Ox-Team Days on the Oregon Trail Part 12

But how could I go and leave wife and two babies on our island home?

The summer had been spent in clearing land and planting crops, and my money was very low. To remove my family would cost something in cash, besides the abandonment of the season's work to almost certain destruction. Without a moment's hesitation my wife said to go; she and Mrs. Darrow, who was with us as nurse and companion, would stay right where they were until I got back.

I was not so confident of the outcome as she. At best the trip was hazardous, even when undertaken well-prepared and with company. As far as I could see, I might have to go on foot and pack my food and blanket on my back. I knew that I should have to go alone. Some work had been done on the road during the summer, but I was unable to learn definitely whether any camps were yet in the mountains.

At Steilacoom there was a certain character, a doctor, then understood by few, and I may say not by many even to the end. Yet, somehow, I had implicit confidence in him, though between him and me there would seem to have been a gulf that could not be closed. Our habits of life were diametrically opposite. I would never touch a drop, while the doctor was always drinking--never sober, neither ever drunk.

It was to this man that I entrusted the safe keeping of my little family. I knew my wife had such an aversion to people of his kind that I did not even tell her with whom I would arrange to look out for her welfare, but suggested another person to whom she might apply in case of need.

When I spoke to the doctor about what I wanted, he seemed pleased to be able to do a kind act. To rea.s.sure me, he got out his field gla.s.ses and turned them on the cabin across the water, three miles distant. Looking through them intently for a moment he said, "I can see everything going on over there. You need have no uneasiness about your folks while you are gone."

And I did not need to have any concern. Twice a week during all the time I was away an Indian woman visited the cabin on the island, always with some little presents. She would ask about the babies and whether there was anything needed. Then with the parting "_Alki nika keelapie_,"[8]

she would leave.

With a fifty-pound flour sack filled with hard bread, or navy biscuit, a small piece of dried venison, a couple of pounds of cheese, a tin cup, and half of a three-point blanket, all made into a pack of less than forty pounds, I climbed the hill at Steilacoom and took the road leading to Puyallup. The first night was spent with Jonathan McCarty, whose cabin was near where the town of Sumner now stands.

McCarty said: "You can't cross the streams on foot; I'll let you have a pony. He's small, but sure-footed and hardy, and he'll carry you across the rivers anyhow." McCarty also said: "Tell your folks this is the greatest gra.s.s country on earth. Why, I am sure I harvested five tons of timothy to the acre this year."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Twice a week the Indian woman visited the cabin.]

The next day found me on the road with my blanket under the saddle, my sack of hard bread strapped on behind. I was mounted to ride on level stretches of the road, or across streams, of which I had fully sixty crossings to make.

White River on the upper reaches is a roaring torrent; the rush of waters can be heard for a mile or more from the high bluff overlooking the narrow valley. The river is not fordable except in low water, and then in but few places. The river bed is full of stones worn rounded and smooth and slippery, from the size of a man's head to large boulders, thus making footing for animals uncertain. After my first experience, I dreaded the crossings to come more than all else on the trip, for a misstep of the pony's might be fatal.

The little fellow, Bobby, seemed to be equal to the occasion. If the footing became too uncertain, he would stop stock still and pound the water with one foot, then reach out carefully until he could find secure footing, and finally move up a step or two. The water of the river is so charged with sediment that the bottom cannot be seen; hence the necessity of feeling the way. I soon learned that my pony could be trusted on the fords better than I. Thereafter I held only a supporting, not a guiding, rein and he carried me safely over all the crossings on my way out.

Allan Porter lived near the first crossing. As he was the last settler I should see and his the last place where I could get feed for my pony, other than gra.s.s or browse, I put up for the night under his roof.

He said I was going on a "Tom Fool's errand," for my folks could take care of themselves, and he tried to dissuade me from proceeding on my journey. But I would not be turned back. The following morning I cut loose from the settlements and plunged into the deep forest of the mountains.

The road, if it could be called a road, lay in the narrow valley of White River or on the mountains adjacent. In some places, as at Mud Mountain, it reached more than a thousand feet above the river bed.

There were stretches where the forest was so dense that one could scarcely see to read at midday, while elsewhere large burned areas gave an opening for daylight.

During the forenoon of this day, in one of those deepest of deep forests, Bobby stopped short, his ears p.r.i.c.ked up. Just then I caught an indistinct sight of a movement ahead, and thought I heard voices; the pony made an effort to turn and bolt in the opposite direction. Soon there appeared three women and eight children on foot, coming down the road in complete ignorance of the presence of any one but themselves in the forest.

"Why, stranger! Where on earth did you come from? Where are you going, and what are you here for?" asked the foremost woman of the party.

Mutual explanations followed. I learned that their teams had become exhausted and all the wagons but one had been abandoned, and that this one was on the road a few miles behind. They were entirely out of provisions and had had nothing to eat for twenty hours except what natural food they had gathered, and that was not much. They eagerly inquired the distance to food, which I thought they might possibly reach that night. Meanwhile I had opened my sack of hard bread and had given each a cracker, at the eating of which the sound resembled pigs cracking dry, hard corn.

