A Canyon Voyage Part 14

When the _Canonita_ was ready to start one of Clem's oars could not be found, and Prof. had to delay to cut down one of the extras for him.

Then they got their boat up as far as they could, and while Prof. and Andy kept her from pounding to pieces, Clem got in, bailed out, and took his oars. Prof. then climbed in at the stern, but the current was so strong that it pulled Andy off his feet and he was just able to get on, the boat drifting down stern first toward the big rock. Prof. concluded to let the stern strike and then try to throw the boat around into the river. By this time Andy had got hold of his oars, and the eddy seemed to carry them up-stream some twenty-five feet, so perverse and capricious is the Colorado. They swung the bow to starboard into the main current, and with a couple of strong oar-strokes the dreaded rock was cleared, and down the _Canonita_ came to us over the long waves like a hunted deer. We unloaded the _Dean_ and pulled her out for repairs, but it was after four o'clock when we were able to go on again with a fairly tight boat. Then for eight miles the river was a continuous rapid broken by eight heavy falls, but luckily there were no rocks in any of them at this stage of water, and we were able to dash through one after another at top speed, stopping only once for examination. Two of these rapids were portages on the former trip, proving the ease and advantage of high water in some places; but the disadvantages are much greater.

Through a very narrow canyon on the right we caught a glimpse of a pretty creek, but we were going so fast the view was brief and imperfect. At 5:15 o'clock we ran up to a wide sandbank on which grew a solitary willow tree and there Camp 99 was made. For a s.p.a.ce the inner canyon was much wider than above and the mouth of Bright Angel Creek was just below us; a locality now well known because a trail from the Hotel Tovar on the south rim comes down at this point. The name was applied by the Major on his first trip to offset the name Dirty Devil applied farther up.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Grand Canyon.

From Top of Granite, South Side near Bright Angel Creek.]

The next day was Sunday, September 1st, and after the Major had climbed the south wall for observations we started once more on a powerful current. For the first three miles there was a continuous rapid with no opportunity to land. We dashed through waves that tossed us badly and filled the boats half full and then half full again before we had a chance to bail. In fifteen minutes we made the three miles and a half mile more, to arrive at a heavy rapid, which we ran and in two miles reached another with fearful waves, which we also ran. In one Jones was overbalanced by his oar hitting the top of a big wave behind the boat and he was knocked out. He clung by his knees and hands, his back in the water, and the boat careened till I thought she would go over. We could not move to help him without upsetting and were compelled to leave him to his own resources. In some way he succeeded in scrambling back. The waves were tremendous and sometimes seemed to come from all directions at once. There were whirlpools, too, that turned us round in spite of every effort to prevent it. The river was about one hundred and fifty feet wide. After an extremely strenuous morning we halted on the right for dinner, continuing as soon as we had disposed of it. Presently we arrived at a sharp fall of about twenty feet, where we made a portage, and waited at the foot for the photographers to take some negatives and also for repairing the _Canonita_. Finally it was decided to camp on the spot. It was Camp 100. Our record for the day was a trifle over seven miles with nine rapids run and one portage.

Almost the first thing in the morning of September 2d was a portage, after which we had fair water for two or three miles, and then reached a very heavy fall, where we landed on the left and had dinner before making another portage. This accomplished, we proceeded on a river still rising and ran a great many bad rapids, some of them having tremendous falls. In one the fierce current set against the cliff so strongly that we were carried within an oar's length of it, notwithstanding our severe effort to avoid so close an acquaintance with the rough wall. Even between rapids the velocity of the water was extremely high and we flew along at terrific speed, while in the huge waves of the rapids the boats leaped and plunged with startling violence. Toward night a sudden halt was made on the left to examine a bad-looking place half a mile below.

