With Axe and Rifle

by William Henry Giles Kingston

The ground on which we travelled rose but slightly. As we continued our course the scenery became more gloomy and barren, and, except on the ground beneath our feet, scarcely a blade of grass or plant of any description was to be seen growing in the clefts of the dark and sombre rocks. The atmosphere, seldom warmed by the rays of the sun, felt chilly in the extreme, and depressed our spirits, and had it not been for the assurance of my father, that we should discover an outlet on the other side, some of the party would, I think, have turned back, under the belief that we should only arrive at last before some vast cavern, or towering cliff, beyond which all further progress would be barred. Even the Dominie, I saw, did not half like it, but he was too much attached to my father to hesitate about proceeding. Our chief anxiety was about water, as yet not a single cascade had we met with, nor the smallest rivulet trickling down the sides of the mountains. So lofty were the rocks, that we could nowhere see even the tops of the mountains above us. We concluded that we were at some distance from the snowy peak we had discovered the day before, which would probably have sent down a stream to afford us the water we required. We stopped to rest at noon, where the gorge opened out slightly and the ground bore a sufficient amount of grass to enable our horses to crop a scanty meal. As we were anxious to get into a more fertile region before nightfall, we did not remain longer than was necessary. The shades of evening came on far sooner than would have been the case in the plain. The cliffs rose on every hand, towering as high, or even higher, than at the entrance of the gorge. Unwilling to encamp in a place where we could get neither fire nor water, Mr Tidey and I volunteered to push on ahead, hoping that we might find a pleasanter spot for camping than in the narrow defile, even though we might not succeed in altogether emerging from the pass. We hurried on as long as a ray of light penetrated into the gorge, but at length it became so dark that we could scarcely see a yard before us. Were we to proceed further we might knock our heads against a rock or fall into some yawning chasm.

“Stop, Mike!” said my companion, “better to suffer present evil, than to rush into greater we know not of. We must return to our friends, if we don’t break our heads in the meantime, and advise them forthwith to come to a halt.”

So pitchy was the darkness, that we could not see the rocks on either hand, and we were afraid, should we stumble or turn round by any chance, that we might be going away from, instead of nearing our friends. In vain we looked up to catch sight of a star by which we might have guided ourselves, but not a single one could we see.

“It won’t do to halt here,” observed the Dominie; “depend upon it, the captain has come to a stand-still long ago.”

Every now and then we stopped and shouted as we groped our way forward, but no answer came, and at last I began to picture to myself all sorts of accidents which might have happened to my family. Perhaps their footsteps had been dogged by the Indians, or a rock had fallen and crushed them, or the horses, suffering from want of water, had sunk down exhausted.

When I mentioned my apprehensions to Mr Tidey, he laughed at me, and tried to dispel them. “The thing is, Mike, we came over the road in daylight, and we are now going back in the dark, and whereas we were walking four miles an hour, we are now progressing at a quarter that speed.”

Still, I was not convinced, and dreaded that at any instant we might come upon the dead bodies of our friends.

Again and again I shouted out. How my heart bounded when I at length heard my father’s cheery voice replying to our hail. Turning an angle of the pass I saw the light of a fire, by the side of which I could distinguish the carts, the white tent, and the figures of our friends. Guided by the blaze, we soon reached the little encampment. My father and Uncle Denis were as glad to get us back as we were to return, though we had no satisfactory intelligence to communicate. Dio had found some bushes, from which the fuel for our fire had been procured and what was of of equal consequence, a small pool of water, to which our thirsty cattle had been led to drink.

“Had we pushed on we should have missed it, so that we must not grumble at being detained in the pass,” observed my father.

“Provided no storm comes on until we are clear of it,” remarked Uncle Denis; “however, we will not anticipate evils.”