CHAPTER XXIV.
ASCENT OF THE BIGHORN.
In a week we crossed the valley by short stages and again reached the loftier mountains. One afternoon we arrived at a stream where we resolved to pass the night, as we did not know whether we should find water farther on. Tiger at once hastened off to look for game, and as my comrades preferred a rest, I set out to try my luck too. I told Antonio to follow me on Lizzy, that I might not have to carry the game myself, and had got about a mile from camp when I noticed from a clump of oaks a herd of deer on a grassy spot ahead of me, which looked like the ordinary Virginia deer, but were darker-coloured. I took up a deer-call to draw them toward me, as the spot where I was standing was too barren for me to be able to stalk them. I posted myself near an oak, and Antonio sat on Lizzy behind me. The herd advanced toward me on hearing my call, and were near enough when Antonio cried to me, "Here! here!" I fancied he was alluding to the approaching deer, and whispered that I could see them; but he repeated his "here!" and presently added, "Look to your right!" I turned and saw an enormous snow-white bear forty yards from me, I tried to fire, but the bear got behind a large oak, and then behind another, and so was a good distance off ere I could despatch a bullet after it, which I heard enter a tree. It escaped me, as I had left Trusty in camp, for his feet were sore from running over sharp stones lately. The bear heard the call and hurried up, believing that there was booty for it. It was only a variety of the common black bear. I would gladly have secured its beautiful skin, as it is a rarity, but it was out of my reach, and hence I returned to the deer, which after my shot had disappeared in a distant wood. I went after them, and found them grazing again: when I emerged from the bushes I shot a large deer, and found to my surprise that it belonged to a genus I had never seen before. It was of a very dark, almost black, colour, much larger than a Virginia deer, and more lightly built, with a longer black scut. It had cast its antlers, and the new ones had already grown to some size. We packed the entire animal on Lizzy, and carried it to camp, where Owl called it a mule-stag or black-tail deer, a variety not uncommon in the lower regions of the Rocky Mountains.
Our road rapidly ascended from here to the higher mountains, and became daily steeper and poorer in vegetation; still the path we followed was very fair, so that we rather rapidly surmounted the heights, on whose small plateaus our cattle were able to rest again. We left behind us in a few days many mountain chains with their narrow valleys, when suddenly the mountains before us became covered with snow, and we were soon in the wintry landscape again. We suffered terribly from the cold, as our clothes were not at all suited for such a temperature; and though we wrapped ourselves in our skins we could not keep warm. I was the best protected, as I hung my large bearskin over me, and, sitting upon it, wrapped myself up from head to foot; but for all that I did not get warm during the ride, and we were very glad when we reached a hollow in the evening, where we found but little snow and a clump of fir-trees, in which we camped, and warmed the atmosphere around us with an enormous fire.
On the following day our road ran principally over snow-covered rocks, but we came now and then to spots where the sun had melted it, while all around us rose mountains which even at midsummer do not doff their winter garment. At last, early one morning, after spending the night at a very poor fire, we ascended a saddle, whence we looked down into a plain, whose end in the blue misty distance was bordered by high mountains, while on the west and east it was begirt by immense ranges, whose lower chains ran down sharply on both sides in the most remarkable shapes. The steepest rocks here rose precipitously over the valley, and the white stone formed long pinnacles, round domes, globes resting on their pillars, in a word, the strangest shapes, so that our wondering eyes were tempted to see in them towers, castles, and monuments, while farther on the mountain masses rose above each other with a reddish-blue tinge, and touched the clouds with a few isolated peaks. The valley itself, if it may be called so at this elevation, was well watered, and from south to north glistened at the base of the western mountains the surface of a large river, while on the right-hand side signs of water were also visible. Except the forest of pines on the sides of the mountains, vegetation seemed to be restricted to the vicinity of this water, where we noticed a good deal of bush and some rather lofty trees of the aspen and poplar kind. The greater portion of this extensive undulating plain only displayed desolate tracts of stone and rocky knolls. Our Indians call this mountain glen Old Park, and the river before us the sources of the Rio Colorado, which flows through New Mexico and California to the distant Pacific, where it falls into the Gulf of California.
We hastened to the lower regions, and on the third day reached the river, whose course we followed. A few days after we were surprised by two men, as we were letting our horses graze at noon. They were beaver trappers who had been hunting for some years in these mountains, and paid us a visit in the hope of procuring provisions from us. We showed them, however, that in this respect we were almost as badly off as themselves, and that with the best will we could not meet their wishes. They were both Canadians, of French origin, and had led this life in the desert for many years. They were men of very slight education, with repellant manners, and a disagreeable, very coarse appearance, so that we were not sorry when they took their rifles and went away with a hurried farewell.
We marched for about a week near this river, till we reached a bend, when it suddenly trended to the west, and thence pursued its uninterrupted course through the enormous plains. We crossed here an arm of the river which came from the east, and followed another up stream to the north-east. We constantly drew nearer to the mountains on the east, and ere long the highest peak, clad in eternal snow, rose distinctly against the blue sky before us. The Indians called this the Bighorn, which agreed with the statement of the two trappers, of whom we had inquired. I had been determined from the commencement of the journey to get as high as I could up this peak, and hence steered toward it.