"Oh, don't we remember that, though!" said John. "And now that you mention it, I recall that at that time we were speaking of this big bend in the Fraser."

"Yes, and the Canoe River rises in these hills, and it runs north quite a way before it bends down and comes into the Columbia, although it runs to the southeast ultimately, and not to the southwest.

"You see, these mountains are all laid out along great parallels, and the rivers have to do just as we did, hunt a way through if they want to get west. This is the pass of the Columbia where we are now, the way it has found downhill between the Selkirks and the Rockies. Always in getting through from east to west, as I have told you, men have followed the rivers up on one side and down on the other. So you can see, right on this ground, the way in which much of our history has been made."

"One thing about this sort of geography is that when you see it this way you don't forget it. And I rather like those old books which tell about the trips across the country," said John.

"Yes," said his uncle, "they are interesting, and useful as well, and it is interesting to follow their story, as we have done. If you would read The Northwest Passage—Rob's book which he has just mentioned—you will see that they had even worse troubles than we, I should say, for, although they had one good guide, most of them were rank tenderfeet. They were five days getting from Jasper House up to the Yellowhead Pass, and they were a month and a half in getting from Edmonton to the Tete Jaune Cache—very much longer than we were, as you will remember.

"And worst of all—and here's what I want you to remember—they delayed so much from time to time that when they got out of this country they met all the rivers at their swollen stages. They reached the Cache in the middle of July, and that was why they found the Canoe River so swollen and dangerous near its sources. We are about a month ahead of them. And now you will see why I have been crowding so hard all along this trip—I don't want to repeat the mistakes of the earliest explorers who crossed this country, not knowing what they were to find in it. But I give them all honor, these two Englishmen, Milton and Cheadle, for making one of the best trips ever made over the Rockies, all things considered, and contributing as they did to the growth and civilization of this country. For they were among the first to have the vision of all these great developments which have come since then."

"They must have had a hard old time," said Rob, "plugging along and not knowing where they were coming out. But, then, you told us that everybody who crossed the mountains in those times had native guides."

"And so did they. At Edmonton they met a man who had been west with the emigrants the year before, who had started for the gold-fields. This guide had taken the party right up by Cranberry Lake, where we were a few days ago, over the Albreda Pass, and down the Thompson, until he showed them what he called the Cariboo country—which none of them ever reached.

"And when they reached Jasper House they found some of Leo's people—the Rocky Mountain Shuswaps—living over there. In that way they got more directions on how to reach the Cache. There an old woman told them about the country to the west, and a man took them up to the pass into the Thompson and showed them their way down—if way it could be called. Then, when they got down toward Kamloops, they met yet other natives, and if they had not they must have starved to death, near as they were to the settlements. Left alone, these men perhaps never would have gotten even to the Yellowhead Pass. I'll warrant it was some Indian who first ran the rapids on the Columbia. Eh, Leo?"

"Maybe-so," smiled Leo, who had been listening intently to every word of this. "Injun not always 'fraid of water, some tribes."

"Well," said Uncle Dick, "I don't know whether it was courage or laziness, Leo, but certainly a great many of your people were the ones to tell the whites about the rapids on some of these bad rivers."

They all laughed heartily over this at Leo, who joined in.

"But it's true," Uncle Dick went on, "there never has been an original passage of the Rocky Mountains made by a white man, from the time of Lewis and Clark and Mackenzie up to the modern engineers, which was not conducted, in reality, by some native who pointed out the way.

"Now here we are, with Leo and George. I trust them perfectly. Leo's map, there on the sand at the Boat Encampment, showed me that he was perfectly accurate, and that he knew the places of all the streams and rapids. So I feel no fear about our getting down the Big Bend from here with him as our guide. I'll warrant that Leo can draw a map of the river from here to Revelstoke as accurately as any professional map-maker, and name every stream and tell every rapid all the way down. In short, we furnish the grub and Leo furnishes the experience."

"We'll not furnish grub much longer," said Moise. "The flour she's getting mighty low, and not much pork now, and the tea she's 'bout gone."

"Well, what could you expect?" said Uncle Dick. "With three Injuns and an engineer to eat, we ought to have an extra boat to carry the grub—not to mention John, here, who is hungry all the time. We may have to eat our moccasins yet, young men."

"Leo says we can't get any fish yet," said John, "and we're not to stop for any more bear meat, even if we could eat it. We're not apt to get any grub right along the river either. I don't see how any one can hunt in this awful forest. It's always cold and dark, and there doesn't seem to be anything to eat there. Rob and I measured some trees by stretching out our arms, and we figured that they were thirty feet or more around, some of them. And one log we walked which paced over three hundred feet—it was so thick we couldn't crawl over it at all. That's no sort of place to hunt."

"No, not for anything unless it was a porcupine," said Uncle Dick. "We may have to come to that. But even with a little grub we can last for a hundred miles or so, can't we? Can't we make forty or fifty miles a day, Leo?"

Leo laughed and shook his head. "Some day not make more than ten or twelve mile," said he.

"Well, I know that there's a good deal of slack water for quite a way below here. At least, I have heard that that is the case. So for a time, if we don't meet bad head-winds, we can put a good deal of this country back of us."

"Could any one walk along these banks and get out to the settlements at all if he were left alone in here?" inquired Rob.

