Transcriber's note:
Spelling and punctuation inconsistencies been harmonized.
Obvious printer errors have been repaired. Italic text has been
marked with _underscores_. Please see the end of this book for
further notes.
JACK IN THE ROCKIES
_By the same Author_
JACK THE YOUNG COWBOY
JACK THE YOUNG TRAPPER
JACK THE YOUNG CANOEMAN
JACK THE YOUNG EXPLORER
JACK IN THE ROCKIES
JACK AMONG THE INDIANS
JACK THE YOUNG RANCHMAN
PAWNEE HERO STORIES AND FOLK TALES
BLACKFOOT LODGE TALES
THE STORY OF THE INDIAN
THE INDIANS OF TO-DAY
THE PUNISHMENT OF THE STINGY
AMERICAN DUCK SHOOTING
AMERICAN GAME BIRD SHOOTING
TRAILS OF THE PATHFINDERS
[Illustration: "THROWING HIS GUN TO HIS SHOULDER HE FIRED
AT THE ANIMAL." _Page 221_]
JACK
IN THE ROCKIES
OR
A BOY'S ADVENTURES WITH A PACK TRAIN
BY
GEORGE BIRD GRINNELL
_Author of_ "_Jack the Young Ranchman_," "_Jack Among the Indians_,"
"_Pawnee Hero Stories_," "_Blackfoot Lodge Tales_,"
"_The Story of the Indian_," "_The Indian
of To-Day_," _Etc._
_Illustrated by_
EDWIN WILLARD DEMING
[Illustration]
NEW YORK FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1904,
BY FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY
_All rights reserved_
_Thirteenth Printing_
_Printed in the United States of America_
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I THE INDIANS OF FORT BERTHOLD 9
II THE BATTLE OF THE MUSSELSHELL 27
III THE START FOR THE BLACKFOOT CAMP 43
IV OLD FRIENDS AND NEW 56
V BUFFALO HUNTING WITH THE BLACKFEET 73
VI AMID WONDERS OF THE YELLOWSTONE
PARK 86
VII GEYSERS AND HOT SPRINGS 97
VIII ACROSS THE CONTINENTAL DIVIDE 109
IX AN ELK HUNT UNDER THE TETONS 122
X TRAILING BLACK-TAILS 137
XI TRACKS IN THE SNOW 147
XII WHAT WILL BECOME OF THE ELK? 160
XIII A PACK HORSE IN DANGER 172
XIV A BIGHORN 180
XV A CHARGING GRIZZLY 189
XVI SOMETHING ABOUT BEARS 194
XVII THE STORY OF A MAN KILLER 202
XVIII JACK'S FIRST MOOSE 216
XIX WATCHING A BEAR BAIT 228
XX A PUZZLING TRAIL 240
XXI HUGH GOES "ON DISCOVERY" 248
XXII STEALING FROM HORSE THIEVES 257
XXIII "DIED WITH HIS BOOTS ON" 266
ILLUSTRATIONS
"THROWING HIS GUN TO HIS SHOULDER
HE FIRED AT THE ANIMAL" _Frontispiece_
"HE REACHED FAR FORWARD, AND GRASPED THE
LONG HAIR ON THE BUFFALO'S HUMP" 82
"ALMOST BELOW THEM, FEEDING, WERE TWO
GOOD SIZED RAMS" 183
"'HANDS UP'! HUGH CALLED" 268
FOREWORD
At the time Jack Danvers journeyed through the Yellowstone National
Park, that wonderful country was little known. Since then it has
become famous, and people from all parts of the globe go to visit
it. There is no more delightful summer excursion possible than a
trip to the National Park where--if one can take a pack train and
journey away from the beaten roads and trails--it is still possible
to see elk and deer and many other wild animals, almost in their
old time abundance.
In the spring of 1903 President Roosevelt did just this, and on his
return wrote a most interesting article about what he saw, telling
of the abundance of the elk, the familiarity of the deer, the
shyness of the antelope and the tameness of the mountain sheep.
American boys and girls are happy in having in their own country so
lovely and so marvelous a region.
Jack in the Rockies
CHAPTER I
THE INDIANS OF FORT BERTHOLD
With noisy puffings the steamboat was slowly pushing her way
up the river. On either side the flat bottom, in some places
overgrown with high willow brush, in others, bearing a growth of
tall and sturdy cottonwoods, ran back a long way to the yellow
bluffs beyond. The bluffs were rounded and several hundred feet in
height, rising imperceptibly until they seemed to meet the blue
of the sky, so that the boat appeared to be moving at the bottom
of a wide trough. Hour after hour she pushed on, meeting nothing,
seeing nothing alive, except now and then a pair of great gray
geese, followed by their yellow goslings; or sometimes on the shore
a half-concealed red object, which moved quickly out of sight, and
which observers knew to be a deer.
