“Well,” said Rob, thoughtfully, after a time, “after all, the best way to learn about a country is to go and see it yourself. You can read all about it in books, but still it looks different when you come to see it yourself.”
“Wait till I get my map done,” said John, “and many a time after this we’ll talk it all over, and we can tell on the map right where we were all the time.”
“Well, you’re at the summit now at thiscamp,” said Uncle Dick. “Yonder to the east is Miette water. Over yonder is the Fraser. It’s downhill from here west, and sometimes downhill rather faster than you’ll like. We’ve come a couple of hundred miles on our journey to the summit here, and in a little more than fifty more we’ll be at the Tête Jaune Cache. That’s on the Fraser—and a wicked old river she is, too.”
“How’s the trail between here and there, Uncle Dick?” asked Jesse, somewhat anxiously.
“Bad enough, you may depend.”
“And don’t we get any more fishing?”
Uncle Dick smiled. “Well, I’ll tell you,” said he; “we’ll probably not have a great many chances for trout as good as we’ll have to-morrow. It’s only two or three miles from here to Yellowhead Lake, and I think we’ll find that almost as good a fishing-place as Rainbow Lake was the other day.”
“
It’s cold up here, just the same,” said Jesse, when he rolled out of his blanket early on the following morning, “and the woods and mountains make it dark, too, on ahead there. Somehow the trees don’t look just the same to me, Uncle Dick.”
“They’re not the same,” said Uncle Dick, “and I am glad you are so observing. From here on the trees’ll get bigger and bigger. They always are, on the Pacific side of the Rocky Mountains. The east side is far more dry and barren. When you get down into the Columbia valley or the Fraser country you’ll see Douglas firs bigger than you ever thought a tree could grow.”
“Yes, and devil’s-club, too,” said Rob. “I stepped on one just a little while ago, and it flew up and hit me on the knee.”
Uncle Dick laughed. “You’ll see devil’s-clubaplenty before you get done with this trip,” said he. “In fact, I will say for all this upper country, it doesn’t seem to have been laid out for comfort in traveling. The lower Rockies, in our country, say in Wyoming and Colorado, are the best outdoor countries in the world. It’s a little wet and soft up here sometimes, although, fortunately, we’ve had rather good weather.
“From now on,” he continued, “you’ll see a change in the vegetation. You can still see the fireweed—it seems a universal plant all the way from the Saskatchewan to the Peace River and west even to this prairie here. That and the Indian paint—that red flower which you all remember—is common over all the north country. Then there is a sort of black birch which grows far up to the north, and we have had our friends the willows and the poplars quite a while. Now we’ll go downhill into the land of big trees and devil’s-club.”
“So that’s the last of the Yellowhead Pass for this trip,” said Rob, turning back, as within the hour after they had arisen they were in saddle once more for the west-bound trail.
“Yes,” said Uncle Dick, “one of the most mysterious of all the passes. I often wondermyself just what time it was that old Jasper Hawse first came through here.”
“Was it really named after him, and who was he?” inquired John.
“Some say he was an Iroquois Indian who had red hair—in which case he must have been part white, I should say. Others say he was a Swede. Yet others say that ‘Tête Jaune,’ or ‘Yellowhead,’ was an old Indian chief who had gray hair. Now, I’ve seen a few white-haired Indians—for instance, old White Calf, down in the Blackfoot reservation—and their hair seems rather yellow more than pure white when they are very old. At any rate, whoever the original Tête Jaune was, we are bound now for his old bivouac on the Fraser, fifty miles below, the Tête Jaune Cache.
“Every man who wants to do mountain exploring has heard of the Tête Jaune Cache on the Fraser River. It has been one of the most inaccessible places in the Rockies. But now it will be easy to get there in a year or so, and I am sure on this beautiful Yellowhead Lake just ahead of us somebody will put up a hotel one day or other, and they will make trails around in these mountains and kill all these goats and bear.”
“How far is it down to the lake?” inquired Jesse, pushing up his riding-pony alongside the others.
“About half an hour,” replied his uncle. “Not too good a trail, and about a hundred feet drop from the summit down.”
Surely enough, they had gone but a little distance over the winding and difficult blazed route when they came out into an open spot whence they could see Yellowhead Lake lying before them. It was a lovely sheet of water about four miles long, with bold mountains rising on either side.
“Now, young men,” said their leader, as they paused, “we’ll not take the liberties with these mountains that some of the earlier travelers did. We’ll call that big mountain on the south side of the lake Mount Fitzwilliam. On the north side is old Bingley, but I presume we’d just as well call it Yellowhead Mountain now. Some called it Mount Pelee, but we’ll call it Yellowhead, because it seems too bad the pass and mountain should not have the same name from the same man—whoever he was. That’s the guardian of the pass from this side, at any rate. It looks as though it shut up the pass, because, you see,it bends around the foot of the mountain. I’ve climbed that mountain in my time—none too easy a job. In that way you can see the headwaters of the Fraser River, and glaciers twenty miles south of here. From the top of Yellowhead you can see Mount Geikie, although we are past it now.”
