The Restless Indian Boys Were Wandering Along
Their Edges And Clambering Up And Down Their Rugged Sides, And
Sometimes A Group Of Them Would Stand On The Verge Of A Cliff And
Look Down On The Array As It Passed In Review Beneath Them.
As we
advanced, the passage grew more narrow; then it suddenly expanded
into a round grassy meadow, completely encompassed by mountains; and
here the families stopped as they came up in turn, and the camp rose
like magic.
The lodges were hardly erected when, with their usual precipitation,
the Indians set about accomplishing the object that had brought them
there; that is, the obtaining poles for supporting their new lodges.
Half the population, men, women and boys, mounted their horses and
set out for the interior of the mountains. As they rode at full
gallop over the shingly rocks and into the dark opening of the defile
beyond, I thought I had never read or dreamed of a more strange or
picturesque cavalcade. We passed between precipices more than a
thousand feet high, sharp and splintering at the tops, their sides
beetling over the defile or descending in abrupt declivities,
bristling with black fir trees. On our left they rose close to us
like a wall, but on the right a winding brook with a narrow strip of
marshy soil intervened. The stream was clogged with old beaver dams,
and spread frequently into wide pools. There were thick bushes and
many dead and blasted trees along its course, though frequently
nothing remained but stumps cut close to the ground by the beaver,
and marked with the sharp chisel-like teeth of those indefatigable
laborers.
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