On the boat were two of our old friends. From the far East had
come Jack Danvers, traveling day after day until he had reached
Bismarck, Dakota, where he found awaiting him Hugh Johnson, as
grave, as white-haired, and as cheery as ever. At Bismarck they
had taken the up-river steamer, "Josephine," and the boat had
sailed early on the morning of July 5th.
Hugh and Jack were on their way back up to the Piegan country. They
had separated at Bismarck the previous autumn, and while Hugh kept
on down the river, to take a west-bound train, which should carry
him back to Mr. Sturgis' ranch in Wyoming, Jack had gone East, to
spend the winter in New York. He had had a year of hard work at
school, for his experience of the previous winter had taught him
that it paid well to work in school, and to make the most of his
opportunities there. This made his parents more willing to have him
go away to this healthful life, and he found that if he did his
best he enjoyed all the better the wild, free life of the prairie
and the mountains, which he now hoped would be his during a part,
at least, of every year.
His summer with the Piegans had taught him many things known to
few boys in the East, and given him many pleasures to which they
are strangers; and the more he saw of this prairie life the more
he enjoyed it, and the more he hoped to have more and more of it.
Sometimes, when he awoke early in the morning, or at night, after
he had gone to bed, as he lay between sleeping and waking, he used
to go over in his mind the scenes that he had visited, and the
stirring adventures in which he had taken part, and these memories,
with the hope of others like them, gave him a pleasure that he
would not have parted with for anything.
Often when he was in New York, walking through narrow city
streets, looking up at high buildings, hearing the roar and rattle
of the passing traffic, and watching the people hurry to and fro,
each one absorbed in his own business, it was hard to realize that
away off somewhere, only a few days' journey distant, there was a
land where there was no limit to the view, where each human being
seemed absolutely free, and where it was possible to travel for
days and days without seeing a single person. Always interwoven
with his dreams and his imaginings about this distant country was
the memory of the friend Hugh, to whom he was so deeply attached.
It hardly seemed to him possible to go anywhere in the West, except
in company with Hugh, and until he had joined him, it never seemed
as if his journey had begun, or was really going to be made.
All through the day the boat went on, turning and twisting, and
at different times facing all points of the compass. Sometimes
the sun would be shining on the port side of the boat, a little
later on the starboard side, then it would be ahead, and again
behind. Hugh and Jack spent their time chatting on the upper deck
of the boat, Hugh smoking vigorously, to keep off the mosquitoes,
while Jack, the edges of his handkerchief under his hat and tucked
inside his coat collar, to leeward of Hugh, took advantage of the
constant stream of smoke that poured from his pipe. They had much
to tell each other of the winter that had passed, and much to say
of the trip on which they were now starting. Fort Benton was their
destination, and until they reached there, and saw their friend
Joe, the Blackfoot Indian who was to meet them with the horses,
they were uncertain what they should do.
There were not a few passengers on the boat. Some of them were
carefully dressed persons, wearing long frock coats, white shirts,
and a modest amount of jewelry, residents of the thriving towns
of Helena or Virginia City, Montana; others were army officers,
on their way to posts in the Northwest, or now starting out on
some exploring expedition; while others still were persons of
whose occupation and destination it was hard to judge from their
appearance.
Among them was a middle-aged man who Jack thought, from his
conversation, had long been a resident of the plains, and who told
Jack something about a trade that he had long practised--that of
wolfing.
"Why, young fellow," he said, "it is only a few years ago since
there was good money in wolfin', but I had to quit it down in the
southern country for wolves got too scarce when the buffalo got
killed off. Wherever there was buffalo there was plenty of wolves,
for the wolves made their livin' off the herds, just like the
Indians; and when I say wolves I mean big wolves, coyotes, foxes,
and swifts.
