saddle has also small
pommel bags in which are matches, compass, leather thongs, knife and a
whistle (this last in case I get lost), and there are rings and strings
in which other bundles such as lunch can be attached while on the march.
A horsehair army saddle blanket saves the animal's back. Nimrod's saddle
is exactly like mine, only with longer and larger stirrups.
[Illustration: I. SADDLE COVER FOR WET WEATHER. Designed by A.A.
Anderson.]
[Illustration: II. POLICEMAN'S EQUESTRIAN RAIN COAT.]
You have now your personal things for eating, sleeping and riding. It
remains but to clothe yourself and you are ready to start. Provide
yourself with two or three champagne baskets covered with brown
waterproof canvas, with stout handles at each end and two leather straps
going round the basket to buckle the lid down, and a stronger strap going
lengthwise over all. Or if you do not mind a little more expense,
telescopes made of leatheroid, about 22 inches long, 11 inches wide and 9
inches deep, with the lower corners rounded so they will not stick into
the horse, and fitted with straps and handles, make the ideal travelling
case; for they can be shipped from place to place on the railroad and can
be packed, one on each side of a horse. They are much to be preferred to
the usual Klondike bag for convenience in packing and unpacking one's
things and in protecting them.
It is hardly necessary to say that clothes have to be kept down to the
limit of comfort. Into the telescopes or baskets should go warm flannels,
extra pair of heavy boots, several flannel shirt waists, extra riding
habit and bloomers, fancy neck ribbons and a belt or two--for why look
worse than your best at any time?--a long warm cloak and a chamois jacket
for cold weather, snow overshoes, warm gloves and mittens too, and some
woollen stockings. Be sure you take flannels. This is the advice of one
who never wears them at any other time. A veil or two is very useful, as
the wind is often high and biting, and I was much annoyed with wisps of
hair around my eyes, and also with my hair coming down while on
horseback, until I hit upon the device of tying a brown liberty silk veil
over the hair and partially over the ears before putting on a sombrero.
This veil was not at all unbecoming, being the same color as my hair, and
it served the double purpose of keeping unruly locks in order and
keeping my ears warm. A hair net is also useful.
Then you must not forget a rubber bath tub, a rubber wash basin, sponge,
towels, soap, and toilet articles generally, including camphor ice for
chapped lips and pennyroyal vaseline salve for insect bites. A brown
linen case is invaluable to hold all these toilet necessaries, so that
you can find them quickly. A sewing kit should be supplied, a flask of
whiskey, and a small "first-aid" outfit; a bottle of Perry Davis pain
killer or Pond's extract; but no more bottles than must be, as they are
almost sure to be broken. In your husband's box, ammunition takes the
place of toilet articles. I shall pass over the guns with the bare
mention that I use a 30.30 Winchester, smokeless. For railroad purposes
all this outfit for two goes into two trunks and a box--one trunk for all
the bedding and night things: the other for all the clothing, guns,
ammunition, eating things, and incidentals. The box holds the saddles,
bridles, and horse things.
In a pack train, the bed-rolls, weighing about fifty pounds each, go on
either side of one horse, and the telescopes on each side of another
horse--in both cases not a full load, and leaving room on the top of the
pack for a tent and other camp things. The saddles, of course, go on the
saddle horses. The cost of such an outfit, in New York, is about two
hundred dollars each; but it lasts for years and brings you in large
returns in health and consequent happiness.
I am willing to wager my horsehair rope (specially designed for keeping
off snakes) that a summer in the Rockies would enable you to cheat time
of at least two years, and you would come home and join me in the ranks
of converts from the usual summer sort of thing. Will you try it? If you
do, how you will pity your unfortunate friends who have never known what
it is to sleep on the south side of a sage brush, and honestly say in the
morning, "It is wonderful how well I am feeling."
But to begin:--
III.
THE FIRST PLUNGE OF THE WOMAN TENDERFOOT.