“When are we going to do our fishing?” inquired John, in his practical fashion.
“Well, I’ll tell you,” said his uncle; “if you’ll be good and travel steadily, we’ll make camp at the side of this lake and fish this afternoon.”
“Agreed,” said John; “go ahead.”
They found it not so easy to go ahead as might have been supposed, for the trail passed through some very rough and troublesome country, made the worse by burned timber which had blown down. At last, however, they made their way along the northwest shore and neared the narrows at the lower end of the lake. Here they found a low peninsula jutting out into the lake, where there was a little grass and good clean footing as well as the fine shade of some tall pines.
“Here we are,” said the leader of the party; and soon they had off-saddled and the horseswere grazing, while the others prepared for the bivouac.
“Now, if we had a boat,” said Rob, “I believe we would get some trout in this lake, and good ones, too.”
“They’re here, all right,” said Uncle Dick, “as I can testify, but boats don’t grow in the Rocky Mountains this high up. You’ll have to try it from the shore.”
“But could we not make a raft? I see some pretty good cedar timber lying along here. And I’ve got some hay-wire in my war-bag—I never travel without it.” Rob was eager.
“And a very good thing it is to have in camp, too. Well, try your raft if you like, but be careful.”
All three of the young Alaskans, more experienced than most boys of their age in outdoor work, now fell at the task of making themselves a raft or float. Soon they had half a dozen cedar logs lying side by side in the shallow water, their limbs trimmed off closely with the axes. Under Rob’s instructions they now lashed two crosspieces on top of the logs, using the wire to bind them fast to each. So in the course of half an hour they had quite a substantial raft ready foruse. Securing a couple of long poles to use as push-poles, they set boldly out into the shallow bay that lay before them. They took only one rod along, assigning to John the task of doing the angling while the others endeavored to keep the raft steady.
“This is as far as we can go,” said Rob after a while. “Fifteen feet of water, and my pole won’t touch any longer.”
“Well, it looks fishy,” said John. “Hold on, fellows, and I’ll begin to cast.”
He did so, standing as best he could on the uncertain footing under which the green water, clear as glass, showed the sandy bottom plainly below them. Ordinarily it would have been impossible to catch trout in water so clear, but the trout of the Yellowhead Lake at that time were hungry and unskilled. Therefore John had hardly cast a dozen times before he saw a great splash and felt a heavy tug at his line. As a matter of fact, a four-pound rainbow had taken the fly.
“My, he’s a whopper!” said John, as he struck, and endeavored to stop the first rush of the big fish.
But he scarcely finished his last words, for as he stepped back in his excitement, his footslipped on the wet bark of one of the logs, and over he went backward into the deep green water underneath!
It happened so quickly that neither Rob nor Jesse for the moment could understand it. They could see their companion clearly in the water, struggling and twisting as he went down, and surrounded on all sides by a mass of white bubbles, which almost obscured him from view.
“Look out, there!” cried Uncle Dick, from shore, who had seen it all perfectly. At the same time he cast off his coat and was tugging at his shoes, making ready to swim out.
But just at that time the head and face of John appeared above the surface, his face distorted with fright and discomfort. He struck out boldly for the raft just at the instant when Rob held out to him the end of the push-pole.
“Catch hold of this, John,” said he, quietly.
An instant later the puffing swimmer was at the raft.
“Look out now,” said Rob; “don’t swamp us. Just lie there till I get you in.”
“It’s cold!” exclaimed John; and, indeed,his teeth were chattering with the cold of the icy mountain water.
“All right, we’ll be in in a minute,” said Rob; and he began poling the raft toward shore as rapidly as he could. They were not out fifty yards, but it seemed an age before the raft reached shore—or, rather, reached the outstretched hands of Uncle Dick, who stood shoulder-deep in the water waiting for them.
“I was afraid of that raft,” said he, “but it’s lucky it was no worse. Come here, John.”
“It wasn’t the fault of the raft, sir,” chattered John. “I just got foolish and slipped off. I’m all right. Where’s my fish?”
Surely enough, they turned to the other end of the raft; where they saw John’s rod fast between two logs, where the reel held it firmly. All the line was run out, but when Jesse reached out and brought in the rod he felt a surge at the other end which told that the fish was still on.
“Let me have him,” said John. “I’m just going to get even with him if I can, and take him out of the wet, too.”
Much relieved at seeing him so plucky and at finding him now safe, the others roared with laughter as he stood, wet and shivering,at the edge of the beach, fighting his big trout for several minutes before he could get him in. But at last victory rested with the skilful young angler, and Uncle Dick with a piece of coffee-sacking scooped out the big rainbow as he came inshore.
“Well, there,” said he, “is fish enough for supper. Now, John, go and strip and wring your clothes and dry out by the fire. I think maybe that’ll be fish enough for a while. We’re lucky to get the fish, and lucky to get you, too, for it’s no joke to go overboard in water as cold as that.”