"In the autumn, as soon as the fur began to get good, I used to
start out and find a herd of buffalo, and after shootin' two or
three of them, I'd skin them down, and rip them up, and put from
one to three bottles of strychnine in each carcass. After the blood
that lay in the ribs had been poisoned good, I'd smear that over
the meat on the outside. Generally I'd try to kill my buffalo
close to where I was goin' to camp, and after I had put out my
baits I went to camp and slept until near day. Then, before I could
see, I'd get up, cook my breakfast, hitch up, if I had a team,
and go round to all my baits. Likely, around each one I'd find my
half dozen to fifteen wolves, and sometimes it would take me two
or three days to skin them. Likely enough, if the weather turned
right cold, I got a good many more wolves than I could skin, and
had to stack them up, and wait till I got time. It was mighty hard
work now, and don't you forget it. Then, too, there was always a
chance that Indians might come along and make trouble for me. You
take a man out on the prairie, ten years ago, and even the friendly
Indians were likely to scare him a whole lot, or take his hides,
even if they didn't take away his gun and his horses. As for the
hostiles, if they got too close to a man it was all up with him.
But I never had no trouble with them, except once, and then I was
camped in the dug-out, with plenty of provisions, and there was
only three of the Indians. I saw them comin', and suspected who
they were, and managed to get my horses into the dug-out with me
and stood 'em off. They scared me bad though.
"I should think so," said Jack.
The man stopped talking to fill his pipe and after he had lighted
it puffed thoughtfully. Then he continued: "There's another way
I've wolfed it, and that is by draggin' a bait over quite a scope
of country, and droppin' pieces of poisoned meat along the trail.
I used to do that when I couldn't find animals to kill for bait.
This worked pretty well for awhile but it's no good any more down
in that country."
"I've seen coyotes killed by putting poisoned tallow in auger
holes, bored in chunks of wood," said Jack.
"Yes," said the man, "that's good sometimes, and they stay there
lickin' and lickin' up the bait until they die right there. You
don't have to look over much country to find your wolves."
"What kind of meat did you use when you were dragging the bait?"
asked Jack.
"Most any kind would do," replied the wolfer; "sometimes it would
be a piece of buffalo meat, sometimes a shoulder of a deer, but
the best bait of all is a beaver carcass; there's lots of grease
and lots of smell to that, and the wolves and coyotes are sure to
follow it. This draggin' a trail is good too, because the wolves,
when they go along and snap up the poisoned bait, don't go off, but
keep right on followin' the trail, and you find them there, maybe
quite a long way from where they pick the bait.
"Where are you goin', young fellow; you and that old man I see you
talking with?"
"We're going up to Benton," said Jack, "and I don't know where
we're going from there. I expect we'll meet a friend there, with
our horses, and then we're going to make a trip, off maybe on the
prairies, and maybe into the mountains; we can't tell yet."
"Sho," said the man, "you're sure goin' to have a good time. I've
got to get a job when I get to Benton; somethin' that'll keep me
until it comes time for fur to get good."
The next morning when Jack and Hugh left their stateroom a heavy
fog hung low over the river and the boat was not moving, but was
tied up to the bank, for it was so thick that there was danger of
running aground on the frequent sand-bars, and as the river was
now falling, the captain was unwilling to take the chance of such
delay. On the lower deck was a dug-out canoe, the property of a
temporary passenger, who was going only to Fort Berthold, and,
after breakfast, Jack suggested to Hugh that they should borrow
this canoe and go off a little way up the river, taking their guns,
and seeing whether they could kill anything. Hugh said this could
not be done, explaining that it would be easy enough to get lost,
which would be bad for them, and very irritating to the captain,
who might feel it necessary to wait for them; and besides this,
the fog might lift at any moment, when the boat would move onward
much faster than they could paddle. As it happened, the fog lifted
almost immediately, and the boat set forward; and a little before
noon the village of the Rees, Gros Ventres and Mandans, high up on
the bluff above the river, was seen; and soon after the boat tied
up, and all hands went ashore.
The bluff rose steeply from the river, and up and down its face
were steep trails, worn by the feet of women passing up and down
as they carried water and the driftwood which they gathered, up to
the village. On the top of the bluff stood the bee-hive shaped gray
houses, which Hugh told Jack were much like those occupied by the
Pawnees.
They began to climb the bluff toward the village, and Jack asked
Hugh about the Indians who lived here.
"In old times," said Hugh, "these Indians were scattered out up and
down the river. The Gros Ventres lived furthest up, between here
and Buford, and the Rees and Mandans lived further down the stream.
