Nothing can exceed the roughness and sterility of the country we have to-day traversed, and the endless succession of steep declivities, and broken, rocky precipices, surmounted. Our line of march, as soon as we left the low grounds of the river valley, led over moderately elevated ridges of oak-openings. We came at length to some hickory trees. Beneath one of them, the nuts laid in quantities on the ground. We sat down, and diligently commenced cracking them; but this was soon determined to be too slow a process to satisfy hungry men, and, gathering a quantity for our night's encampment, we pushed forward diligently. Tramp! tramp! tramp! we walked resolutely on, in a straight line, over hill and dale. Trees, rocks, prairie-grass, the jumping squirrel, the whirring quail—we gave them a glance, and passed on. We finally saw the sun set; evening threw its shades around; night presented its sombre hue; and, as it grew dark, it became cloudy and cold. Still, no water to encamp by was found, and it finally became so dark that we were forced to grope our way. By groping in the darkness, we at length stood on the brink of a precipice, and could distinctly hear the gurgling sound of running water in the gulf below. It was a pleasing sound; for we had not tasted a drop since early dawn. Had we still had our horse, we should not have been able to get him down in the darkness; but, by seizing hold of bushes, and feeling our way continually, we reached the bottom, and encamped immediately by the stream. It was a small run of pure mountain water. Soon a fire arose on its banks. We cracked a few of the nuts. We drank our accustomed tin-cup of tea. We wrapped ourselves in our blankets upon its immediate margin, and knew no more till early daylight, when a cold air had quite chilled us.
Nov. 30th. We were happy to get out of this gulf at the earliest dawn. After travelling a couple of miles, we stepped suddenly into a well-beaten horse-path, running transversely to our course, with fresh horse-tracks leading both ways. We stopped to deliberate which end of the path to take. I thought the right-hand would conduct us to the mouth of the river which we had been pursuing down, where it could hardly fail there should be hunters or pioneer settlers located. My companion thought the left hand should be taken, without offering any satisfactory reason for it. I determined, in an instant, to rise above him mentally, by yielding the point, and set out with a firm and ready pace to the left. We travelled diligently about three miles without meeting anything to note, but were evidently going back into the wilderness we had just left, by a wider circuit, when my companion relented, and we turned about on our tracks toward the mouth of the river. We had not gone far, and had not yet reached the point of our original issue from the forest, when we descried a man on horseback, coming toward us. Joy flashed in our eyes. When he came up, he told us that there was a hunter located at the mouth of the river, and another, named Wells, nearly equidistant on the path he was pursuing; and that, if we would follow him, he would guide us to the latter. This we immediately determined to do, and, after travelling about seven miles, came in sight of the cabin.
Our approach was announced by a loud and long-continued barking of dogs, who required frequent bidding from their master before they could be pacified. The first object worthy of remark that presented itself on our emerging from the forest, was a number of deer, bear, and other skins, fastened to a kind of rude frame, supported by poles, which occupied the area about the house. These trophies of skill in the chase were regarded with great complacency by our conductor, as he pointed them out, and he remarked that Wells was "a great hunter, and a forehanded man." There were a number of acres of ground, from which he had gathered a crop of corn. The house was a substantial, new-built log tenement, of one room. The family consisted of the hunter and his wife, and four or five children, two of whom were men grown, and the youngest a boy of about sixteen. All, males and females, were dressed in leather prepared from deerskins. The host himself was a middle-sized, light-limbed, sharp-faced man. Around the walls of the room hung horns of the deer and buffalo, with a rifle, shot-pouches, leather coats, dried meats, and other articles, giving unmistakeable signs of the vocation of our host. The furniture was of his own fabrication. On one side hung a deerskin, sewed up in somewhat the shape of the living animal, containing bears' oil. In another place hung a similar vessel, filled with wild honey.
All the members of the family seemed erudite in the knowledge of woodcraft, the ranges and signs of animals, and their food and habits; and while the wife busied herself in preparing our meal, she occasionally stopped to interrogate us, or take part in the conversation. When she had finished her preparations, she invited us to sit down to a delicious meal of warm corn-bread and butter, honey and milk, to which we did ample justice. A more satisfactory meal I never made.
It was late in the afternoon when our supper was prepared, and we spent the evening in giving and receiving information of the highest practical interest to each party. Wells recited a number of anecdotes of hunting, and of his domestic life. We repaid him with full accounts of our adventures. What appeared to interest him most, was the accounts of the bears and other wild animals we had seen. When the hour for rest arrived, we opened our sacks, and, spreading our blankets on a bearskin which he furnished, laid down before the fire, and enjoyed a sound night's repose.
