With a mile in my favor, the little ponies ridden by the pursuers could not overtake me.
While these thoughts occurred to me as affording a possible means of escape, the brigands doubtless felt that as soon as I began to descend the hill they would have me at their mercy. Immediately after passing the crown of the hill I lost sight of them. Tightening the girth I sprang into the saddle and urged my horse to his utmost speed. The narrow trail was thickly studded with boulders rising several inches above the surface, over which my horse took many a flying leap, and I was not without apprehension that an unlucky stumble of my faithful Ned in attempting to clear them might unhorse me.
When the robbers reached the top of the divide and saw me at full speed a mile in advance they comprehended the ruse, and putting spurs to their horses, gave me instant chase.
It was then that my race for life began. They gained upon me rapidly at the commencement, and at one time were so near that I could hear the labored breathing of their horses. So close, indeed, were they that I seized my cantinas with the purpose of casting the twenty-five pound sack of gold dust into the first sheltered nook I could see by the wayside to lighten the burden of my horse. No opportunity offered, however, that would have escaped the sight of those in pursuit, and I replaced the sack, and with the weight in excess of two hundred pounds my gallant horse strove on with unabated speed until I saw one by one the horses of the robbers worn out by exhaustion. Two of them that followed longest finally closed the pursuit with an infernal yell and gave up the chase.
After an urgent ride of two or three miles farther I completed the trip by a slow pace through the Deer Lodge Valley, and the next morning took the coach from Deer Lodge City to Helena, thankful for an escape from a peril I hope never again to encounter.
CHAPTER XLIX
AN INTERESTING ADVENTURE
For the first three or four years after the settlement of Montana, a favorite mode of returning to the States was by Mackinaw boat, down one or the other of the two great rivers whose upper waters traverse the Territory. The water trip, if not less exposed to Indian attack, was pleasanter, less laborious and expensive, and sooner accomplished than the long, weary journey by the plains.
The upper portions, both of the Missouri and Yellowstone, pass through a country abounding in some of the grandest, most unique, and most richly diversified scenery on the continent. Of themselves the rivers are very beautiful,—their waters pure, cold, broken into frequent rapids; at one moment passing through tremendous cañons and gorges; at the next, babbling along widespread meads; and anon, as if by a transformation of enchantment, dashing into the midst of a desolation which realizes all the descriptive horrors of Dante’s “Inferno,”—affording to the eye a greater variety of picturesque beauty than any of the other great rivers of the continent. A journey down them in a Mackinaw boat is an incident to fill a prominent place in the most adventurous life.
The point selected for embarkation on the Yellowstone was about twelve miles above the spot where Captain Clark started on his descent of the river, when returning from the famous expedition of 1804–06. An isolated grove of lofty cottonwoods has grown upon the only soil within miles, under the overhanging crags of a cañon whose sombre walls lift themselves three thousand feet or more into the atmosphere. The river glides through those strong jaws with the swiftness and silence of a huge serpent escaping its pursuers, forming an eddy just in front of the grove, which, being convenient of access, was early selected as a favorable place for the construction of boats and embarkation of companies.
At this grove, in the Fall of 1865, a company of six hundred persons commenced, in forty-three boats of different patterns, the long journey of three thousand miles to the States. The distance to the mouth of the Yellowstone was eight hundred and twenty miles, and little more was known of its general character at that time than could be derived from the geographical memoir written by Captain Clark sixty years before. A gentleman who belonged to the party has informed me that, after the first day’s sail, he had learned to confide so fully in this narrative for geographical accuracy, that he was enabled to anticipate, long before reaching them, every prominent landmark and rapid mentioned in it. No better geographers than Lewis and Clark have, since their time, visited the country which they explored; but their book, valuable as it must ever prove for its historical and topographical accuracy, left untold the surpassing grandeur and novelty of the scenes through which they passed. There is not a river in the world which, for its entire length of one thousand miles, presents with the same grandeur and magnificence so much of novelty and variety in the stupendous natural architecture that adorns its banks. Its source is in a beautiful lake, unlike, in general character and appearance, any other body of water on the globe. It is surrounded by innumerable warm and hot springs, sulphur deposits, and mud volcanoes. At a few miles’ distance is the largest geyser basin in the world, and close at hand stupendous cataracts and beautiful cascades. Here, too, is a cañon which for forty miles of distance is filled with physical wonders, so numerous, strange, and various as to defy description, and almost surpass comprehension.