A long time ago,--back maybe more than a hundred years,--the Rees
and the Mandans all lived together, away down below here; but then
they had some sort of a quarrel among themselves, and the Mandans
moved on up the stream, and for a long time camped near the mouth
of the Knife River. For a while after that there was some fighting
between the Rees and Mandans, but after a time they made peace,
and gradually the tribes came together again; and now for a long
time they've all lived together in this village of Berthold. In old
times each of these villages was a big one, but since the white
men came among them, and brought smallpox, and liquor, and all the
other things that the white men bring, they are dying off fast, and
I don't believe that now there is more than eight or nine hundred
of these Indians all together. You know these Rees here are kind
of kin to the Pawnees; they speak near the same language, so that
I can talk with 'em, and they call the Pawnees their relations. I
think they used to be a part of the Skidi band. Nobody knows just
when they separated from the Pawnees, but it must have been a good
while ago."
Hugh paused, and Jack asked: "Does any one know how they came to
separate, Hugh? Is there any tradition about it?"
"Yes," said Hugh, "there is. The old story is that all the Pawnees
were out hunting, and the Sioux got around some of 'em, and cut
'em off from the rest and kept fighting 'em, and driving 'em, and
fighting and driving, until they got 'em away up on the Missouri
River, so far from their friends that they had to winter there.
Then, along back, maybe about 1830, soon after the beginning of the
fur trade on the upper river, the Rees fought the white folks, and
were generally hostile. After that they went back and joined the
Pawnees, but they couldn't get along well with the Pawnees, and
quarreled with them, and finally the Pawnees drove 'em off. So they
came on back up the river. It was after that that they joined the
Mandans, and they've lived together ever since."
By this time they had reached the top of the bluff, and were now
close to the houses, on whose curious domed roofs many people were
sitting,--women busy with their work, young men wrapped in their
robes, and looking off into the distance, and little girls playing
with their dolls or their puppies. The ground in the village all
about the houses was worn bare by the passage of many feet; Indians
were going to and fro, women carrying water and wood, men naked, or
wrapped in their summer sheets, little boys chasing each other, or,
with their ropes trying to snare the dogs, which were usually too
cunning for them.
Jack was greatly interested in the houses, and wished to look
into one, and to this Hugh said there would be no objection. The
entrance of each house was by a long passage-way, closed above,
and at the sides, and passing through this, they found themselves
at the door. Jack expected to go into a room that was dark; but
this was not so. Above the center of the large room was a wide
open space, which answered both for chimney and for window. About
the fireplace, which was under the smoke hole, at the corners of a
square, stood four stout posts, reaching up to and supporting the
rafters of the roof. The floor of the house was swept clean, and
all around the walls were raised platforms, serving for beds, and
separated by screens of straight willow sticks strung on sinew,
from the adjacent bed on either side. In front of some of the beds
similar screens hung down like curtains so that the bed could
be cut off from the observation of those in the house. Over the
fireplace hung a pot, and two pleasant-faced women were sitting
near it, sewing moccasins. They looked up pleasantly, as the
strangers stood in the doorway, and Hugh spoke a few words to them,
to which they made some answer. Then the strangers withdrew.
Keeping on through the village, they walked out on the higher
prairie, toward the tribal burying-ground, but not such a
burying-ground as Jack was accustomed to see. Here were placed the
dead, wrapped up in bundles, on platforms raised on four poles,
eight or ten feet above the ground. Evidently no attention was paid
to them after burial, for many of the poles which supported the
platforms had rotted and fallen down, and, in the older part of
the graveyard the ground was strewn with pieces of old robes and
clothing, and with white bones.
Hugh told Jack that farther away, and down on lower ground, where
the soil was moist, the Rees, Mandans, and Gros Ventres had farms,
where they raised corn, beans, pumpkins, and squashes, and that in
old times they used to raise tobacco.
It was now time to return to the boat, for the wait was to be only
a short one, and on their way back he told of something that had
happened not many years before in the Mandan village.
"The people were hungry," said Hugh, "and there was no food in
camp. They sent young men off in all directions to look for
buffalo, but none could be found. As the people grew hungrier and
hungrier the White Cow Society made up their minds that they would
give a dance, and try to bring the buffalo. They did this, and
danced for a long time; but no buffalo were found, and there were
no signs that any were coming. Still the people of the White Cow
Society danced, and still the other people watched them, and prayed
that they might bring the buffalo. One day, after they'd danced
for ten days, suddenly a big noise was heard in the village, and
when the people rushed out of the lodges to see what was happening,
there, among the lodges, was a big buffalo bull, charging about
right close to the lodge in which the White Cow Society were
dancing. All the dogs in the village seemed to be about him,
barking at his head, and biting at his heels, and he was trying
only to get away, and paying no attention to the Indians that were
all about him.