The Major and Prof. tried to climb where they could get a good view of it, but they failed. The Major said we would run it in the morning, though Prof. was dubious about the feasibility of doing so successfully and said he thought it about the worst place we had yet seen. We camped on a rocky talus where we were. A small sandbank was found nearby for our beds, and we made another discovery, a small pool of clear, pure water, a rare treat after the muddy Colorado which we had been drinking for so long. Twenty rapids were placed to our credit for this one day in a trifle over fifteen miles, and we felt that we were vanquis.h.i.+ng the Grand Canyon with considerable success.

Our life now was so strenuous every hour of the day that our songs were forgotten, and when night came every man was so used up that as soon as supper was over rest and sleep were the only things that interested us.

Though our beds were as hard and rough as anything could be, we slept with the intensity of the rocks themselves, and it never seemed more than a few minutes before we were aroused by the Major's rising signal "Oh-ho, boys!" and rose to our feet to pack the blankets in the rubber bags, sometimes with a pa.s.sing thought as to whether we would ever take them out again. For my part, never before nor since have I been so tired. One night when the Major called us to look out for the boats I did not hear him and no one waked me so I slept on, learning about it only the next morning. Our food supply was composed partly of jerked beef, and as this could not be put in rubber because of the grease it became more or less damp and there developed in it a peculiar kind of worm, the largest about an inch long, with mult.i.tudinous legs. There were a great many of them and they gave the beef a queer taste. In order to clear the sacks as far as possible of these undesirable denizens I several times emptied them on wide smooth rocks, and while the worms were scrambling around I sc.r.a.ped up the beef without many of them, but could not get rid of all. Andy's method of cooking this beef was to make a gravy with bacon fat and scorched flour and then for a few moments stew the beef in the gravy. Ordinarily this made a very palatable dish but the peculiar flavour of the beef now detracted from it, though we were so hungry that we could eat anything without a query, and our diminis.h.i.+ng supply of rations forbade the abandonment of the valuable beef.

When we arose on the morning of September 3d the dubious rapid was tossing its huge waves exactly as on the night before and humanity seemed to be out of the reckoning. By eight o'clock we were ready for it, and with everything in good trim we pushed off. The current was strong from the start, and a small rapid just below camp gave additional speed, so that we were soon bearing down on the big one with wild velocity. The river dropped away abruptly, to rise again in a succession of fearful billows whose crests leaped and danced high in air as if rejoicing at the prospect of annihilating us. Just then the Major changed his mind as to running the place, for now standing on the boat's deck he could see it better than before from the region of our camp. He ordered us to pull hard on our left, intending to land at a spot that was propitious on the left or south bank, but no sooner had he given this command than he perceived that no landing above the fall was possible. He gave another order which put us straight in the middle again and down we flew upon the descent. The Major as usual had put on his life-preserver and I think Jones had on his, but Jack and I, as was our custom, placed ours inflated immediately behind our seats, not wis.h.i.+ng to be hampered by them. The plunge was exceedingly sharp and deep, and then we found ourselves tossing like a chip in a frightful chaos of breakers which almost buried us, though the boats rose to them as well as any craft possibly could. I bailed with a camp kettle rapidly and Jack did the same, but the boat remained full to the gunwales as we were swept on. We had pa.s.sed the worst of it when, just as the _Dean_ mounted a giant wave at an angle perhaps of forty or fifty degrees, the crest broke in a deluge against the port bow with a loud slap. In an instant we were upside-down going over to starboard. I threw up my hand instinctively to grasp something, and luckily caught hold of a spare oar which was carried slung on the side, and by this means I pulled myself above water. My hat was pasted down over my eyes. Freeing myself from this I looked about. Bottom up the boat was clear of the rapid and sweeping on down with the swift, boiling current toward a dark bend. The _Canonita_ was nowhere to be seen. No living thing was visible. The narrow black gorge rose in sombre majesty to the everlasting sky. What was a mere human life or two in the span of eternity? I was about preparing to climb up on the bottom of the boat when I perceived Jones clinging to the ring in the stern, and in another second the Major and Jack shot up alongside as if from a gun. The whole party had been kept together in a kind of whirlpool, and the Major and Jack had been pulled down head first till, as is the nature of these suctions on the Colorado, it suddenly changed to an upward force and threw them out into the air.