It was about midnight in the end of August when Nimrod and I tumbled off
the train at Market Lake, Idaho. Next morning, after a comfortable
night's rest at the "hotel," our rubber beds, sleeping bags, saddles,
guns, clothing, and ourselves were packed into a covered wagon, drawn by
four horses, and we started for Jackson's Hole in charge of a driver who
knew the road perfectly. At least, that was what he said, so of course he
must have known it. But his memory failed him sadly the first day out,
which reduced him to the necessity of inquiring of the neighbours. As
these were unsociably placed from thirty to fifty miles apart, there were
many times when the little blind god of chance ruled our course.
We put up for the night at Rexburgh, after forty long miles of alkali
dust. The Mormon religion has sent a thin arm up into that country, and
the keeper of the log building he called a hotel was of that faith. The
history of our brief stay there belongs properly to the old torture days
of the Inquisition, for the Mormon's possessions of living creatures
were many, and his wives and children were the least of them.
Another day of dust and long hard miles over gradually rising hills, with
the huge mass of the Tetons looming ever nearer, and the next day we
climbed the Teton Pass.
There is nothing extraordinary about climbing the Teton Pass--to tell
about. We just went up, and then we went down. It took six horses half a
day to draw us up the last mile--some twenty thousand seconds of
conviction on my part (unexpressed, of course; see side talk) that the
next second would find us dashed to everlasting splinters. And it took
ten minutes to get us down!
Of the two, I preferred going up. If you have ever climbed a greased pole
during Fourth of July festivities in your grandmother's village, you
will understand.
When we got to the bottom there was something different. Our driver
informed us that in two hours we should be eating dinner at the ranch
house in Jackson's Hole, where we expected to stop for a while to
recuperate from the past year's hard grind and the past two weeks of
travel. This was good news, as it was then five o'clock and our midday
meal had been light--despite the abundance of coffee, soggy potatoes,
salt pork, wafer slices of meat swimming in grease, and evaporated
apricots wherein some nice red ants were banqueting.
"We'll just cross the Snake River, and then it'll be plain sailing," he
said. Perhaps it was so. I was inexperienced in the West. This was what
followed:--Closing the door on the memory of my recent perilous
passage, I prepared to be calm inwardly, as I like to think I was
outwardly. The Snake River is so named because for every mile it goes
ahead it retreats half way alongside to see how well it has been done. I
mention this as a pleasing instance of a name that really describes the
thing named. But this is after knowledge.
About half past five, we came to a rolling tumbling yellow stream where
the road stopped abruptly with a horrid drop into water that covered the
hubs of the wheels. The current was strong, and the horses had to
struggle hard to gain the opposite bank. I began to thank my patron saint
that the Snake River was crossed.
Crossed? Oh, no! A narrow strip of pebbly road, and the high willows
suddenly parted to disclose another stream like the last, but a
little deeper, a little wider, a little worse. We crossed it. I made
no comments.
At the third stream the horses rebelled. There are many things four
horses can do on the edge of a wicked looking river to make it
uncomfortable, but at last they had to go in, plunging madly, and
dragging the wagon into the stream nearly broadside, which made at least
one in the party consider the frailty of human contrivances when matched
against a raging flood.
Soon there was another stream. I shall not describe it. When we
eventually got through it, the driver stopped his horses to rest, wiped
his brow, went around the wagon and pulled a few ropes tighter, cut a
willow stick and mended his broken whip, gave a hitch to his trousers,
and remarked as he started the horses:
"Now, when we get through the Snake River on here a piece, we'll be
all right."
"I thought we had been crossing it for the past hour," I was feminine
enough to gasp.
"Oh, yes, them's forks of it; but the main stream's on ahead, and it's
mighty treacherous, too," was the calm reply.
When we reached the Snake River, there was no doubt that the others were
mere forks. Fortunately, Joe Miller and his two sons live on the opposite
bank, and make a living by helping people escape destruction from the
mighty waters. Two men waved us back from the place where our driver was
lashing his horses into the rushing current, and guided us down stream
some distance. One of them said:
"This yere ford changes every week, but I reckon you might try here."
We did.
