“Permit me to help you out, Hippy,” offered Emma sweetly. “What you would say, had you not forgotten the piece you committed to memory from the guide book, is, Nature has lavished her most extraordinary gifts on the region of the Yellowstone. Here are wild woodland, carpeted with varicolored flowers, crystal rivers, thundering cataracts, gorgeous canyons, sparkling cascades, birds and animals; but of all its wonders none is so unusual, so startling, so weird, as the spouting geysers, especially the one that wears Captain Gray’s pajamas and Stacy Brown’s shirt,” finished Emma in a gale of laughter from her companions.
That night the water in their cooking utensils froze, and the Overlanders rose in the morning chilled to the marrow. A brisk run up and down, while Jim was building the fire, restored their circulation and their spirits.
“Our altitude above sea level is seven thousand, seven hundred and thirty-eight feet,” announced Tom Gray. “No wonder the water froze last night.”
Their route, from that point on, lay along the west bank of the Yellowstone River on their way to the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. They started out early in the morning, and by sunrise were well on their way. On their right the guide pointed out the profile of the Sleeping Giant on a high mountain range, the features being coated with snow.
“It’s a wonder he doesn’t freeze his face,” commented Stacy.
“Perhaps he would were it as soft as some persons,” suggested Emma demurely.
“Ouch!” cried Stacy. “That one went home.”
“Yes, the place where you ought to be,” added Nora.
“Home is all right when a fellow hasn’t any other place to go to. Of course home is the place for girls because all they can do is to chatter and try to look pretty,” retorted Chunky.
The journey was made without incident, unless the perpetual cloud of dust could be called an incident. Dust seems a necessary part of Government roads in the Yellowstone, and the Overland Riders were covered with it ere they had proceeded far on their way.