There was no time to lose, for we did not wish to go far in this condition; another rapid might be in waiting around the corner. Jack and I carefully got up on the bottom, leaving the Major at the bow and Jones at the stern, and leaning over we took hold of the starboard gunwale under water, and throwing ourselves back quickly together we brought the _Dean_ up on her keel, though she came near rolling clear over the other way. She was even full of water, but the cabins supported her. Jack helped me in and then I balanced his effort so as not to capsize again.

The bailing kettles were gone, but as our hats had strangely enough remained on our heads through it all we bailed with them as fast as possible for a few seconds till we lowered the water sufficiently to make it safe to get the others on board. The Major came aft along the gunwale and I helped him in, then Jack helped Jones. The oars, fortunately, had not come out of the locks, thanks to our excellent arrangement, and grasping them, without trying to haul in the bow line trailing a hundred feet in the water, we pulled hard for a slight eddy on the left where we perceived a footing on the rocks, and as soon as we were near enough I caught up the rope, made the leap, and threw the bight over a projection, where I held the boat while Jack and Jones bailed rapidly and set things in order so that we could go to the a.s.sistance of the _Canonita_. The Major's Jurgenssen chronometer had stopped at 8:26:30 from the wetting.

The _Canonita_, being more lightly laden than the _Dean_, and also not meeting the peculiar coincidence of mounting a wave at the instant it broke, came down with no more damage than the loss of three oars and the breaking of a rowlock. Probably if the Major had sat down on the deck instead of in the chair we might also have weathered the storm.[34]

About a mile and a half below we made a landing at a favourable spot on the right, where the cargoes were spread out to dry and the boats were overhauled, while the Major and I climbed up the wall to where he desired to make a geological investigation. We joked him a good deal about his zeal in going to examine the geology at the bottom of the river, but as a matter of fact he came near departing by that road to another world.

We were now in an exceedingly difficult part of the granite gorge, for, at the prevailing stage of water, landings were either highly precarious or not possible at all, so we could not examine places before running, and could not always make a portage where we deemed it necessary. There were also all manner of whirlpools and bad places. Starting on about three o'clock we descended several rapids in about six miles, when we saw one ahead that looked particularly forbidding. The granite came down almost vertically to the water, projecting in huge b.u.t.tresses that formed a succession of little bays, especially on the left, where we manoeuvred in and out, keeping close against the rocks, the current there being slack. The plan was for me to be ready, on turning the last point, to jump out on some rocks we had noticed from above not far from the beginning of the rapid. As we crept around the wall I stood up with the bight of the line in one hand, while Jack pulled in till we began to drift down stern foremost alongsh.o.r.e. At the proper moment I made my leap exactly calculated. Unluckily at the instant the capricious Colorado threw a "boil" up between the bow and the flat rock I was aiming at, turning the bow out several feet, and instead of landing where I intended I disappeared in deep water. I clung to the line and the acceleration of the boat's descent quickly pulled me back to the surface. She was gliding rapidly past more rocks and the Major jumped for them with the purpose of catching the rope, but they were so isolated and covered with rus.h.i.+ng water that he had all he could do to take care of himself. Jones then tried the same thing, but with the same result. Jack stuck to his post. I went hand over hand to the bow as fast as I could, and reaching the gunwale I was on board in a second. One of my oars had somehow come loose, but Jack had caught it and now handed it to me. We took our places and surveyed the chances. Apparently we were in for running the rapid stern foremost and we prepared for it, but in the middle of the stream there was a rock of most gigantic proportions sloping up the river in such a way that the surges alternately rolled upon it and then slid back. Partly up the slope we were drawn by this power, and on the down rush the boat turned and headed diagonally just right for reaching the left bank. We saw our opportunity and, pulling with every muscle, lodged the _Dean_ behind a huge boulder at the very beginning of the main rapid, where I made the line fast in the twinkle of an eye. Meanwhile the Major had hastily scrambled up to where he could see down the canyon, and he heard Jack's hearty shout of "All right!" Lowering the _Dean_ a couple of rods farther to a sandbank at the mouth of a gulch we went into camp feeling that we had done enough river work for one day, and the _Canonita's_ crew without accident lowered down to the same place before Andy had supper ready. My hat had come off in my deep plunge and beyond this I did not have one. Near by was a small clear spring that gave us another treat of palatable water, the Colorado now being muddier than ever, as it was still on the rise, coming up three feet more while we were here. The entire day's run was eight and one-eighth miles. The Major and Prof. succeeded in getting down three miles on foot to reconnoitre.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Grand Canyon.