"Then everybody was glad, for all could see that the Master of Life
had sent this bull, to answer their prayers; and all believed that
he had come ahead of the main herd, which would soon follow him.
Before he had got out of the village, the bull was shot. The White
Cow Society came out of their lodge, and danced around the village,
and while they were doin' this, one of the scouts came in, and
reported that a big band of cows was not far off. Then everybody
was glad, and all wondered at the strong medicine of the White Cow
Society. The next day the men went out and made a surround, and
killed plenty of cows, and brought in the meat, and there came a
terrible storm, and when the storm cleared off the whole prairie,
beyond the ridge near Knife River, was black with buffalo. Now
there was plenty in the camp, and every one was happy. The men went
out and brought in fat meat, and it was dried, and no more that
winter was there any suffering for food."
"That's a good story, Hugh," said Jack, "but do you suppose the
dancing of the White Cow Society really brought the buffalo?"
"I couldn't tell you, son. The Indians believed it did, but I don't
suppose any white folks would. But I've seen so many queer things
follow these medicine performances that I don't know what to think
about them, myself."
By this time they had reached the shore, and looking around, as
they passed over the gang-plank to the deck, they saw the captain
and purser coming down the trail just behind them. The deck hands
were already beginning to cast off the fasts, and a moment later
the whistle sounded, the boat's nose turned out into the river, and
the steady thump, thump of the paddle-wheel began again. On the
bank stood the three or four white men belonging to the agency,
and up and down the bottom, and clustered in little groups on the
bluffs, were Indians, dressed in buckskin, or in bright-colored
cloth, who stood motionless, watching the steamer as she slowly
moved away.
"That's a mighty interesting place, Hugh; and I want to get you to
tell me all about it. Who are the Gros Ventres, and who are the
Mandans? You've told me about the Rees, but I want to know about
the others."
"Well, son," said Hugh, "I don't know as I can tell you very much
about them, but I'll try. The Gros Ventres are close relations
to the Crows; in fact, many people call them the River Crows, to
distinguish them from the real Crows, that live up close to the
mountains, on the head of the Yellowstone. Those fellows are called
the Mountain Crows, and there's a good many more of them than
there are of these. These people, I suppose, got their name, Gros
Ventres, from the French, and I never heard why it was given to
'em. I never could see that they were any fatter, or had any bigger
bellies, than other Indians, and I never found out any reason for
the name. They don't call themselves by any such name as that;
their name for themselves is _Hi d[)a]t sa_, and that's said to
mean, willows. Anyhow, they used to be called Willow Indians; so I
have been told.
"In old times, they say that there were three tribes of them, but
the other tribes have been lost, or forgotten, and now they're all
together--all one bunch of Indians. There's one thing you want
to remember, that there are two different outfits of Indians,
both called Gros Ventres; one of them, these people here, whom we
know as the Gros Ventres of the Village, or Gros Ventres of the
Missouri; the others are the Gros Ventres of the Prairie, whose
country is east of the Blackfoot country, and who used to be
friendly with the Blackfeet, and then fought them for a long time,
and now are friendly again. Those Gros Ventres of the Prairie are
no kin at all to these people, but are a part of the Arapahoes,
from whom, according to the old story, they split off a long, long
time ago. They talk the Arapahoe language, and call the Arapahoes
their own people, and still visit them back and forth. Nowadays
they have an agency along with the Assinaboines, further west, at
Fort Belknap, over on Milk River. Ninety-nine men out of every
hundred get these Arapahoes and these River Crows mixed up, just
for the reason that the French called them both Gros Ventres. Don't
you ever do that, because when a man makes that mistake it shows
that he don't know nothing about Indians. Try to remember that,
will you?"
"Of course I will, Hugh. I don't want to make any mistakes,
especially now since I have been out and seen something of real
Indians. People back East, and especially all the fellows at
school, think that I know everything about Indians now. They're all
the time asking me questions about them, who they are, and where
they live, and I should hate to make any mistakes in my answers.
Now tell me, who are the Mandans?"