Dec. 1st. We were up with the earliest dawning of light, and determined to regain our position at Camp No, on the Great North Fork, with all possible despatch, and pursue our tour westward. We had understood from the conversation of the hunters among themselves, that they designed forthwith to proceed on a hunting excursion into the region we had passed, on the Great North Fork, and determined to avail ourselves of their guidance to our deposits and horse. We understood that our course from that point had been circuitous, and that the place could be reached by a direct line of twenty miles' travel due north-west. We purchased from our host a dressed deerskin for moccasins, a small quantity of Indian corn, some wild honey, and a little lead. The corn required pounding to convert it into meal. This we accomplished by a pestle, fixed to a loaded swing-pole, playing into a mortar burned into an oak stump. The payment for these articles, being made in money, excited the man's cupidity; for, although he had previously determined on going in that direction, he now refused to guide us to Camp No, unless paid for it. This was also assented to, with the agreement to furnish us with the carcase of a deer.
By eleven o'clock, A. M., all was ready, and, shouldering our knapsacks and guns, we set forward, accompanied by our host, his three sons, and a neighbor, making our party to consist of seven men, all mounted on horses but ourselves, and followed by a pack of hungry, yelping dogs. Our course was due north-west. As we were heavily laden and sore-footed, our shoes being literally worn from our feet by the stony tracts we had passed over, the cavalcade were occasionally obliged to halt till we came up. This proved such a cause of delay to them, that they finally agreed to let us ride and walk, alternately, with the young men. In this way we passed over an undulating tract, not heavily timbered, until about ten o'clock at night, when we reached our abandoned camp, where we found our baggage safe. A couple of the men had been detached from the party, early in the morning, to hunt the stipulated deer; but they did not succeed in finding any, and came in long before us, with a pair of turkeys. One of these we despatched for supper, and then all betook themselves to repose.
Dec. 2d. One of the first objects that presented itself this morning was our horse Butcher, from the neighboring canebrake, who did not seem to have well relished his fare on cane leaves, and stood doggedly in front of our cabin, with a pertinacity which seemed to say, "Give me my portion of corn." Poor animal! he had not thriven on the sere grass and scanty water of the Ozarks, where he had once tumbled down the sides of a cliff with a pack on, been once plunged in the river beyond his depth, and often struggled with the tangled greenbriar of the valleys, which held him by the foot. With every attention, he had fallen away; and he seemed to anticipate that he was yet destined to become wolf's-meat on the prairies.
The hunters were up with the earliest dawn, and several of them went out in quest of game, recollecting their promise to us on that head; but they all returned after an absence of a couple of hours, unsuccessful. By this time we had cooked the other turkey for breakfast, which just sufficed for the occasion. The five men passed a few moments about the fire, then suddenly caught and saddled their horses, and, mounting together, bid us good morning, and rode off. We were taken quite aback by this movement, supposing that they would have felt under obligation, as they had been paid for it, to furnish us some provisions. We looked intently after them, as they rode up the long sloping eminence to the north of us. They brought forcibly to my mind the theatrical representation, in the background, of the march of the Forty Thieves, as they wind down the mountain, before they present themselves at the front of the cave, with its charmed gates. But there was no "open sesame!" for us. Cast once more on our own resources in the wilderness, the alternative seemed to be pressed upon our minds, very forcibly, "hunt or starve." Serious as the circumstances appeared, yet, when we reflected upon their manners and conversation, their obtuseness to just obligation, their avarice, and their insensibility to our actual wants, we could not help rejoicing that they were gone.
Dec. 3d. Left alone, we began to reflect closely on our situation, and the means of extricating ourselves from this position. If we had called it camp "No" from our disappointment at not finding it inhabited on our first arrival, it was now again appropriately camp "No," from not obtaining adequate relief from the hunters. We had procured a dressed buckskin for making moccasins. We had a little pounded corn, in a shape to make hunters' bread. We had not a mouthful of meat. I devoted part of the day to making a pair of Indian shoes. We had not a single charge of shot left. We had procured lead enough to mould just five bullets. This I carefully did. I then sallied out in search of game, scanning cautiously the neighboring canebrake, and fired, at different times, three balls, unsuccessfully, at turkeys. It was evident, as I had the birds within range, that my gun had been sprung in the heavy fall I had had, as before related, in the crossing Calamarca. My companion then took his gun, and also made an unsuccessful shot. When evening approached, a flock of turkeys came to roost near by. We had now just one ball left; everything depended on that. I took it to the large and firm stump of an oak, and cut it into exactly thirty-two pieces, with geometrical precision. I then beat the angular edges of each, until they assumed a sufficiently globular shape to admit of their being rolled on a hard surface, under a pressure. This completed their globular form. I then cleansed my companion's gun, and carefully loaded it with the thirty-two shot. We then proceeded to the roost, which was on some large oaks, in a contiguous valley. I carried a torch, which I had carefully made at the camp. My companion took the loaded gun, and I, holding the torch near the sights at the same time, so that its rays fell directly on the birds, he selected one, and fired. It proved to be one of the largest and heaviest, and fell to the earth with a sound. We now returned to camp, and prepared a part of it for supper, determining to husband the remainder so as to last till we should reach settlements by holding a due west course.