“You can just bet it isn’t!” said John, his face now almost blue with cold, although he was beginning to revive in the warm rays of the sun. “Just for that, I am going to eat that fish—or as much of him as I can.”
Moise, although good-natured, none the less was fond enough of good living, and, moreover, disposed to rest very well content when the camping conditions were as good as those in which they now found themselves. He thought that it might be just as well not to be in too big a hurry.
“Suppose we did get caught on those high water, M’sieu Deek,” he said; “if we only wait some time, she’ll run down bime-by. But suppose we’ll don’t got nothing to eat but bacon and flour, and go starve to death. What then?”
“Well, Moise,” said Rob, as they sat at the breakfast-table, where the good voyageur made this remark, “we’ve got a whole lake full of trout there waiting for us to go out and catch them—if we didn’t fall off the raft again.”
“Never mind about that raft any more, young man,” said Uncle Dick. “A raft is all right if you have nothing else, and if you have to use it, but it is not compulsory here. We’ll just leave the raft business and try for some trout down here in the creek.”
“There’ll ain’t no trout on those creek,” objected Moise. “I’ll try him myself, and not get no bite. Besides, M’sieu Deek, feesh is all right for woman and dog, but meat she is more better for strong man.”
“That’s the way I feel about it,” said John, his mouth half full of bacon. “I wouldn’t mind a little fresh meat once in a while. But where are we going to get it?”
“No moose up in here,” volunteered Jesse, “and I don’t suppose any caribou either. As for sheep, I suppose there are none this side of the high peaks east of here, are there, Uncle Dick?”
“Probably not. But we’ll find caribou farther west. Besides, there are any number of white goats in these mountains all around us here. I suppose you know what they are, although I’m not sure you ever saw them in Alaska.”
“I know them,” said Rob. “They’re thegreatest climbers in the world—‘On top’ is their motto always.”
“That’s why the head of a white goat is always considered a good trophy among sportsmen; it means that the hunter has had to climb high for it. They’re a sporting proposition, all right, those goats; but when it comes to eating, that’s something different. I boiled goat meat two days straight once, and it was still like shoe leather.” Uncle Dick shook his head.
“Oh, you’ll got old goat—old Guillaume goat,” said Moise. “He’s too tough for eat. But s’pose you’ll got some small leetle goat; she’s good for eat like anything.”
“So I’ve heard,” said Uncle Dick, “but I’m willing to take my chances with flour and bacon.”
“Well, now,” said Rob, “if there are goats in here I’d like awfully well to try to photograph one, at least. They tell me they’re so dull and stupid you can go right up on them.”
“I’m not so sure about their being stupid,” replied Uncle Dick. “I think it’s more likely that they just are not afraid of anything. A big billy will kill any dog in the world, andsome hunters declare that they will even fight a grizzly bear. Their little black horns are sharp as needles, and they can hit a hard blow with that neck of theirs, backed by a couple of hundred pounds of bone and muscle.
“Whatever a goat may be as to wisdom, he won’t run away, and you can never hurry him. A bighorn will run for miles if he smells or sees you, but if a goat sees you he’ll take his own time, stop and look at you, and then go off as slowly as he likes. If you get too close to him, he may stop and stamp his feet, and work his lips at you, and show he’s angry. But he’ll never show he is scared. That’s why they are so easy to kill, once you climb up where they are. That ought to make them easy to photograph, too, Rob. I should say there were ten chances to get a goat photograph to one of the bighorn.”
“Do you suppose there are any around here?” inquired Jesse.
“Plenty of them on old Yellowhead Mountain, right here above us.”
“Well, why not have a hunt, then?”
Uncle Dick threw up his hands. “Now, there you go again, always wanting to stopto fish or hunt! I’ve told you that we ought to hurry on through.”
“Well, just one day!” argued John.
Uncle Dick sighed. “Well,” said he, “we ought to be glad you’re not drowned, John. And I suppose you think we ought to make some sacrifice on that account? Well, all right. If you promise to be contented with one day’s hunt, and to start out to-morrow morning and keep on the trail until we strike the Tête Jaune Cache, I’ll agree to go with you to-day. The fact is, I wouldn’t mind stretching my own legs a little bit, for I’m cramped with saddle work. But I warn you it’s a stiff pull up that mountain there.”
“Shall we just go to photograph?” asked Rob, “or shall we take the rifle?”
“As you like, for this is British Columbia here, and I’ve a license for each of you to shoot game as needed. But we only want one goat, so we don’t need to take more than one rifle. And it really is hard climbing.”
“Let me take my camera,” said Rob, “and you carry the rifle, Uncle Dick. The others won’t need to take anything at all.”
“Then we wouldn’t have anything to do but just climb,” protested John.
His uncle smiled at him. “Come now,” said he; “I’ll let you do the shooting if you see a good, fat young goat. For my part, I’d as soon shoot a poor, sick calf in a barnyard. You and Jesse decide which is to shoot, and I’ll carry the gun until the time comes.”