Had my hair been of the dramatic kind that realises situations, it would
have turned white in the next ten minutes. The water was over the horses'
backs immediately, the wagon box was afloat, and we were being borne
rapidly down stream in the boiling seething flood, when the wheels struck
a shingly bar which gave the horses a chance to half swim, half plunge.
The two men, who were on horseback, each seized one of the leaders, and
kept his head pointed for a cut in the bank, the only place where we
could get out.
Everything in the wagon was afloat. A leather case with a forty dollar
fishing rod stowed snugly inside slipped quietly off down stream. I
rescued my camera from the same fate just in time. Overshoes, wraps,
field glasses, guns, were suddenly endowed with motion. Another moment
and we should surely have sunk, when the horses, by a supreme effort,
managed to scramble on to the bank, but were too exhausted to draw more
than half of the wagon after them, so that it was practically on end in
the water, our outfit submerged, of course, and ourselves reclining as
gracefully as possible on the backs of the seats.
Had anything given away then, there might have been a tragedy. The two
men immediately fastened a rope to the tongue of the wagon, and each
winding an end around the pommel of his saddle, set his cow pony
pulling. Our horses made another effort, and up we came out of the
water, wet, storm tossed, but calm. Oh, yes--calm! After that, earth
had no terrors for me; the worst road that we could bump over was but an
incident. I was not surprised that it grew dark very soon, and that we
blundered on and on for hours in the night until the near wheeler just
lay down in the dirt, a dark spot in the dark road, and our driver,
after coming back from a tour of inspection on foot, looked worried. I
mildly asked if we would soon cross Snake River, but his reply was an
admission that he was lost. There was nothing visible but the twinkling
stars and a dim outline of the grim Tetons. The prospect was excellent
for passing the rest of the night where we were, famished, freezing, and
so tired I could hardly speak.
But Nimrod now took command. His first duty, of course, being a man, was
to express his opinion of the driver in terms plain and comprehensive;
then he loaded his rifle and fired a shot. If there were any mountaineers
around, they would understand the signal and answer.
We waited. All was silent as before. Two more horses dropped to the
ground. Then he sent another loud report into the darkness. In a few
moments we thought we heard a distant shout, then the report of a gun
not far away.
Nimrod mounted the only standing horse and went in the direction of the
sound. Then followed an interminable silence. I hallooed, but got no
answer. The wildest fears for Nimrod's safety tormented me. He had fallen
into a gully, the horse had thrown him, _he_ was lost.
Then I heard a noise and listened eagerly. The driver said it was a
coyote howling up on the mountain. At last voices did come to me from out
of the blackness, and Nimrod returned with a man and a fresh horse. The
man was no other than the owner of the house for which we were searching,
and in ten minutes I was drying myself by his fireplace, while his
hastily aroused wife was preparing a midnight supper for us.
To this day, I am sure that driver's worst nightmare is when he lives
over again the time when he took a tenderfoot and his wife into Jackson's
Hole, and, but for the tenderfoot, would have made them stay out
overnight, wet, famished, frozen, within a stone's throw of the very
house for which they were looking.
IV.
WHICH TREATS OF THE IMPS AND MY ELK.
"If you want to see elk, you just follow up the road till you strike a
trail on the left, up over that hog's back, and that will bring you in a
mile or so on to a grassy flat, and in two or three miles more you come
to a lake back in the mountains."
Mrs. Cummings, the speaker, was no ordinary woman of Western make. She
had been imported from the East by her husband three years before. She
had been 'forelady in a corset factory,' when matrimony had enticed her
away, and the thought that walked beside her as she baked, and washed,
and fed the calves, was that some day she would go 'back East.' And this
in spite of the fact that for those parts she was very comfortable.
Her log house was the largest in the country, barring Captain Jones's,
her nearest neighbour, ten miles up at Jackson's Lake, and his was a
hotel. Hers could boast of six rooms and two clothes' closets. The
ceilings were white muslin to shut off the rafters, the sitting room had
wall-paper and a rag carpet, and in one corner was the post-office.