Character of River in Rapids.

Photograph by F. S. Dellenbaugh, 1907.]

Continuing in the morning, September 4th, we lowered the boats past the remainder of the rapid and then shoved out into the terrific current once more. Water could hardly run faster than it now did, except in a fall or rapid. The canyon was narrow and for five miles we encountered the worst whirlpools we had anywhere seen. The descent was swift and continuous, but the river was broken only by the whirlpools and "boils"

as we called them, the surface suddenly seeming to boil up and run over.

These upshoots, as a rule, seemed to follow whirlpools. In the latter the water for a diameter of twenty or twenty-five feet would revolve around a centre with great rapidity, the surface inclining to the vortex, the top of which was perhaps eighteen or twenty inches lower than the general level. The vortex itself was perfectly formed, like a large funnel, and about six or eight inches in diameter, where it began to be a hole in the water, tapering thence down in four or five feet to a mere point. The same effect is often seen when the water is flowing out of a round wash-basin through a pipe at the bottom. These were the most perfect whirlpools I have ever seen, those above having been lacking in so distinct a vortex. There were many and we could often see them ahead, but try as we would to cleave through without a complete revolution or two of the boat we could not do it. The boats sank down into the hollow, enabling one to look over the side into the spinning opening, but the boats, being almost as long as the whirlpool's usual diameter, could not be pulled in and we were not alarmed. We found it rather interesting to see if we could get through without turning, but we never did. Any ordinary short object or one that could be tipped on end would surely go out of sight. So furious ran the river along this stretch that we found it impossible to stop, the boats being like bits of paper in a mill-race, swinging from one side to the other, and whirling round and round as we were swept along between the narrow walls till we ran the granite under about five miles from our last camp.

Finally, after a run all told of fourteen miles with twenty-three rapids, we made Camp 103 with walls of friendly sandstone about us. Here again we discovered a small clear spring for drinking and cooking purposes. There was no rain this day and at night we put on our dry clothes with confidence and had a warm comfortable camp with a good sound sleep.

Thursday morning found us early on the river, which to our surprise turned suddenly in a north-north-east direction. When we had gone about nine miles and had run the granite up and down again, it began to turn to the west. At one point the river was not more than fifty feet wide; the current was everywhere exceedingly strong and there were many rapids, of which we ran twelve, and made a portage at another, and a let-down at still another. We camped at the end of the nine miles on a small sandbank, with the total height of walls about four thousand feet, breaking back in terraces after about eight hundred feet. Clem and Jack made a number of photographs wherever practicable, and altogether they had succeeded in securing a representative collection.

