[CHAPTER II.]
Sunset in the wilds—Our first camp—Outlooks—The solitary Sioux—Losses—The Sioux again—A new departure—The cache at the Souri—The story of Red Cloud—The red man’s offer.
A year passed away.
It was summer again—summer hurrying towards autumn—and the day drawing near the evening.
The scene had changed.
Far away into the west stretched a vast green plain. No hills rose on either side; sky and earth met at the horizon in a line almost as level as though land had been water. Upon one side some scattered clumps of aspens and poplars were visible; save these nothing broke the even surface of the immense circle to the farthest verge of vision.
I stood with Donogh in the centre of this great circle, realizing for the first time the grandeur of space of land. We had travelled all day, and now the evening found us far advanced upon our way into the great plains. It was our first day’s real journey. Early on that morning we had left behind us the last sign of civilized settlement, and now, as evening was approaching, it was time to make our first camp in the silent wilds. The trail which we followed towards the west approached some of those aspen thickets already mentioned. The ground, which at a little distance appeared to be a uniform level, was in reality broken into gentle undulations, and as we gained the summit of a slight ascent we saw that a small sheet of blue water lay between the thickets, offering on its margin a good camping-place for the night.
The sun had now touched the western edge of the prairie; for a moment the straight line of the distant horizon seemed to hold the great ball of crimson fire poised upon its rim; then the black line was drawn across the flaming disc; and then, as though melting into the earth, the last fragment of fire disappeared from sight, leaving the great plain to sink into a blue grey twilight, rapidly darkening into night.
We stood on the ridge watching this glorious going down of day until the last spark of sun had vanished beneath the horizon; then we turned our horses’ heads towards the lake, still shining bright in the after-glow, and made our first camp in the wilds. It was easy work. We unloaded the pack-horse, unsaddled the riding-horses, hobbled the fore-legs, and turned them adrift into the sedgy grass that bordered the lakelet. Donogh had a fire soon going from the aspen branches, the lake gave water for the kettle, and ere darkness had wholly wrapt the scene we were seated before the fire, whose light, circled by the mighty solitude, grew ever brighter in the deepening gloom.
While here we sit before our first camp fire, it will be well that I should say something about our plans and prospects for the future.