About this time Lanahan abandoned all activity except looking for Indians, poisoning our minds against Harrington, and attempting the "horse-wrangling" each morning. He would start out alone quite early, and after blundering about in a most inefficient way, and getting all the nervous horses thoroughly excited and scared, would call some of the other men to his assistance, and then proceed himself to get the packs in as great confusion as possible before the horses were brought in, the one or two that he had caught meantime having escaped.
The next night, before we crossed the divide into Jackson's Hole through Trail Creek Cañon, we had a very heavy thunder-storm, and in the intervals between the peals we could hear Lanahan's vociferous invocations to the various saints he relied upon for protection, his appeals mingling with the damning he was getting from his tent-mates for the disturbance he created. He was so much demoralized by the storm, and by the chance of overtaking the Indians, who were evidently not far ahead of us, that he endured all this abuse with perfect meekness, and did not recover his usual intrepid bearing until the next noon, when he resumed his ostentatious superintendence of the outfit.
Our first camp after crossing the divide was at Fighting Bear Creek, and was made memorable by killing a two-year-old bull elk, the toughest of his race; but fresh meat had become so desirable that his india-rubber qualities were not unfavorably criticized until we got something better.
A man coming down the valley told us that the band of Indians had divided, most of them going south, and ten or twelve men and squaws northward, in the direction we were to take. This somewhat reassured Lanahan, though he strongly advised staying where we were for a time, and then striking east into the Gros Ventre Mountains, where he knew of great quantities of game. The stranger also told us of the disappearance of Mr. Robert Ray Hamilton from his new ranch at the upper crossing of Snake River.
We made our permanent camp directly under the peak of the Grand Teton, on the east side. It was in a little park surrounded by pines. Cottonwood Creek, a beautiful sparkling stream, flowed through it, and above us were the grand mountain masses, feeding from their snow-clad sides the chain of little lakes along their bases, which in turn replenish the mighty Snake River during all the rainless summer months. I have never seen so delightful a camping-ground, nor one which supplied so completely every requisite for comfort and sport. Our hunting adventures during the next ten days in this camp were not remarkable, though we might have killed a large amount of game had we desired. There were a great many antelope out on the prairie, and every morning we could see some in the park. I once aroused the curiosity of a solitary buck to the point of coming up within thirty yards of me by concealing myself in the sage-brush and waving about my wide-brimmed hat on the end of my rifle. We found antelope liver the choicest delicacy to be had in the Rockies, and this fact perhaps led us to kill one or two more of these graceful and interesting creatures than we should otherwise have done.
It was hardly late enough for the bull elk to come down from the high ranges to join the cows and calves. Two large bands of these ranged between us and Jackson's Lake, about fourteen miles north. We could have shot some of these almost daily, but one of the men, contrary to our orders, having gone out and killed two calves soon after our arrival, Hanna and I agreed, after he had shot one cow, not to fire at anything except bulls, and we were guiltless of the blood of any more elk during our stay. One day, near Jackson's Lake, Harrington and I came to a salt-lick in the woods, which we approached quietly, thinking game might be there. When we reached the edge, we saw a big cow elk standing among the trees on the other side of the open space, and directly after, another one lying down in the high grass near the first, only her head and neck being visible. She saw us, but did not stir. Keeping perfectly still and looking closely, we discovered seven or eight more, but none with horns. Finally, stepping forward, thinking we had seen them all, a great number jumped up, going out like a covey of quail. Some had been lying down in the high grass within twenty yards of us, and could not have known of our presence. They made a great noise and crashing as they scurried off, and we could only guess at their numbers, but there must have been thirty or forty.
There were not many bears about here. We saw the tracks of several very big ones, but only four living ones. One of these disappeared before we could get a shot, and the other three, an old cinnamon with two well-grown cubs, we found at the top of one of the lower peaks of the Grand Teton near camp. It had taken Hanna and me three hours' hard climbing to get near the summit, where we expected to find some of the bull elk we had heard whistling, and the tracks of which we saw fresh and plentiful as we ascended.
We were moving very quietly along the game trail, Hanna ahead, when he suddenly stopped and pointed about seventy-five yards in front, where we saw the two cubs playing on some rocks overhanging a deep gulch. We fired nearly simultaneously. My cub dropped dead, while Hanna's, badly wounded, started up the mountain howling his best. It was not ten seconds before the mother appeared, not fifteen yards ahead of us, charging down the trail looking as big as a horse and growling savagely. Hanna, being a step in front of me, fired, and the bear dropped, but was up in an instant and came straight on. He shot again, and again she dropped, but was up like a rubber ball. The third time the cartridge failed to explode. The bear turned a little out of the trail, evidently bewildered, but as vicious as ever. As she passed me, within ten feet, I shot, and the ball pierced the heart, but it required two more of the 45-90 bullets to kill her. She was one of the long-legged greyhound kind, but quite fat; and, judging from the impression she made on a small tree she ran against and clawed like an angry cat, she would have badly damaged any man she might have met. Her jaw had been shattered by Hanna's first shot; the second had traversed her body, and there were two through her heart. Her vitality was really astonishing. We got the wounded cub, but the other had rolled down the gulch; and as we could not reach him without a long detour, we left him behind. We skinned the two animals and packed their hides to camp on our backs, finding the loads very heavy before we reached there.
Porcupines were very plentiful, as they are in most parts of the Rockies, and grow to a great size. They sometimes fall victims to bears, which manage to turn them over and get at the unprotected parts, eating everything but the quill-covered skin. In one day's hunt I saw the remains of three that had been thus treated. Bears also dig up the nests of yellow-jackets for the larvæ they contain; and we came upon a nest so lately rifled that many of its former occupants were still buzzing angrily about.
After pleasant days spent at this camp, we packed up and started north to go through the Yellowstone Park. As we were passing out of Jackson's Hole, we looked back and had a superb view of the great valley with the Snake River winding through it, the bare ranges of the Gros Ventre Mountains, and the towering snow-capped rocky peaks of the Tetons—a wonderful picture.