During the morning of Friday, September 6th, we ran two rapids in two miles, which brought us to one which we thought required a let-down and we made it. As it was easy, Jack and Clem busied themselves photographing while we were doing it, and we also had dinner here. About two o'clock we went on and in less than three miles ran four rapids, the fourth being an exceedingly heavy fall, at the foot of which we went into camp on the right bank. A little distance above on the same side of the river was a fine clear cold creek larger than the Paria in quant.i.ty of water. We called it Tapeats Creek, because a Pai Ute of that name, who had pointed it out to the Major from the Kaibab, claimed it. During the day the work had been far less strenuous, there were few whirlpools, the river was falling, and it was in every way much easier than above in the granite. A morning was spent at Tapeats Creek for examinations, and we found there some ancient house ruins not far up the side canyon. I discovered a fine large metate or Indian mill, deeply hollowed out, and foolishly attempted to take it to camp. On arriving there it was so heavy I had to drop it and it broke in two, much to the Major's disgust, who told me I ought to have let it alone, a fact which I realised then also. Our rations were now running very low again, for we had taken more days for this pa.s.sage than were planned, and as soon as we launched forth after dinner we began to look longingly for the mouth of Kanab Canyon and the pack-train. The river was much easier in every respect, and after our experience of the previous days it seemed mere play. The granite ran up for a mile or two, but then we entered sedimentary strata and came to a pretty little cascade falling through a crevice on the right from a valley hidden behind a low wall. We at once recognised it as one which Beaman had photographed when he and Riley had made their way up along the rocks from the mouth of the Kanab during the winter. We remembered that they had called it ten miles to the Kanab from this place, and after we had climbed up to examine what they had named Surprise Valley we went on expecting to reach the Kanab before night.

Running several small and one fairly large rapid, we saw, after twelve miles from the last camp, a seeming crack on the right, and a few seconds later heard a wild yelling. In a little while we landed and lowered to the head of a rapid, and running to the right up the backwater into the mouth of the Kanab Canyon, we found George Adair, Nathan Adams, and Joe Hamblin, our three faithful packers, waiting there for us with the rations. They had grown very anxious, for we were several days overdue, and they feared we had been destroyed,--a fear that was emphasised by one of Andy's discarded s.h.i.+rts was.h.i.+ng ash.o.r.e at their feet. We pulled the boats a short distance up the Kanab on the backwater and made a comfortable camp, 106, on its right bank, where we were soon lost in letters and papers the pack-train had brought down.

Our alt.i.tude was now 1800 feet above sea-level, showing a descent from the Little Colorado, in about 70 miles, of 890 feet, with 131 rapids run, besides six let-downs and seven portages. The total descent from the Paria was 1370 feet.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 32: There is but one Grand Canyon--the one here referred to.

Persons unfamiliar with Western geography frequently confound the Canyon of the Arkansas with that of the Colorado because the former is in the state of Colorado. The Grand Canyon is in Arizona but on the _Colorado_ River.]

[Footnote 33: Professor Thompson in his diary calls the descent 130 feet in three-quarters of a mile.]

[Footnote 34: For the benefit of any one who contemplates descending the Colorado I would state that unsinkable boats are the only kind to use and the centre of gravity should be kept low. Cork life-jackets are indispensable.]

CHAPTER XV

A New Departure--Farewell to the Boats--Out to the World through Kanab Canyon--A Midnight Ride--At the Innupin Picavu--Prof. Reconnoitres the Shewits Country--Winter Quarters in Kanab--Making the Preliminary Map--Another New Year--Across a high Divide in a Snow-storm--Down the Sevier in Winter--The Last Summons.

