Mount Hyde
The next day the boat and the provisions, excepting a six days supply carried in the packs, were carefully cached, and at 10:45 camp was left and the memorable tramp begun. Each man carried about twenty-five pounds. The stream was followed a short distance, then the abrupt ascent to the plateau climbed, old river beaches being found all the way up. Ascending a birch knoll, the river was in view for quite a long distance and a large branch seen making in from the west. To the north the highest mountain, in fact the only peak in the vicinity, was seen towering up above the level plateau. Towards this peak, christened Mt. Hyde, the party tramped, and arriving at the top saw the country around spread out like a map. Way off towards the northwest a large lake was seen from which Grand River probably flows, and nearer was a chain of small, shallow and rocky ponds. The country is rocky, covered with deep moss and fairly well wooded, with little underbrush. The wood is all spruce save in the river valleys where considerable birch is mixed in. The black flies were present in clouds, even in the strong wind blowing at the top of Mt. Hyde, and made halt for rest or any stop whatever intolerable. Leaving the mountain, after taking bearings of all the points to be seen, the party struck for the river and camped on the bank between the two branches coming in from the westward, several miles apart. The following day, with faces much swollen from fly bites of the day before, the line of march was along the banks till 2 P.M. when the upper fork was reached.
The course of the river is southeast. This branch course is from the northwest. The main stream turns off sharply to the northeast and after a few miles passes into a deep canon, christened "Bowdoin Canon," between precipitous walls of archeac rock from six hundred to eight hundred feet high. This canon was afterward found to be about twenty-five miles long and winding in its course. In but few places is the slope such as to permit a descent to the river bank proper, and the canon is so narrow, and the walls of such perpendicular character, as to make the river invisible from a short distance. It might truly be said that the discovery of this canon, infinitely grander on account of its age than any other known to geology, and surpassed by few in size, is the most important result of the expedition. Several photographs of it were made, which were not injured by the exposure to wet and rough usage that the camera had to receive during the return journey, and alone convey an adequate idea of this most wonderful of nature's wonders.
At night the first camp away from the river was made, on the plateau. The two men felt that the next day must be their last of advance, so weakened were they by the terrible tramping over deep moss and the persistent bleeding by black flies. The stock of provisions, too, was running low, and with their diminishing strength was a warning to turn back that could not be neglected. A half dozen grouse, three Canada and three rough, had been added to their supplies, but even with full meals they could not long stand the double drain upon their strength.
In the morning a high hill was seen, for which they started, drawing slightly away from the river. Soon a roar from the direction of the river was noticed, which differed from the ordinary roar of the rapids. Altering their course it was found the roar "kept away," indicating an unusually heavy sound. Pushing forward, thinking it must be the desired falls, they soon came out upon the river bank, with the water at their level. This proved the falls to be below them, and looking down they could be seen "smoking" about a mile distant. A distinct pounding had also been felt for some time previous, which further assured them that the falls were at hand. The roar that had attracted their attention was of the river running at the plateau level. At the point they came out upon it, it was nearly two hundred yards wide, a heavy boiling rapid. Walking down the great blocks of rock which form the shore, the river appeared to narrow and at 11.45 A.M., the Grand Falls were first seen.
The marked Bowdoin Spruce
After making pictures of the Falls a feeling of reaction manifested itself in Cary's physical condition, and he remarked, "I do not wish to go farther, I need sleep." Cole, as assistant, had avoided the wear and anxiety of leadership. His athletic work at Bowdoin, in throwing the shot and hammer and running on the Topsham track, had given him stored energy of arm and leg. This reserve strength prompted him to press forward and see more of a region new to human eyes. Leaving his hatchet with Cary, now rolled up in his blanket, with the hope and expectation that on waking he would use the same in preparing fuel and cooking supper, Cole pressed forward into the strange and unknown country three or four miles, and then, for a final view of the location, climbed the highest tree he could find and from its top surveyed the waste of land and river. He stood thus exalted near the center of the vast peninsula of Labrador. Four hundred and fifty miles to the east lay the wide expanse of Hamilton Inlet. Four hundred and fifty miles to the north lay Cape Chudleigh, towards which he could imagine the Julia A. Decker, vainly as it proved, pointing her figure head through fog and ice. Only six hundred miles due south the granite chapel of Bowdoin College points heavenward both its uplifted hands. Four hundred and fifty miles to the west rolled the waves of that great inland ocean, Hudson's Bay, into whose depths, Henry Hudson, after his penetrations to northern waters above Spitzbergen, after his pushing along the eastern coast of Greenland, after his magnificent and