"Why, Boy," Replied The Veteran,
"Caution Is Caution, But One Must Not Put Up With Too Much, Even
From A Bear.
Would you have me suffer myself to be bullied all
day by a varmint?"
CHAPTER XXVII.
Indian Trail.- Rough Mountain Travelling.- Sufferings From Hunger
and Thirst- Powder River.- Game in Abundance.-A Hunter's
Paradise.- Mountain Peak Seen at a Great Distance.- One of the
Bighorn Chain.- Rocky Mountains.- Extent.- Appearance.- Height.-
The Great American Desert.- Various Characteristics of the
Mountains.- Indian Superstitions Concerning Them.- Land of
Souls.- Towns of the Free and Generous Spirits- Happy Hunting
Grounds.
FOR the two following days, the travellers pursued a westerly
course for thirty-four miles along a ridge of country dividing
the tributary waters of the Missouri and the Yellowstone. As
landmarks they guided themselves by the summits of the far
distant mountains, which they supposed to belong to the Bighorn
chain. They were gradually rising into a higher temperature, for
the weather was cold for the season, with a sharp frost in the
night, and ice of an eighth of an inch in thickness.
On the twenty-second of August, early in the day, they came upon
the trail of a numerous band. Rose and the other hunters examined
the foot-prints with great attention, and determined it to be the
trail of a party of Crows, returning from an annual trading visit
to the Mandans. As this trail afforded more commodious
travelling, they immediately struck into it, and followed it for
two days.
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