The day following our arrival at the mouth of the Kanab Canyon was Sunday, September 8th, and with the exception of some observations taken by Prof., and the writing of notes, the whole camp was in a state of rest. After our trying work in the granite we enjoyed immensely the lying around warm and dry with plenty to eat. Monday morning everybody expected to begin preparations for the descent to the Grand Wash. We were surprised just as we were about to rise from our places around the canvas on which breakfast had been spread, when the Major, who was sitting in his chair thinking, suddenly exclaimed, "Well, boys, our voyage is done!" In a way these words were a disappointment, for we all wanted to complete the task and we were entirely ready to go on, notwithstanding that our recent experience with high water in the granite indicated great hazard ahead, where there was more granite; but on the whole the disappointment was agreeable. We knew the second granite gorge toward the lower end of the chasm to be nearly as bad as the first one. There was besides one exceedingly difficult pa.s.sage there, which Prof. called Catastrophe Rapid, where the Howlands and Dunn had left the first party, which on the prevailing stage of water the Major believed would be foolhardy to attempt. Prof. in his diary says, "It is nonsense to think of trying the lower bend with this water." He and the Major had talked the matter over Sat.u.r.day night and thought of stopping about forty miles down at Mount Trumbull, where we knew we could climb out; then they thought of sending only one boat that far, but by Sunday night they decided to end all river work here. Prof. said he could map the course from the notes of the first party and that he would rather explore the adjacent country by land.[35] There were some breaks in the notes from here down to Catastrophe Rapid, due to the fact that when the papers were divided on that memorable day on which the Howlands and Dunn left the party, instead of each division having a full copy of all the notes, by a mistake they had only portions of both sets.

In addition to the difficulty of the forbidding Catastrophe Rapid there was a possibility of an attack on us by the Shewits. Jacob through one of his Pai Ute friends had information that they were preparing to lay an ambush, and he sent warning to that effect. Jacob knew the natives too well to have given us this notice unless he thought it a real danger, but we did not allow it much consideration at the time. Yet it would have been an easy matter for the Shewits to secrete themselves where they could fall upon us in the night when we were used up by working through some bad rapid, and then, hiding the goods, throw our bodies into the river and burn the boats, or even turn them loose, thus leaving no proof of their action, our disappearance naturally being laid to destruction by the river, a termination generally antic.i.p.ated. I have sometimes thought that when they killed the Howlands and Dunn they did it deliberately to get their guns and clothes, thinking it would not be found out, or at least that they could put forth a good excuse, as they did.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Grand Canyon.

At a Rapid--Low Water.]

We were in the field to accomplish certain work and not to perform a spectacular feat, and the Major and Prof. having decided that the descent of the remainder of the canyon, considering all the circ.u.mstances, was for us impracticable and unnecessary, we prepared to leave for Kanab. We unpacked the good old boats rather reluctantly. They had come to possess a personality as such inanimate objects will, having been our faithful companions and our reliance for many a hundred difficult miles, and it seemed like desertion to abandon them so carelessly to destruction. We ought to have had a funeral pyre. The flags of the boats, which Mrs. Thompson had made and which had been carried in them the entire way, were still to be disposed of, and that of the _Dean_ was generously voted to me by the Major, Jack, and Jones, who had crew claims to it; that of the _Nellie Powell_ was awarded to Steward; while Clem received the _Canonita's_. I tried to persuade the Major to pack the _Dean_ out in sections and send her east to be kept as a souvenir of the voyage, but he would not then listen to it, though years later he admitted that he regretted not taking my suggestion.

Three years afterward I came back to this place with my own party and would then have executed my desire, but no trace of our former outfit remained except a hatch from one of the middle cabins, and the Major's chair. The latter I carried to Salt Lake, where I presented it to Cap, who was living there.

As before mentioned, the Colorado was so extremely high that the water backed up into the Kanab Canyon, and it was there that we left the boats, each tied to an oar stuck in the ground.[36] We could not get all the goods on the horses of the pack-train, and left a portion to be brought out later. Jack and Clem remained to make photographs, and taking a last look at the boats, with a good-bye to all, we turned our faces up the narrow chasm of the Kanab. A small stream ran in the bottom, and this formed large pools amongst numerous ponderous boulders that had fallen in from the top of the walls some three thousand feet above our heads, the bottom being hardly more than sixty to seventy-five feet wide. It was with considerable difficulty that we got the animals past some of these places, and in one or two the pools were so long and deep they had to swim a little. The prospectors the year before had worked a trail to some extent, but here, where the floods ran high at times, changes occurred frequently. By five o'clock we had gone about eight miles up this slow, rough way, and arrived at a singular spring, where we went into camp. This we called Shower-Bath Spring. The water charged with lime had built out from the wall a semi-circular ma.s.s covered by ferns, which was cut away below by the floods till one could walk under in the sprinkling streams percolating through it. It was a very pretty place, but like all of its kind in the deep gorges it was a favourite resort for tarantulas, many of which we had seen in the depths of the Grand Canyon. These, with scorpions, rattlesnakes, and Gila-monsters, were the poisonous reptiles of the gorge.