“That’s all right,” said Moise, who overheard their conversation. “Those boys was both fine shot, both of him. You let him shoot one small, leetle goat for Moise, and I’ll show you he’s good for eat.”
“Agreed,” said Uncle Dick, “but, mind you, you’ve only got to-night to cook him—I fear we might get caught in the high waters if we stopped here until you boiled it tender!”
They made ready now for their climb, each with a light pair of nailed boots and heavy stockings. Under their leader’s advice they stripped down to their flannel shirts, but each carried along a canvas jacket, ready to put on when they reached the upper heights where the wind was sure to be very cold. Uncle Dick carried John’s rifle, and Rob took his favorite camera, provided with a curtain shutter, and an eye-piece on top where he could look in and see the game on the ground glass and thus focus it properly. The weatherwas very fine, and they started out in the best of spirits.
They walked steadily up through the heavy pine forest which covered the foot of the mountain; and then, striking the steeper grade along a bare ridge, they climbed steadily until, turning about and looking down, they could see the glorious prospect which lay below them. The surface of the lake, deep green in color, barely wrinkled now by a light morning breeze, was visible from end to end, three miles or more. On the other side of it showed the bold peaks of Fitzwilliam mountain, back of that yet other peaks were disclosed as they climbed. In that direction there lay an undiscovered country, and they might well reflect that few even had looked out across it as they themselves now were doing from their lofty perch. They knew well enough that the old traders who passed through here rarely left the trail except for necessary hunting, but passed on through as rapidly as they might, this being merely their highway, and not their hunting-grounds.
“What is this, Uncle Dick?” called Rob, after a time, as, turning from their study of the noble landscape, they resumed their workof ascending the steep mountainside. Rob pointed to the broken surface of the ground at his feet.
“What do you mean, Rob?” asked the older hunter.
“It looks as if horses had been here,” said Rob, “yesterday, late.”
“Yes,” said Uncle Dick, smiling, “but not horses, I should say.”
“Maybe not,” said Rob, doubtfully. “But I thought maybe prospectors had been in here.”
“Only the original prospectors—the ones with white coats and long whiskers and sharp horns,” said Uncle Dick.
“But it looks like a regular trail!”
“It is a regular trail, but if you will look closer you’ll see the hoof marks. Horses do not have split toes, my boy. In fact, I have no doubt this is the regular stairway of the goat family that lives on this mountain. Like enough they’ve been down in here to get some different sort of grass or water. They’ve evidently been using this path quite a while.”
“How high do you suppose they are now?” inquired John.
“Who can tell? A mile or two, or three,or five, for all I know. It will take us two or three hours to get up to the rim-rock, at least, and I’ve usually noticed that goats don’t stop much short of the rim-rock when they start to go up a hill. The sign is fresh, however, made late last night or very early this morning; I think with you, Rob, that it was yesterday.”
“How many are there?” inquired Jesse, bending over the broad trail.
“Hard to tell, for they’ve used this trail more than once. A dozen or more, I should say. Well, all we can do is to follow after them and thank them for showing us a good path.”
They climbed on up all the more eagerly now, and when they reached more open country where the sun shone fairly on them they soon were dripping with perspiration. But, young as were these hunters from Alaska, they were not inexperienced in mountain-climbing. They knew that the way to get up a mountain is to keep on slowly and steadily, not hurrying, and never resting very long at a time. Thus they advanced for three-quarters of an hour, until they could see still farther out over the country below them.Now they could see that the game had sometimes wandered about feeding, and the trail itself divided and grew fainter.
Uncle Dick pointed out all these things quietly and suggested that they would better be on the lookout. They advanced now more carefully, and whenever they came to the edge of an open reach or topped some shoulder of the slope they paused and examined the country ahead very carefully. At last, when they had reached an altitude where the trees were much smaller and more scattering, Uncle Dick stopped and took his field-glasses from the case. He lay for some time, resting the glasses on a big rock, sweeping all the country ahead of him with the glasses. At last they saw him stop and gaze steadily at one spot for quite a while.
“See anything?” asked Jesse, eagerly.
Uncle Dick did not reply at once, but after a time handed Jesse the glasses. “Look over there,” said he, “about half a mile, right at the foot of that rock wall. You’ll see something that looks like a flock of snowballs, rather large ones.”
Jesse tried the glasses for a time, and at last caught the spot pointed out to him. “Isee,” said he, in a whisper. “Goats! Lots of them.” They showed so plainly in the glasses, in fact, that he spoke carefully, as though he feared to frighten them.
“Oh, look at them!” said he, after a while. “The young ones are playing like little sheep, jumping and butting around and having a regular frolic.”
“Any big ones?” asked Rob, quickly.
“I should say so; five or six, all sizes. And they look white as big pillows. There’s one that looks as though he had on white pants, and his long white beard makes him look like an old man. He’s looking right down the mountain. You can see them plain against that black rock.”