successful exploration of the American coast from Maine to Virginia, penetrating Delaware bay and river and sailing up that river crowned by the Palisades and the hights of the Catskills, honored with his name and whose waters bear the largest portion of the commercial wealth of our own country; still fascinated by the vision of a northwest passage that intrepid explorer penetrated into the waters of the unknown sea whose waves unseen dash along the coasts of Labrador from its westward to its northern shores and Cape Chudleigh. All these explorations he accomplished in a sailing vessel about the size of the Julia A. Decker, the ship "Discoverie" of seventy tons. He had wintered at the southern extremity of Hudson's Bay surrounded by a mutinous crew. In the hardships and suffering of the next season, after he had divided his last bread with his men, in the summer of 1611, while near the western coast of Labrador, half way back to the Straits, by an ungrateful crew he was thrust into a sail boat with his son John and five sailors sick and blind with scurvy, and was left to perish in the great waste of waters, which, bearing his name, is "his tomb and his monument." Cole, with his mind and imagination filled with these facts, involuntarily took his knife and carved his name and the expedition on the upper part of the tree which formed his outlook. It might be his monument as the Inland Sea was that of Hudson. Then to have the tree marked and observable to other eyes, in case other eyes should see that country, he commenced to cut the branches from near the top of the tall spruce. He regretted much the leaving of the hatchet with Cary as he was obliged to do the work with his knife. It was a slow and laborious job. His imagination, as it roamed over the wide land, and his interest in his present efforts, had consumed time faster than he knew, and the slanting rays of the western sun started him with thoughts of Cary and supper. It was dark when he reached Cary and he was still asleep. The hatchet was idle, and he wished more than ever that his efforts on the branches of the marked Bowdoin Spruce had been rendered less laborious and more expeditious by the aid of this, to be hereafter his constant companion and source of safety along with another and more diminutive friend, a pocket pistol.
Grand Falls
The falls proper are three hundred and sixteen feet high, and just above the river narrows from two hundred and fifty to fifty yards, the water shooting over a somewhat gradual downward course and then plunging straight down with terrific force the distance mentioned, and with an immense volume. The river is much higher at times and the fall must be even grander, for while the party was there the ground quaked with the shock of the descending stream, and the river was nearly at its lowest point. At the bottom is a large pool made by the change of direction of the river from south at and above the falls to nearly east below. The canon begins at the pool and extends as has been described, with many turns and windings, for twenty-five miles through archaic rock. Above the falls in the wide rapids, the bed was of the same rock, which seems to underlie the whole plateau. In 1839, the falls were first seen by a white man, John McLean, an officer of the Hudson Day Co., while on an exploring expedition in that "great and terrible wilderness" known as Labrador. His description is very general, but he was greatly impressed with the stupendous height of the falls, and terms it one of the grandest spectacles of the world. Twenty years later, one Kennedy, also an employe of the Hudson Bay Co., persuaded an Iroquois Indian, who did not share the superstitious dread of them common among the Labrador Indians, to guide him to the thundering fall and misty chasm. He left no account of his visit, however, and in fact, though one other man reached them, and Mr. Holmes, an Englishman, made the attempt and failed, no full account of the falls has been given to the world, until Cary and Cole made their report. Above the falls as far as could be seen, all was white water, indicating a fall of about one hundred foot per mile. In the course of twenty-five or thirty miles there is a descent of twelve hundred feet, nearly equal to the altitude of the "Height of Land," as the interior plateau of Labrador is called, which has probably been previously overestimated. The next forenoon was spent in surveying and making what measurements could be made in the absence of the instruments lost in the upset. At noon, after having spent just twenty-four hours at Grand Falls, the party turned back. The very fact of having succeeded, made distance shorter and fatigue more easily borne, so they travelled along at a rattling pace, surveying at times and little thinking of the disaster that had befallen them. Camp was made on the river bank, beneath one of the terraces which lined both sides.
Saturday Aug. 15th, the march back to the boat cache was resumed. Towards night, as they approached the place, smoke was seen rising from the ground, and fearing evil, the men broke into a run during the last two miles. As Cary's journal puts it: "We arrived at our camp to find boat and stores burnt and the fire still smoking and spreading. Cole arrives first, and as I come thrashing through the bushes he sits on a rock munching some burnt flour. He announces with an unsteady voice: 'Well, she's gone.' We say not much, nothing that indicates poor courage, but go about to find what we can in the wreck, and pack up for a tramp down river. In an hour we have picked out everything useful, including my money, nails, thread and damaged provisions, and are on the way down river hoping to pass the rapids before dark, starting at 5."