The United States Government Post-office of Deer, Wyoming, took up
two compartments of Mrs. Cummings' writing desk, and she was called
upon to be postmistress fifteen minutes twice a week, when the small boy,
mounted on a tough little pony, happened around with the leather bag
which carried the mail to and from Jackson, thirty miles below.
[Illustration: SHE WAS POSTMISTRESS TWICE A WEEK.]
"I'd like some elk meat mighty well for dinner," Mrs. Cummings continued,
as she leaned against the kitchen door and watched us mount our newly
acquired horses, "but you won't find game around here without a
guide--Easterners never do."
Nimrod and I started off in joyous mood. The secret of it, the
fascination of the wild life, was revealed to me. At last I understood
why the birds sing. The glorious exhilaration of the mountains, the
feeling that life is a rosy dream, and that all the worry and the fever
and the fret of man's making is a mere illusion that has faded away into
the past, and is not worth while; that the real life is to be free, to
fly over the grassy mountain meadow with never a limitation of fence or
house, with the eternal peaks towering around you, terrible in their
grandeur and vastness, yet inviting.
We struck the trail all right, we thought, but it soon disappeared and we
had to govern our course by imagination, an uncertain guide at best. We
got into dreadful tangles of timber; the country was all strange, and the
trees spread over the mountain for miles, so that it was like trying to
find the way under a blanket; but we kept on riding our horses over
fallen logs and squeezing them between trees, all the time keeping a
sharp watch over them, for they were fresh and scary.
Finally, after three hours' hard climbing, we emerged from the forest on
to a great bare shoulder of the mountain, from which the whole country
around, vast and beautiful, could be seen. We took bearings and tried to
locate that lake, and we finally decided that a wooded basin three miles
away looked likely to contain it.
In order to get to it, we had to cross a wooded ravine, very steep and
torn out by a recent cloudburst. We rode the horses down places that I
shudder in remembering, and I had great trouble in keeping away from the
front feet of my horse as I led him, especially when there were little
gullies that had to be jumped.
It was exciting enough, and hard work, too, every nerve on a tingle and
one's heart thumping with the unwonted exercise at that altitude; but oh,
the glorious air, the joy of life and motion that was quite unknown to my
reception and theatre-going self in the dim far away East!
We searched for that lake all day, and at nightfall went home confident
that we could find it on the morrow.
Mrs. Cummings' smile clearly expressed 'I told you so,' and she remarked
as she served supper: "When my husband comes home next week, he will take
you where you can find game."
The next morning we again took some lunch in the saddle bag and started
for that elusive spot we had christened Cummings' Lake. About three
o'clock we found it--a beautiful patch of water in the heart of the
forest, nestling like a jewel, back in the mountains.
We picketed the horses at a safe distance, so that they could not be seen
or heard from the lake. At one end the shore sloped gradually into the
water, and here Nimrod discovered many tracks of elk, a few deer, and one
set of black bear. He said the lake was evidently a favourite drinking
place, that a band of elk had been coming daily to water, and that,
according to their habits, they ought to come again before dusk.
So we concealed ourselves on a little bluff to the right and waited. The
sun had begun to cast long lines on the earth, and the little circle of
water was already in shadow when Nimrod held up his finger as a warning
for silence. We listened. We were so still that the whole world seemed to
be holding its breath.
I heard a faint noise as of a snapping branch, then some light thuds
along the ground, and to the left of us out of the dark forest, a dainty
creature flitted along the trail and playfully splashed into the water.
Six others of her sisters followed her, with two little ones, and they
were all splashing about in the water like so many sportive mermaids when
their lordly master appeared--a fine bull elk who seemed to me, as he
sedately approached the edge of the lake, to be nothing but horns.
I shall never forget the picture of this family at home--the quiet lake
encircled by forest and towered over by mountains; the gentle graceful
creatures full of life playing about in the water, now drinking, now
splashing it in cooling showers upon one another; the solicitude of a
mother that her young one should come to no harm; and then the head of
them all proceeding with dignity to bathe with his harem.
