The hours passed swiftly by for Jack and Hugh, as they watched the river banks on either side. The boat had met a flood of water just above Berthold, which, if it made progress against the strong current more slow, nevertheless saved time by deepening the water, so that they did not run aground on sand-bars. Several times during the morning, antelope were seen feeding in the bottom, lifting their heads to gaze at the boat, as it puffed and snorted along, but not being enough alarmed to take to flight. After supper that night, as they sat on the deck about sundown, Hugh, watching the banks, pointed out no less than three distant spots on the wide bottom, which he told Jack were bears digging roots. They were a long way off, yet with his glasses Jack was able to make out their forms, and to recognize them as bears.
CHAPTER II
THE BATTLE OF THE MUSSELSHELL
Early next morning the boat stopped at Fort Buford, above the mouth of the Yellowstone River.
The wait was to be only a short one, and no one left the boat. Jack was interested in looking from the upper deck at the post, where there were a number of soldiers, and it looked like a busy place. Away to the left was seen the broad current of the Yellowstone coming down between timbered banks. As the two friends sat on the upper deck and looked off toward the shore, Hugh, in response to some question by Jack, said:
"Yes, in old fur-trading days this used to be a mighty interesting place. Just above here was one of the great trading posts of old times, and pretty much all the tribes of the northern prairie used to come here to get their ammunition, and whatever other stuff they could buy. Old man Culbertson was here for a long time, and lots of people from back east and from foreign parts used to come up the river as far as this. Sometimes they used to have great fights out here on this flat, when two hostile tribes would come in to trade and would get here at the same time. I've heard great stories about the way the Indians used to fight here among themselves almost under the walls of the post; and, then, again, sometimes the Indians used to crawl up as near to the fort as they could, and try to run off the horse herd, which would be feeding right out in front of the post. Sometimes they'd get 'em; sometimes they wouldn't, but would get one of the herders. On the whole, however, the place wasn't often attacked, because the Indians couldn't afford to quarrel with the people who furnished them with their goods. When 'twas Fort Union, 'twas a mighty lively place."
"Why Hugh," said Jack, "do you mean to tell me that this is old Fort Union?"
"Sure," said Hugh.
"Why," said Jack, "I've read lots about Fort Union. Don't you know that in 1843 Audubon, the naturalist, and a party of his friends, came up here to find out a lot about the Western birds and animals? I've read a lot of Audubon, and he speaks constantly of Fort Union, and about the things he used to see here, and the buffalo hunting, and about Mr. Culbertson. Dear me! dear me! when I was reading about it I never thought that I would see Fort Union."
"Well," said Hugh, "this is the place; and if this man Audubon was out here in 1843, that, I think, was just the year before they had the big smallpox here. Men that were here at the time tell me that there were two or three big camps of Indians here, and that they got the smallpox in the fall, just before the ground froze, and the Indians died off like wolves about a poisoned carcass; and the ground was hard, and they could not dig graves for them, and they just stacked up the bodies outside of the fort, in rows, like so much cord-wood, and had to wait till the ground melted in the spring before they could bury 'em. There must have been a pile of Indians died."