“Just like a goat,” said Uncle Dick. “They never try to hide themselves. And even when there’s snow on the mountains they’ll leave it and go lie on a black rock where everybody can see them. Well, come on, and we’ll see what sort of a stalk we can make on them.”
They went on much more cautiously now, under Dick’s guidance, keeping under cover in the low trees and working to one side and upward in the general direction of theirgame. It was hard work, and all the boys were panting when at last their leader called a halt.
“We’ll wait here,” said he, in a low tone of voice. He now unslung the rifle from his back and handed it to John. “You and Rob go on now,” said he. “Don’t shoot until Rob is done with his picture-making. And when you do shoot, don’t kill an old billy, for we couldn’t keep the head. Kill one of the young goats—I think there are two or three yearlings there. I wouldn’t shoot either of those two pairs of kids. They’re too little even for Moise, I think.”
“Where are you going, Uncle Dick?” asked Rob.
“Jesse and I are going to stop right here under cover, and Jesse shall have the sport of watching your hunt through the field-glasses—almost as good fun as going along himself. Go on now, and don’t lose any time.”
The two older boys now advanced carefully up the slope, using the cover of the trees as far as they could. They appeared in the open for a little time, only to disappear beyond a series of rocks which projected from the slope above them.
“I don’t see where they’ve gone,” said Jesse, who was steadily watching through the glasses.
“Give them time,” said Uncle Dick. “You must remember that Rob has to get pretty close in order to make the photograph. I’m sure they’re within rifle-range now.”
“Oh, there they are!” whispered Jesse, a little later. “I see them now. They’re up above the goats, and crawling right down toward them. Now there’s old Rob, he’s trying to get to the edge of the rocks; I can see he’s got his camera all ready. He’ll be on top of them, almost, if he gets there.”
“Good boy, Rob!” said Uncle Dick, approvingly. “He has made a good stalk of it.”
Jesse, still gazing through the glasses, now saw his two friends slowly advancing, clinging like flies to the steep rock’s face, but all the time getting closer to their game. The goats seemed not to suspect an enemy, but lay or stood about in perfect unconcern. They did not have any sentinel posted, as the mountain sheep often will, but seemed to feel perfectly secure from all intrusion.
GOATROB’S GOAT
At last Jesse saw Rob stand up straight and walk forward rapidly with his camerain front of him. The goats now heard or scented him, for at once they all stood up and turned toward him, facing him silent and motionless.
“They don’t know what he is!” exclaimed Jesse. “They’re just looking at him. No, there goes a big one right up toward him.”
“In that case,” said Uncle Dick, “Rob will get his picture, sure.” An easy prophecy, for, as a matter of fact, Rob secured several very good pictures of the old goat and the others, as he stood rapidly working his camera, almost in the face of the fearless old billy which advanced toward him so pugnaciously.
But now Jesse saw the band of goats apparently take alarm at something. They turned and began to disperse, some of them climbing slowly up the apparently perpendicular rock face.
“They’ll run right into John!” exclaimed Jesse. “There he is—there, he’s shot! Got him, too!”
They heard the faint sound of the report of the rifle come down from above, and could see the fall of the goat as he slipped and rolled among the rocks.
“Well done,” said Uncle Dick. “They’veboth done their work well, Jesse, and I am pretty sure we’ll have both goat pictures and goat steaks, all we want. I’m glad John did not get crazy and shoot a lot of those poor creatures.”
“Come on,” said Jesse, “let’s run up to where they are.”
In due time they climbed up to where Rob and Jesse were sitting by the side of the dead goat. The boys waved their hats to one another as Jesse approached, smiling and panting.
“I saw it all,” said Jesse, “right in the field-glasses, close up. That’s fine, isn’t it?”
Rob and John both began to talk at once, while Uncle Dick stood smilingly looking down at the dead goat.
“I could have killed two or three big ones,” said John. “What heads they had, too!”
“What could we have done with them?” asked his uncle. “No, you did quite right in killing this yearling—it’s all we want. And I think Rob had the hardest task of any of us; it’s easier to shoot a goat with a rifle than with a camera.”
“Well,” said Rob, “it was just the way you said—they didn’t seem afraid at all. I’vegot one picture, square front end, of that old fellow, and I don’t think he was twenty feet away from me. He seemed to think the camera was something that was going to hurt him, and he showed fight.”
“Now,” said Uncle Dick, “the next thing is to get our meat down the mountain.”
Rolling up his sleeves, he now prepared to skin out such meat as he wanted from the dead goat. He cut off the head and neck, and cut off the legs at the knee-joints. Then he skinned back only the fore quarters, leaving the hide still attached to the hind quarters and the saddle. Using his belt, he folded the skin over the saddle, and then, tying the sleeves of his coat so that it covered his shoulders, he hoisted the saddle astride of his neck.
“I don’t fancy this smell very much,” said he, “but I guess it will be the easiest way to get our meat down the mountain. Come on now, boys, every fellow for himself, and be careful not to get a fall.”
