About the first of August, 1876, Mr. Isaac and I were in Omaha, awaiting the arrival of Professor Cope from Philadelphia.
We met him at the depot, and I remember his watching me with astonishment as I limped along the street on my crippled leg. At last, turning to Isaac, whom he knew to be a horseman, he asked, “Can Mr. Sternberg ride a horse?”
Isaac answered: “I’ve seen him mount a pony bareback and cut out one of his mares from a herd of wild horses.”
That satisfied the Professor, and when we got to Montana, he gave me the worst-tempered pony in the bunch.
We were soon hurrying along over the treeless plains of Nebraska, gaining in altitude every hour, until we reached the highlands of the Great Divide, and plunged down into Weber and Echo canyons, whose forests are dwarfed into miniatures by the majesty of the mountains about them.
It was the first time that I had ever been among these stupendous cliffs and ranges, and I held my breath for very wonder as they unfolded before my astonished vision. They soon became familiar sights enough, but never, even when I gazed every day upon the three Tetons, with the snow glistening in their gorges in midsummer, or upon the mighty ranges of the Rockies, did I lose my feeling of awe at the power here displayed by the almighty Architect who carved these wonderful canyons and set these towering peaks as solemn sentinels over the works of His hands.
We had the pleasure of Mrs. Cope’s company as far as Ogden. Then we three men, taking the narrow-gauge railway, went on to Franklin, Idaho. Here the most uncomfortable journey I have ever experienced awaited us,—six hundred miles in a Concord coach, through the dry, barren plains of Idaho. Our six horses raised clouds of fine dust, which penetrated our clothing and filled our eyes and ears, and, sticking to the perspiration that oozed from every pore, soon gave us the appearance of having the jaundice.
I cannot begin to describe the discomforts of that terrible ride. We traveled ten miles an hour, day and night, stopping only for meals, which cost us a dollar each, and consisted of hot soda biscuit, black coffee, bacon, and mustard, without butter, milk, or eggs. If, worn out from continued loss of sleep, we dozed off for a moment, a sudden lurch of the coach into a chuck-hole would break our heads against a post or a neighbor’s head. I remember that once when the Professor was almost exhausted from lack of sleep I took his head in my arms and held it there, so that he might get a few hours’ rest. I should like here to express my gratitude to the fellow passengers who so often gave me a seat by the driver, where, buttoned in by the leathern apron, I got more than my share of sleep.
When we reached the mountains, the beauty of the scenery and the absence of dust made the journey more endurable, but we had to walk up all the steep ascents.
At Helena we laid off for a few days. There the news was fresh from the battle-field, of Custer and the brave men who had followed him to death. A letter of his, written just before he entered the valley of death, was read to us by the proprietor of the hotel. I remember one sentence of it: “We have found the Indians, and are going in after them. We may not come out alive.”