Captain Clark's First Employment,
On Lighting A Fire, Was To Extract From His Feet The Thorns,
Which He Found Seventeen In Number."
The dung of the buffalo, exposed for many years to the action of sun,
wind, and rain, became as dry and firm as the finest compressed hay.
As "buffalo chips," in these treeless regions, it was the overland emigrants'
sole dependence for fuel.
The explorers now approached a wonderful pass in the Rocky Mountains
which their journal thus describes:
"A mile and a half beyond this creek [Cottonwood Creek] the rocks approach
the river on both sides, forming a most sublime and extraordinary spectacle.
For five and three quarter miles these rocks rise perpendicularly
from the water's edge to the height of nearly twelve hundred feet.
They are composed of a black granite near their base, but from the lighter
color above, and from the fragments, we suppose the upper part to be flint
of a yellowish brown and cream color.
"Nothing can be imagined more tremendous than the frowning darkness of
these rocks, which project over the river and menace us with destruction.
The river, one hundred and fifty yards in width, seems to have forced
its channel down this solid mass; but so reluctantly has it given way,
that during the whole distance the water is very deep even at the edges,
and for the first three miles there is not a spot, except one of a few yards,
in which a man could stand between the water and the towering perpendicular
of the mountain.
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