[CHAPTER VII]
LAKE McDONALD AND ITS TRAIL
IN the northern part of Montana, towards the Canadian border, the Main Range of the Rocky Mountains has been rent and carved by glacial action during ages gone by, until the peaks, like tusks, stand separate and distinct in a mighty, serrated line. No one of these reaches so great a height as Shasta, Rainier or Hood, but here the huge, horned spine rises almost sheer from the sweep of tawny prairie, and not one, but hosts of pinnacles, sharp as lances, stand clean cut against the sky. Approaching the range from the East, in the saffron glow of sunset, one might fancy it was wrought of amethyst, so intense and pure is the colour, so clear and true the minutest detail of the grandly sculptured outline. Within the ice-locked barriers of those heights live glaciers still grind their passages through channels of stone; down in shadowy ravines, voiceful with silver-tongued falls, lie fair lakes in the embrace of over-shadowing altitudes. The largest of these lakes, McDonald, is the heart of a vast and marvelous country, the center of many trails.
The road to Lake McDonald winds along the shores of the Flathead River for half a mile or more, skirting the swift current now churned into white foam by rapids, then calm and transparent, revealing the least stone and tress of moss in its bed, in shades of limpid emerald. Leaving the river, the way lies through dense forests of pine and tamarack, cedar and spruce, and so closely do the spreading boughs interlace that the sun falls but slightly, in quivering, pale gold splashes upon the pads of moss and the fragrant damp mold which bursts into brilliant orange-coloured fungus and viciously bright toadstools. Each fallen log, each boulder wrested from its place and hurled down by glacier or avalanche, is dressed in a faery garb of moss and tiny, fragrant shell-pink bells called twinflowers, because two blossoms, perfect twins, always hang pendent from a single stem as slender as spun glass, and these small bells scent the air with an odour as sweet as heliotrope. Within the forest dim with perpetual twilight, one feels the vastness of great spaces, the silence of great solitudes.
Suddenly there bursts upon one, with all the up-bearing exhilaration of a first sight of the sea, a scene which, once engraved upon the heart, will remain forever. The trees part like a curtain drawn aside and the distance opens magnificently. The intense blue of the cloudless sky arches overhead, the royal waters of the lake flow blue and green with the colours of a peacock's tail or the variegated beauty of an abalone shell; sweeping upward from the shores are tall, timbered hills, so thickly sown with pine that each tree seems but a spear of grass and the whole forest but a lawn, and towering beyond, yet seeming very near in the pure, white light, is a host of peaks silvered with the benediction of the clouds—the deathless snow. The haze that tints their base is of a shade one sometimes finds in violets, in amethysts, in dreams. Indeed, these mountains seem to descend from heaven to earth rather than to soar from earth towards heaven, so great is their sublimity.
As one floats away on the lake the view changes. New vistas open and close, new peaks appear above and beyond as though their legion would never come to an end. Straight ahead two irregular, rugged mountains with roots of stone emplanted in the water, rise like a mighty portal, and between the two, seeming to bridge them, is a ridge called the "Garden Wall." The detail of the more immediate steeps grows distinct and we see from their naked crests down their timbered sides, deep furrows, the tracks of avalanches which have rushed from the snow fields of Winter, uprooting trees and crushing them in the fury of the mad descent. A long, comparatively level stretch, not unlike a gun sight set among the bristling, craggy summits, is the "Gunsight Pass," the difficult way to the Great St. Mary's Lakes, the Blackfeet Glacier and the wonderful, remote region on the Eastern slope of the range. Huge, white patches mark glaciers and snow fields, for it is within these same mountains that the Piegan (Sperry) and many others lie. And as we drift on and on across the smooth expanse of water, the magic of it steals upon our souls. For there is about the lake a charm apart from the beauty of the waters and the glory of the peaks; of spirit rather than substance; of soul-essence rather than earthly form. That mysterious force, whatever it may be, rising from the water and the forest solitudes and descending from the mountain tops, flows into our veins with the amber sunshine and we feel the sweeping uplift of altitudes heaven-aspiring that take us back through infinite ages to the Source which is Nature and God.
Glacier Camp
The good old captain of the little craft weaves fact and fancy into wonderful yarns as he steers his launch straight for the long, purplish-green point which is the landing. To him no ocean greyhound is more seaworthy than his boat, and he likes to tell of timid tender-feet entreating him to keep to shore when the lake was tumultuous with storm, and how he, spurning danger, guided them all safely through the trough of the waves. He keeps a little log wherein each passenger is asked to write his name. The poor old man has a maimed hand, his eyes are filmy with years and his gums are all but toothless, but it would seem that nature has compensated him for his afflictions by concentrating his whole strength in his tongue. He knows each landmark well, and gravely points out to the credulous traveller, the highest mountain in the world; calls attention to the 18,000 fathoms of lake depth whence no drowned man ever rises, and other marvels, each the greatest of its kind upon the circumference of the globe. There came a day soon after when the lake chafed beneath a lashing gale and the little craft and her gallant captain were dumped ingloriously upon the beach. But accidents happen to the best of seamen, and the launch, after a furious expulsion of steam, and much hiccoughing, was dragged once more into her place upon the wave.
Although there is evidence that Lake McDonald was long ago frequented by some of the Indian tribes, it was not known to the world until comparatively recent times. There are two stories of its discovery and naming, both of which have a foundation of truth. The first is that Sir John McDonald, the famous Canadian politician, riding across the border with a party, cut a trail through the pathless woods and happening to penetrate to the lake, blazed his name upon a tree to commemorate the event, thus linking his fame with the newly found natural treasure. The old trail remains—probably the virgin way into the wilderness. The second story—which is from the lips of Duncan McDonald, son of Angus, runs thus: He and a little band of Selish were crossing from their own land of the Jocko into the country of the Blackfeet which lies East of the Main Range, to recover some ponies stolen by the latter tribe, when they came in view of this lake hitherto unknown to them. Duncan McDonald, who was the leader or partizan, as the French-Canadians say, blazed the name "McDonald" upon some pines along the shore. It matters little who was actually the first to set foot on these unpeopled banks, but it is a strange coincidence that the two pathfinders should have borne the same name.