It was hard and sometimes rather slow work scrambling down the steep face of the mountain, especially high up where the rocks were bare. But after a time they came to the small green trees, and then to the tallpines under whose shade the ground was softer and gave them a better footing. It did not take them so long to come down as it had to ascend, but they were all tired when late that afternoon they arrived at their camp on the little promontory.
Moise was overjoyed at their success, and was all for cooking some of the meat at once; but Uncle Dick checked him.
“No,” said he, “it’s too fresh yet. Skin it out, Moise, and hang it up overnight, at least. You may set a little of it to stew all night at the fire, if you like. Soak some more of it overnight in salt and water—and then I think you’d better throw away all the kettles that you’ve used with this goat meat. It may be all right, but I’m afraid it’s going to be a long time before I learn to like goat. If this were a mountain sheep, now, I could eat all that saddle myself.”
Moise asked who killed the goat, and when told that it was John he complimented him very much. For Rob’s work with the camera he had less praise.
“I s’pose she’s all right to make picture of goat,” said he, “but s’pose a man he’s hongree, he couldn’t eat picture, could he?”
Rob only laughed at him. “You wait, Moise,” said he. “When I get my pictures made maybe you’d rather have one of them than another piece of goat meat.”
In spite of Uncle Dick’s disgust, Moise that evening broiled himself a piece of the fresh goat meat at the fire, and ate it with such relish that the boys asked for a morsel or so of it themselves. To their surprise, they found the tenderloin not so bad to eat. Thus, with one excuse or another, they sat around the fire, happy and contented, until the leader of the party at last drove them all off to bed.
“I like this place,” said John, “even if I did come pretty nearly getting drowned out there in the lake.”
And indeed the spot had proved so pleasant in every way that it was only with a feeling of regret that they broke camp on Yellowhead Lake and proceeded on their westward journey.
Up to this time on their journey the weather had continued most favorable, there having been little rain to disturb them either on the trail or in camp. Now, however, they were on the western slope of the Rockies and in the moister climate of the Pacific region. When they left camp on Yellowhead Lake it was in a steady downpour which left them drenched thoroughly before they had gone a mile.
The trail, moreover, now proved not only uncomfortable, but dangerous, the rain making the footing so soft that in many cases on steep slopes they were obliged to dismount and lead their horses up or down. Indeed, the trail scarcely could be called a trail at all, all trace of the original traders’ paths now being lost. Many persons, mostly engineers or prospecting adventurers, had passed here, each takinghis own way, and the sum of their selections served only to make bad very much worse. In the level places the trail was a quagmire, on some of the steeper slopes simply a zigzag of scrambling hoof tracks.
They kept on, in spite of their discomforts, throughout the forenoon without pause. It was their purpose to get on the farther side of as many of these mountain streams as possible. They were now in a bold mountain country, where numerous small tributaries came down to the great Fraser which roared and plunged along beside their trail. “The Bad River,” old Sir Alexander Mackenzie called one of the headwaters of the Fraser, and bad enough it is from its source on down.
They were now near the forks of the two main tributaries of the Fraser, one roaring torrent coming down from the south. The trail held to the north bank of the Fraser, following down from the lake along the rapid but harmless little river which made its outlet. To ford the Fraser was, of course, impossible. Time and again the young adventurers paused to look down at the raging torrent, broken into high, foaming waves by the numerous reefs of rock which ran across it. Continuallythe roar of the angry waters came up to them through the trees. More than ever they realized that they now were on the shores of one of the wickedest rivers in all the Rockies, as their Uncle Dick had told them of the Fraser.
They now observed that the trees of the forest through which they traveled were much larger than they had been. But, splendid as this forest growth had been, they found that in a large area fire had gone through it in some previous year, and this burned country—orbrûlè, as Moise called it—made one of the worst obstacles any traveler could encounter. This hardship was to remain with them almost all the way down the Fraser to the Tête Jaune Cache, and it added immeasurably to the trials of pack-train travel.
At last they pulled up alongside of a broad and brawling stream, turbulent but shallow, a little threatening to one not skilled in mountain travel, but not dangerous to a party led as was this one, by a man acquainted with the region.
GRANDAPPROACHING THE GRAND CAÑON ON THE FRASER RIVER
“Here we are at Grant Creek,” said Uncle Dick, as they paused on the hither side of the stream. “This is one of the many swifttributaries on the north side of the Fraser, but I am glad we’ve got to ford it, and not the Fraser itself. You see, we have to keep on the north bank all the way down now.”
Uncle Dick carefully located his landmarks and examined some stones and stumps to get some idea of the stage of the water.
“It’s all right,” said he. “Come on across. Follow me closely now.”
Soon they were belly-deep in the tawny flood of the stream, which came down noisily all about them. The sturdy horses, however, seemed not to be in the least alarmed, but followed old Danny, Uncle Dick’s pony, as he slowly plodded on across, angling down the stream and never once losing his footing in the rolling stones of the bottom. The stream was not over a hundred and twenty feet wide at this point, and the ford was made with no difficulty at all.