[Ill.u.s.tration:

B. Preliminary map of a portion of the southern part of the unknown country indicated by the blank s.p.a.ce on Map A at page 95, showing the Hurricane Ledge, Uinkaret and Shewits Mountains, and the course of the Grand Canyon from the mouth of Kanab Canyon to the Grand Wash. The Howlands and Dunn left the first expedition at Catastrophe Rapid, at the sharp bend a few miles below the intersection of the river and longitude 113 30', climbed out to the north, and were killed near Mt.

Dellenbaugh.]

The next morning, Tuesday, the 10th of September, our pack-train was early on the way. The walls grew somewhat lower, though still two thousand feet high, and the canyon was usually seventy-five to one hundred feet wide at the bottom. There were patches of alluvial deposit now along the sides of the watercourse, covered by fields of cactus loaded with "apples," the p.r.i.c.kly leaves compelling us to keep the trail the prospectors had made by their pa.s.sage to and from the ephemeral Eldorado. After a time we emerged from the lower canyon into a wider one in the way previously described; that is, like going from one floor to another by an incline between narrow walls. The little stream having vanished, a pool of rain-water helped us out for dinner, and while it was preparing Prof. and I climbed up to secure notes on the topography.

A trifle before sunset we arrived at the cedar tree, a short distance below the mouth of the s.h.i.+numo Canyon, where our party had camped the previous March. The pockets were full of clear, fresh water, and we had plenty for horses as well as men. Not far off some human bones were found, old and bleached. We thought they must be the remains of one of the Navajo raiders who escaped wounded from the Mormon attack near this locality. The canyon bottom was quite wide at this point and comparatively level, covered by rushes and gra.s.s, and the horses were able to get a good meal.

During the day every time I dismounted to take compa.s.s bearings on the trail I felt a sharp, peculiar pain shoot up my right leg from in front about half-way between ankle and knee. I could only discover a small red spot at the initial point, and concluded that I must have struck a sharp rock or cactus spine. Our party now again divided, the Major and Jones going up s.h.i.+numo Canyon to the Kaibab region, while Prof. and I rode on up the Kanab Canyon, starting at eight o'clock in the morning, Wednesday, September 11th, and riding steadily all day. As we had not expected to come out in this way saddles were scarce. Prof. and the Major had two of the three used by the packers, while the third was awarded to Jones, who was to have a long ride on the Kaibab trip. The rest of us had to make s.h.i.+ft as we could, and I rigged up a "sawbuck"

pack-saddle, with rope loops for stirrups and a blanket across it to sit on. This was not much better than, or as good perhaps as, bareback, and the horse was a very hard trotter. We wished to reach Kanab that night.

We kept on at as rapid a gait as the canyon would permit, though it was easier than in March, when the numerous miners had not yet broken a way by their ingress and egress in search of the fabulous gold that was supposed to exist somewhere in the inaccessibility of the great chasm.

The harder a locality is to arrive at the bigger the stories of its wealth, while often in the attempts to reach it the prospector treads heedlessly ground that holds fortunes up to his very eyes. We continued straight up Kanab Canyon, the walls running lower and lower, till there was nothing but rounded hills. Then we emerged on the summit, which was a valley bottom, about twenty miles from Kanab. Shortly after dark we halted for a bite to eat and a brief rest before striking for our old storehouse, a log cabin in Jacob's corral, where we arrived about eleven o'clock, having made about forty miles. I collected all the blankets I could find, and, throwing them on the inside of Jacob's garden fence, I was almost immediately asleep, and knew nothing till Jacob came along and said a "Good-morning." My ablutions over, I went to Sister Louisa's to breakfast with Prof. and Mrs. Thompson. The gardens were now yielding an abundance of fresh fruits, peaches, melons, etc., and I blessed the good management and foresight that directed the immediate planting of these things in a Mormon settlement. It seemed as if I could not get my fill.