Neither they nor I had time to parley long. The women with their children, barefoot and ragged, bareheaded and unkempt, started down the mountain, intent on reaching food, while I went up the road wondering how often this scene was to be repeated as I advanced on my journey.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Edward S. Curtis_

White River in the upper reaches is a roaring torrent.]

A dozen biscuits of bread is usually a very small matter, but with me it might mean a great deal. How far should I have to go? When could I find out? What would be the plight of my people when found? Or should I find them at all? Might they not pa.s.s by and be on the way down the Columbia River before I could reach the main immigrant trail? These and kindred questions weighed on my mind as I slowly ascended the mountain.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

FOOTNOTE:

[8] By and by I will return.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The boy led his mother across the log.]

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

BLAZING THE WAY THROUGH NATCHESS Pa.s.s

THE Natchess Pa.s.s Trail, along which I must make my way, had been blazed by a party of intrepid pioneers during the summer of 1853. Fifteen thousand dollars had been appropriated by Congress to be expended for a military road through the pa.s.s. I saw some of the work, but do not remember seeing any of the men who were improving the road.

I stuck close to the old trail, making my first camp alone, just west of the summit. I had reached an alt.i.tude where the night chill was keenly felt, and with only my light blanket missed the friendly contact of the faithful ox that had served me so well on the Plains. My pony had nothing but browse for supper, and he was restless. Nevertheless I slept soundly and was up early, refreshed and ready to resume the journey.

Such a road as I found is difficult to imagine. How the pioneer trail-blazers had made their way through it is a marvel. It seemed incredible that forests so tall and so dense could have existed anywhere on earth. Curiously enough, the heavier the standing timber, the easier it had been to slip through with wagons, there being but little undecayed timber or down timber. In the ancient days, however, great giants had been uprooted, lifting considerable earth with the upturned roots. As time went on the roots decayed, making mounds two, three, or four feet high and leaving a corresponding hollow into which one would plunge; for the whole was covered by a dense, short evergreen growth that completely hid from view the unevenness of the ground. Over these hillocks and hollows and over great roots on top of the ground, they had rolled their wagons.

All sorts of devices had been tried to overcome obstructions. In many places, where the roots were not too large, cuts had been taken out. In other places the large timber had been bridged by piling up smaller logs, rotten chunks, brush, or earth, so that the wheels of the wagon could be rolled over the body of the tree. Usually three notches would be cut on the top of the log, two for the wheels and one for the reach, or coupling pole, to pa.s.s through.

In such places the oxen would be taken to the opposite side, and a chain or rope would be run to the end of the wagon tongue. One man drove, one or two guided the tongue, others helped at the wheels. In this way, with infinite labor and great care, the wagons would gradually be worked over all obstacles and down the mountain in the direction of the settlements.

But the more numerous the difficulties, the more determined I became to push through at all hazards, for the greater was the necessity of acquainting myself with the obstacles to be encountered and of reaching my friends to encourage and help them.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Edward S. Curtis_

In the heart of a Cascade forest.]

Before me lay the summit of the great range, the pa.s.s, at five thousand feet above sea level. At this summit, about twenty miles north of Mt.

Rainier in the Cascade range, is a small stretch of picturesque open country known as Summit Prairie, in the Natchess Pa.s.s.

In this prairie, during the autumn of 1853, a camp of immigrants had encountered grave difficulties. A short way out from the camp, a steep mountain declivity lay squarely across their track. One of the women of the party exclaimed, when she first saw it, "Have we come to the jumping-off place at last?" It was no exclamation for effect, but a fervent prayer for deliverance. They could not go back; they must either go ahead or starve in the mountains.

Stout hearts in the party were not to be deterred from making the effort to proceed. Go around this hill they could not. Go down it with logs trailed to the wagons, as they had done at other places, they dared not, for the hill was so steep the logs would go end over end and would be a danger instead of a help. The rope they had was run down the hill and turned out to be too short to reach the bottom.

James Biles, one of the leaders, commanded, "Kill a steer." They killed a steer, cut his hide into strips, and spliced the strips to the rope.

It was found to be still too short to reach to the bottom.

The order went out: "Kill two more steers!" And two more steers were killed, their hides cut into strips and the strips spliced to the rope, which then reached to the bottom of the hill.

By the aid of that rope and the strips of the hides of those three steers, twenty-nine wagons were lowered down the mountain side to the bottom of the steep hill. Only one broke away; it crashed down the mountain and was smashed into splinters.

The feat of bringing that train of wagons in, with the loss of only one out of twenty-nine, is the greatest I ever knew or heard of in the way of pioneer travel.

[Ill.u.s.tration: By the aid of one short rope and the strips of the hides of three steers, twenty-nine wagons were lowered down the mountain side.]