“This is easy,” said Uncle Dick, as they emerged on the western side. “But three miles ahead we come to the Moose River, and that’s apt to be a different proposition. You can’t tell anything about any of these rivers until you try them. One thing is sure, we can’t get any wetter than we are.”
“I’ve noticed all these streams are highest in the afternoon,” said Rob—“a lot higher, too. We’ve often mentioned that.”
“Yes; that’s because the snow melts in the morning and starts the water down the high slopes. It takes some time for it to get down to the lower levels. Morning is the best time to ford any of these mountain rivers, as I have told you.”
The trail was none too good on to the Moose River, and they were none too cheerful as they paused to look over the situation at the bank of this stream.
“When I crossed here the last time I marked a stump with an ax,” said Uncle Dick. “That was barely below swimming-line. Ah, there it is, I see—we’ve got six inches to the good, and that means we can get across, I think. It’s lucky it isn’t worse. There are some falls up this river a little way, and perhaps we could get across the narrows there, but in any case we would have to get the horses across down here, and we had better all make it together. Anyhow, I’ll go ahead on Danny and see how it works. Moise, you’ll bring up the rear; Rob, you go next ahead of Moise, and you, John and Jesse, follow just behindme a little way back. If Danny loses his footing, all of you stop at once and wait for further orders. Well, here goes.”
He spurred his plucky little horse into the roily, turbulent flood, closely followed by the others as he had instructed. Fortunately, the pack-train, by this time well broken into the work of the trail, made no disturbance, but followed along stolidly in the rear of the leader. Thus, little by little, they edged on across and at last crossed the dangerous middle part of the river. Here Uncle Dick angled a little down, following the shallow water indicated by the light ripples. As the boys saw Danny begin to show more and more above the surface of the water, until he was walking no deeper than his knees, they swung their hats and shouted exultantly, for now they were safely to cross one of the most dangerous rivers on the whole trail.
“Well,” said Uncle Dick, as at last they pulled up on the farther side, “that’s done, at any rate. From here it’s only a couple of miles or so to the head of Moose Lake. The trail is fierce along there, but once beyond that lake we can safely call the worst of our whole journey past and done with. We canmake it in a few hours’ steady work if we have luck.”
They pushed on, and after a time paused at a point near the head of Moose Lake, from which they could see it lying before them, seven miles or so of slaty gray water, now wrinkled under the downpouring rain. It was a prospect not in the least cheerful, to be sure.
“The Fraser River runs straight through this lake,” said Uncle Dick, “and, as you see, it is getting more water every mile out of these hills. This is the only quiet place on the whole Fraser River that I know of. But we can’t get across it, couldn’t even if we had boats, for here are the horses.
“But if we could cross the lake here, and if we could cross the Selwyn Mountains over there on the other side of it, we would find a little creek up there which heads up just opposite Price Creek. You see, Price Creek runs down into the Canoe River, which is the stream we’re going to follow below Tête Jaune Cache. They say the Indians used to take horses up this little creek and down Price Creek on the other side. If so, they must have had horses born on the other side of the Fraser, for I’ll warrant they couldn’tget them across from the north side where we are.”
“Did any white man ever go over that way?” asked Rob, curiously.
“Not that I know of. I don’t know when the Indians went there, but there’s a story that some of them took horses across the Selwyns over yonder. As for us, we’ve got to keep on down this valley. We are twenty miles west from the Yellowhead Pass, and have thirty miles more to go yet to the Tête Jaune Cache.”
“What are these big mountains over on the right?” inquired Rob.
“That’s the Rainbow range. We make our way right along their feet. On beyond the lake for some distance the river is a little more quiet, then she drops; that’s all. There’s a strip of water in here twenty miles or so that no boat could live in at all. There were two rattle-headed engineers who did try to take a boat down a part of the Fraser in here, and in some miraculous way they ran maybe ten or twelve miles of it, part in and part out of the water. Then their boat smashed on a rock, and they both were drowned. One body was found, the other was never heard of.”
“Well,” said John, “we’re complaining a good deal about going along on horses, but I believe I like that better than taking a boat on that river.”
“When we’ll make camp to-day, M’sieu Deek?” asked Moise, pushing up alongside the leader’s horse. They all sat in the rain, dripping like so many drowned rats.
“Well,” said Uncle Dick, “this is pretty bad, isn’t it? It seems to me that we had better use all the daylight we can to-day, for we’re wet as we can get anyway. There are no bad streams now, but the trail is awful of itself—side-hills andbrûlè, and in and out of the water all along the lake side. But we’ve got to pass it some time. Suppose we make the best of a bad bargain, and see if we can get to the lower end of the lake to-day?”