[Ill.u.s.tration:

C. Preliminary map of a portion of the central part of the unknown country indicated by the blank s.p.a.ce on Map A at page 95, showing the Kaibab Plateau, mouth of the Paria, Echo Peaks, House Rock Valley, and the course of part of Glen Canyon and of Marble Canyon and the Grand Canyon to the mouth of the Kanab Canyon. El Vado is at the western intersection of the 37th parallel and the Colorado River, and Kanab is in the upper left-hand corner of the map--just above the 37th parallel which is the boundary between Utah and Arizona. The words "Old Spanish Trail from Santa Fe to Los Angeles" near El Vado were added in Was.h.i.+ngton and are incorrect. The old Spanish trail crossed at Gunnison Crossing far north of this point, which was barely known before 1858.]

Friday the 13th, the next day, was my birthday and Mrs. Thompson, who was always striving to do something to make our circ.u.mstances pleasant, prepared a large peach pie with her own hands in celebration. The Major and Jones having come in the night before, we pa.s.sed most of the time that day in a large tent eating melons, the Major acting as carver of the fruit. When we had eaten a watermelon he would declare that he thought muskmelon far better. We all agreed. He would cut one only to find when we had eaten it that we had changed our minds and wanted watermelon, which see-saw opinions we kept up till all the melons were gone. It would be impossible for any one who had not had our canyon fare to appreciate the exhilarating effect of this fresh fruit.

My leg, which had developed the pain coming up the Kanab Canyon, now swelled till it was almost the same size throughout and any pressure made an imprint as in a piece of putty. No one knew what to make of it.

I rode over to Johnson's, that person being the nearest to a doctor of any one in the country, though the Mormons do not much believe in medicines, and he gave me a liniment to apply. This did no good. In a few days the swelling disappeared except where the spot of keen pain was, and there a lump was left half as large as a man's fist, with two small red spots in the middle of it. I now concluded that these spots marked the bite of a tarantula that must have gotten in my blankets at Shower-Bath Spring. Suppuration set in at the spots where the flesh turned black and all the men said it was a bad-looking wound. They thought I would lose my leg. I concluded to poultice it to draw out any poison that remained, and kept bread-and-milk applied continuously.

After a while it seemed to have a tendency to heal.

We ran the base line up through Kanab and at the head of it pitched a small observatory tent over a stone foundation on which Prof, set up a large transit instrument for stellar observations. He got in connection, by the telegraph, with Salt Lake City and made a series of close observations. I began an hourly set of barometrical readings and as soon as Clem came back he helped me to run them day and night for eight consecutive days. Jack meanwhile was preparing for a trip to the Moki Towns, the Major and Jones had gone off for some special work, and Andy started with a waggon for Beaver to bring down rations. Occasional bands of trading Navajos enlivened the days and I secured five good blankets in exchange for old Yawger, who was now about useless for our purposes.

Prof. gave him to me to get what I could for him, and he also gave Clem another derelict for the same purpose. On the 9th of October Jack, Andy, and Clem, started with Jacob on his annual trip to the Mokis by way of Lee's Lonely Dell while Jones went north to Long Valley on the head of the Virgin, for topography. The Major on foot, with a Mormon companion and a Pai Ute, explored from Long Valley down the narrow canyon of the Virgin to Shunesburg, about 20 miles, a trip never before made.[37] The canyon is about two thousand feet deep and in places only twenty or thirty feet wide, twisting in such a way that the sky was not visible at times, and the stream often filled it from side to side so that they had to swim.