Had I to do again what followed, I hope I should act differently. Nimrod
was watching them with a rapt expression, quite forgetful of the rifle in
his hands, when I, who had never seen anything killed, touched his arm
and whispered: "Shoot, shoot now, if you are going to."
The report of the rifle rang out like a cannon. The does fled away as if
by magic. The stag tried also to get to shore, but the ball had
inflicted a wound which partially paralysed his hindquarters. At the
sight of the blood and the big fellow's struggles to get away, the
horror of the thing swept over me. "Oh, kill him, kill him!" I wailed.
"Don't let him suffer!"
But here the hunter in Nimrod answered: "If I kill him now, I shall never
be able to get him. Wait until he gets out of the water."
The next few seconds, with that struggling thing in the water, seemed an
eternity of agony to me. Then another loud bang caused the proud head
with its weight of antlers to sink to the wet bank never to rise again.
Later, as I dried my tears, I asked Nimrod:
"Where is the place to aim if you want to kill an animal instantly, so
that he will not suffer, and never know what hit him?"
"The best place is the shoulder." He showed me the spot on his elk.
"But wouldn't he suffer at all?"
"Well, of course, if you hit him in the brain, he will never know; but
that is a very fine shot. Your target is only an inch or two, here
between the eye and the ear, and the head moves more than the body.
But," he said, "you would not kill an elk after the way you have wept
over this one?"
"If--if I were sure he would not suffer, I might kill just one," I
said, conscious of my inconsistencies. My woman's soul revolted, and yet
I was out West for all the experiences that the life could give me, and
I knew, if the chance came just right, that one elk would be sacrificed
to that end.
The next day, much to Mrs. Cummings' surprise, we had elk steak, the most
delicious of meat when properly cooked. The next few days slipped by. We
were always in the open air, riding about in those glorious mountains,
and it was the end of the week when a turn of the wheel brought my day.
First, it becomes necessary to confide in you. Fear is a very wicked
companion who, since nursery days, had troubled me very little; but when
I arrived out West, he was waiting for me, and, so that I need never be
without him, he divided himself into a band of little imps.
Each imp had a special duty, and never left me until he had been crushed
in silent but terrible combat. There was the imp who did not like to be
alone in the mountains, and the imp who was sure he was going to be lost
in those wildernesses, and the imp who quaked at the sight of a gun, and
the imp who danced a mad fierce dance when on a horse. All these had been
conquered, or at least partially reduced to subjection, but the imp who
sat on the saddle pommel when there was a ditch or stream to be jumped
had hitherto obliged me to dismount and get over the space on foot.
This morning, when we came to a nasty boggy place, with several small
water cuts running through it, I obeyed the imp with reluctance. Well, we
got over it--Blondey, the imp, and I--with nothing worse than wet feet
and shattered nerves.
I attempted to mount, and had one foot in the stirrup and one hand on the
pommel, when Blondey started. Like the girl in the song, I could not get
up, I could not get down, and although I had hold of the reins, I had no
free hand to pull them in tighter, and you may be sure the imp did not
help me. Blondey, realising there was something wrong, broke into a wild
gallop across country, but I clung on, expecting every moment the saddle
would turn, until I got my foot clear from the stirrup. Then I let go
just as Blondey was gathering himself together for another ditch.
I was stunned, but escaped any serious hurt. Nimrod was a great deal more
undone than I. He had not dared to go fast for fear of making Blondey go
faster, and he now came rushing up, with the fear of death upon his face
and the most terrible swears on his lips.
Although a good deal shaken, I began to laugh, the combination was so
incongruous. Nimrod rarely swears, and was now quite unconscious what his
tongue was doing. Upon being assured that all was well, he started after
Blondey and soon brought him back to me; but while he was gone the imp
and I had a mortal combat.
I did up my hair, rearranged my habit, and, rejecting Nimrod's offer of
his quieter horse, remounted Blondey. We all jumped the next ditch, but
the shock was too much for the imp in his weakened condition; he tumbled
off the pommel, and I have never seen him since.