Jack in the Rockies: A Boy's Adventures with a Pack Train

by George Bird Grinnell

"Why, no," said Hugh, "if I were you I'd leave the horses here to rest, and go afoot. You can hunt better afoot, and then if you kill anything that's too big for you to pack in, you can come down and get a horse for it."

The next morning the two boys started early, and for a long time scrambled up the hill. When they reached the top of the bench above camp, they found before them a plateau, more or less level, and beyond that rose another ridge, which cut off the view. They climbed and climbed for a long time, passing over one bench after another, and at length, a little before noon, Joe saw far off on the hillside, at about the same level with themselves, three mountain sheep. They were on quite another mountain, for there were two wide gorges between them and the boys; and, what was more to the point, the sheep had already seen them and were looking. So the boys kept on climbing.

At last they reached the rocks, a great brown slope of broken weathered lichen-covered stones, which rose steeply before them; but the going was not bad, and they climbed up, heading always for a place where the precipices above seemed broken away, so that they could get through. It was now noon and the sun shone warm, but a cool breeze was blowing along the hillside, and the air was fresh and invigorating. Jack said, "Now, Joe, when we get to the top of this cliff we'll find a sheltered place, and sit down there and eat."

"That will be good," said Joe; "I'm hungry." They had now climbed quite high, and looking across at the mountain on the other side of the stream, could see that the timber was small, and that a little higher up it seemed to stop. Joe said, "We ought to see sheep up here, it seems to me."

"I should think so," said Jack, "but we'll have to wait until we get to some place where we can get a good look along the mountain." Before long they reached a ravine, and clambering up it for some distance came out on a rocky hillside, from which both to the north and south they could see a long way over ground that for the most part was open and steeply sloping. Above them the mountains rose in a series of narrow benches—a bench not more than fifty feet wide, and then a cliff as high, then another bench, and another cliff, and so on up. Here, choosing a place which was sheltered from the wind, they sat down and rested for a while, at the same time eating their bread and dried meat, which tasted very good. When they had finished, Jack said:

"Now, Joe, you know more about the mountains than I do. What shall we do? Shall we keep on climbing, and try to get up to the top, or shall we walk along one of these benches? I suppose if we do that we might easily enough run across some sheep, for at this time of the day they'd be likely to be lying down in just such places."

"Yes," said Joe, "that's so; but if they're lying down there, they're looking 'round all the time, and pretty sure to see you before you see them. Then maybe they'll make one jump out of sight, going up the hill, or down, and you don't get a shot."

"Well, then," said Jack, "let's go higher."

"All right," said Joe, "we'll go ahead."

The climb was steep and rough and hard, but they kept at it for sometime longer, and at last found themselves up above the benches and on a gentle rounded rock slope, where little grass grew. There were no trees or tall weeds.