The boys all agreed to this, and so the party pushed on, but they found later that the prediction of their leader was quite true, for none of them had ever seen so fearful a trail as that along the north shore of Moose Lake. But even as it grew darker in the deep valley at last they broke through the farther edge of the heaviest timber, picked their way through a wide strip ofbrûlè, crossedthe last dangerous face of rock side, and emerged into an open area where some sort of camp at last was possible. Here they dismounted, all ready to agree that this was the worst day any of them had ever seen on the trail.
“Well,” said Uncle Dick, chuckling, “I pushed pretty hard to-day, but I had to make up for that lost day we spent hunting goats. To tell the truth, I didn’t think we could get this far on to-day, and so I just count we’re even on the goat-hunt. Besides, we are now past the worst part of our troubles. To-morrow I promise you something worth all the hard work we’ve undergone.”
“What’s that?” demanded Jesse. “Some more hunting?”
“Certainly not. You’ve another guess, Jesse. Something better than that.”
“You don’t mean sheep or grizzly?”
“Something bigger than grizzly, even.”
“That,” said Rob, “must be a mountain.”
“Quite right. I’m going to show you the greatest mountain in all the Canadian Rockies, and one of the greatest mountains on this continent. It isn’t known very much to-day, but soon Mount Robson will be one of theshow-places of this whole country. The Indians have always called it the biggest of all these mountains, time out of mind.”
“What time shall we see it?” inquired Rob.
“That depends a great deal. It’ll be about fourteen miles down the trail to the Grand Fork Valley. Looking right up that, we’ll be staring into the face of old Robson. I only hope the rain will be done by that time, so that the sun will shine and give us a fair view. It’s very rarely that one ever sees Mount Robson clear to the top. But sufficient for to-day are the evils, I presume. Let’s see if we can make ourselves comfortable in camp to-night.”
“One thing,” said John, that night, “this horse business isn’t going to last forever. I hope the Canoe River isn’t as bad as the Fraser, for I’m getting ready to get into a boat once more. I’ve changed my mind a little.”
“I wonder where the Canoe River got its name, Uncle Dick?” queried Rob.
“That I cannot tell you. There are some canoes on the Fraser which came up from the Pacific way, and there are some canoe birches in these woods, this side of the summit. Now,whether some of the old traders one day made a birch-bark canoe and ran that stream I can’t tell. But that is the name given to it by the traders, and I suppose they got it from the earlier traders who crossed this country.
“John,” he added, “this is a hard place for you to bring up your map. I’ll excuse you from your map-making until we have a drier camp than this.”
Happily on the next day the weather relented and the sun greeted them when they were ready for their breakfast, although all the trees were dripping wet. Uncle Dick was very much rejoiced.
“We’ll see Robson to-day if this sun holds,” said he. “Let’s hurry on.”
“There you go!” grumbled John. “Uncle Dick, you always are finding one reason or other for being in a hurry.”
“Well, everything in here is in a hurry,” was his uncle’s answer. “All the water’s in a hurry, and all the engineers are in a hurry. But, speaking of that, you may notice that below the lake here the slopes are not quite so steep. The river is getting wider. By and by it will be so tame that you really can run a boat on it. The Tête Jaune Cache was what you might call the head of water transportation on the west side—as far asthe canoes dared attempt the Fraser going east. From the Tête Jaune Cache it is possible to make a canoe journey up and down the river between that point and Fort George, although every time one makes the journey he takes his own chances.”
“Is the Canoe River a very bad river, then?” demanded John.
“Well, as to that, she’s jammed and drifted and overhung and fast, but not so bad as the Peace River was in many places,” replied Uncle Dick. “I don’t think we need have much anxiety as to that part of our journey. At least, we’ll not worry about it yet, for worrying doesn’t get anybody anything. I only hope that Mount Robson will not put on his cap until we get down to the lower end of the Grand Fork Valley.”
They found their trail now as it had been described, less dangerous. Indeed, there was but one risky crossing, that of a rock slide which ran down sheer to the river-bank, where a misstep might have been fatal. They kept steadily on until at length they opened up the wide valley of the Grand Fork, a tributary which comes down from the great peaks which surround the noble mountain known as Robson.
When at last the full view up this valley unfolded before them they pulled up and paused, not saying a word. It was a wonderful sight that lay before them, one of the most wonderful in all the great Rockies. On every hand ran frowning slopes crowned with dark forest growth, flanked here and there by the yet darker shadows of the passing clouds. But towering above all, and dwarfing all rivalry, there stood before them one great, noble, white-topped peak, unshaded by any clouds. As the boys gazed at it instinctively they took off their caps.
“That’s Robson!” said Uncle Dick, smiling. “Any way you look at it it’s big. Here you see a sheer wall of bare rock, thousands of feet. The approach is steep as the roof of a house, as you can see. All over it in every little valley there are glaciers. Any way you approach it it’s hard going when you try to climb old Robson—’Yuh-hai-has-kun,’ the Indians called it, ‘the mountain with the stairs.’ But when they tried to climb it they never could quite find the stairs. So far no one has made the ascent.[1]