"I don't know as much about the Mandans as I do about the Gros
Ventres of the Village," said Hugh, "and yet I've heard a lot about
them. They're a kind of queer people; lots of 'em used to have
yellow hair and gray eyes, and lots of 'em now have gray-haired
children, same as you have seen among the Blackfeet. I got hold of
a book once with lots of pictures of Indians in it; mighty good
pictures, too, they were. 'T was written by a man named Catlin, who
came up the river, painting pictures of Indians, a long time ago;
maybe fifty years. He said he thought the Mandans were Welshmen,
and told some story about some foreign prince that brought a
colony of Welshmen over here, and Catlin thought that maybe the
Mandans were descended from that colony. Anyhow they've lived by
themselves, so the story goes, for a great many years; but I've
heard the old men say that long, long ago the tribe came from
away back East somewhere. They followed down a big river that ran
from east to west, likely it may have been the Ohio River, until
they came to the Mississippi, and then they struck off northwest,
and camped on the Missouri, and they have been traveling up the
Missouri, a little way at a time, for an almighty sight o' years.
"This book of Catlin's that I tell you about has got a whole lot
o' stuff about the Mandans, and it is mighty good readin'. You
had better get hold of it sometime when you get back East; it'll
tell you more about 'em than I can. The Mandans have always been
farmers, and raised good crops of corn, and that and their buffalo
give them a pretty good living. But now the buffalo are getting
scarce, and when they give out the Mandans will have to live on
straight corn, I am afraid. There's one thing about the Mandans
that's worth rememberin', they make the best pots of any people
that I know of on the plains. I expect that in old times maybe the
Pawnees made just as good pots, but since the white folks began to
bring brass and copper kettles into the country the Pawnees have
forgotten how to make pots; but the Mandans still keep it up, and
make some pots, big and little----"
"Oh, Hugh!" called Jack at this moment, "Look at the buffalo!" and
he pointed toward the high bluffs on the south side of the river,
and there were three dark spots, running as hard as they could up
the hill.
"Sure enough," said Hugh, "there's the first buffalo we've seen.
Don't they look like three rats scuttling off over the hills, as
fast as they can go. Before long, now, we ought to see plenty of
'em along the river; though we ain't likely to see many buffalo
before we get above Buford."
The boat pushed slowly up the river's muddy current, and Hugh and
Jack continued to talk about the Indian village on the hill.
"A mighty queer thing happened once at that village, son," said
Hugh. "You've heard, maybe, that in some tribes of Indians they
have sort of prophets, or men that foretell things that are going
to happen. I have seen a little of that sort of thing myself,
that I never could explain. Besides that, they've got some way of
learning news that we don't understand anything about. Of course it
may not be as quick as railroads and telegraphs, but its quick.
Let me tell you something that happened there at Berthold, some
years ago, and the man that it happened to lives in the upper
country now, and you may likely run across him some time when you
are up there. He is a Dutchman, and his name is Joe Butch.
"Along in 1868, Joe was working at Berthold, for a trader there,
and the trader got into some sort of a quarrel about a horse with
old White Cow, chief of the Mandans, and I guess old White Cow was
pretty sassy, and maybe he threatened to do something, and Joe
killed him. Well, as soon as he had killed the old man, Joe he
knew that that wasn't no place for him, because the Mandans would
be pretty sure to kill him; so he hops onto his horse, and rides
as hard as he could for Buford, that's eighty miles up the river,
next place we stop at. When he got to Buford he found there a big
camp of Assinaboines, and they were having a big dance, because
the chief of the Mandans, their enemies, had just been killed.
Now, how do you suppose those Assinaboines knew that White Cow had
been killed? Joe didn't waste no time getting onto his horse, and
he rode as hard as he could to Buford; and its a sure thing that
nobody got there before him with the news. I never understood how
they found that out, and I never expect to."
"That seems a wonderful thing, Hugh," said Jack. "I don't see how
they could have found it out if nobody told them, and if there were
no telegraphs."
"Well, it's sure there were no telegraphs," said Hugh, "and I don't
see how anybody could have told them. Joe killed the man, and
started on his ride right off, and had a good horse. That's one of
the things that always beat me."
The hours passed swiftly by for Jack and Hugh, as they watched
the river banks on either side. The boat had met a flood of water
just above Berthold, which, if it made progress against the strong
current more slow, nevertheless saved time by deepening the water,
so that they did not run aground on sand-bars. Several times during
the morning, antelope were seen feeding in the bottom, lifting
their heads to gaze at the boat, as it puffed and snorted along,
but not being enough alarmed to take to flight. After supper that
night, as they sat on the deck about sundown, Hugh, watching the
banks, pointed out no less than three distant spots on the wide
bottom, which he told Jack were bears digging roots. They were a
long way off, yet with his glasses Jack was able to make out their
forms, and to recognize them as bears.