"One can do a great deal if he has to," said Uncle Dick. "But I hope none of us will ever have to try to make the railroad on foot from here. There isn't any trail, and very often the banks are sheer rock faces running into the river. Get behind such a hill, and you're on another slope, and the first thing you know you're clear away from the river and all tangled up. But, still, men have come up here one way or another. On the other side, there used to be a sort of pack-horse trail from Revelstoke up to the Selkirk gold-mines. There are two or three creeks which are still worked along the Big Bend of the Columbia. When we engineers have all done our work it will be easier to get in here than it is to-day."

"Well, I'm going to be an engineer some day," said Rob, firmly, once more. "I like this work."

"Well, you're all going to bed now at once," said Uncle Dick. "We must hurry on down to-morrow, for, unless I am mistaken, this roily water of the Canoe means that the spring rise has begun earlier than it should."



XXVI

DOWN THE COLUMBIA

They did hurry to embark on the next morning, and, as Uncle Dick had predicted, for many miles the river was much more mild, although the current was steady and strong. They had run perhaps four hours when they came to the mouth of a creek which Leo and George said was called either Nagel Creek or End Creek, they did not know which. They went ashore for a time at a little unfinished log cabin which had been started perhaps two years before by some unknown person or persons.

"That way," said Leo, "up creek ten mile, fine bear country; plenty caribou too. S'pose we hunt?"

"Certainly not," said Uncle Dick. "It would take us a day to hunt and another day to get back. What do you say about that, boys?"

"Well," said Rob, "of course we'd like to hunt a little more, but I don't myself much like the thought of walking out of this country with a pack on my back and nothing to eat but a little flour. Besides, I've a feeling that this river is rising all the time now."

"She'll rise five inch last night," said Moise. "I'll mark heem on the stick."

"Yes," said Uncle Dick, "the June rise is going to chase us out, that's sure. All those great snow-fields which you see up there on the Selkirks and the Rockies have got to melt and come right down here where our boat is now. So, Leo, you and George go on ahead—we'll run late to-night and make forty miles to-day, at least, if we can. How far are we from Revelstoke?"

"S'pose 'bout hunderd mile," said Leo. "Long way."

"Not long if it was all clear water like this. But it isn't. A pack-train on an unknown trail is one thing, but a boat on an unknown river is something mighty different. As I've told you, every foot of rise changes the river absolutely in the narrows. Therefore all I can allow you for lunch to-day is a piece of bannock—and we'll eat that as we run."

They found milder water now for twenty-five miles, and made steady progress. The wind had shifted a little bit, and Rob managed to get assistance out of it by rigging a sail from a corner of the tent. This brought the lead-boat ahead so steadily that Leo and George protested and made Rob take down his sail. But soon the long reach of slack water was passed. More and more they could hear, coming up-stream from perhaps a mile ahead, the low, sullen roar of rapids.

The water began to set faster and faster, and seemed each mile to assume more and more malicious habits. Great boils, coming up from some mysterious depth, would strike the boat as though with a mighty hammer so hard as to make the boys look around in consternation. At times they could see the river sink before them in a great slide, or basin, a depression perhaps two hundred feet across, with white water at its edges. Deep boils and eddies came up every now and then without warning, and sometimes the boat would feel a wrench, as though with some mighty hand thrust up from the water. Their course was hardly steady for more than a moment or so at a time, and the boats required continual steering. In fact, it seemed to them that never was there a stream so variable and so unaccountable as this they were now descending.

"She's worse than the Peace River, a whole lot," said Rob; and all the boys agreed with him. In fact, by this time all of them were pretty well sobered down now, for they could see that it was serious work which lay ahead of them. Now and again Uncle Dick would see the boys looking at the black forests which covered these slopes on each side of the river, foaming down between the Selkirks and the Rockies.

Late in the afternoon they passed a little settlement of a few cabins, where a discolored stream came down into the river through a long sluice-box whose end was visible.

"This Howard's camp," shouted Leo. "Them mans wash gold here. Some mans live there now."

Two or three men indeed did come to the bank and wave an excited greeting as the boats swept by. But there was no going ashore, for directly at this place a stretch of rapids demanded the attention of every one in the boats.

And still Uncle Dick urged the Indians of the first boat to go on as far as they could that night. They ran until almost dark, and made camp on the top of a high bank on the left side of the river where once an old lumber camp had been. Here they found the breeze good and the mosquito nuisance much diminished.

"How far now to Revelstoke, Leo?" inquired Uncle Dick, as they sat at their frugal supper that night.

"Maybe-so forty mile, maybe-so sixty," said Leo.

"Can we make it in one day?"

Leo shook his head soberly.

"Two days?"

Leo shook his head.

"Three days?"

"Maybe-so," said he, at last. "Plenty bad water below here," said he.

"Well, I haven't seen any of these awful canyons yet that you've been telling about," said John.

Leo smiled. "To-morrow see 'um plenty," said he. "Pretty soon come Death Eddy, then Death Canyon, then Death Rapids, then Priest Rapids. All them bad places. Maybe-so can't run, water too high."

"We'll not get out of here any too soon, that's sure," said Uncle Dick. "The best time to run any of these mountain rivers is in the fall, for then the water is lowest. But a day or two more will tell the tale for us. So, Moise, please don't starve us any more than you have to—I could eat a whole porcupine now myself if I had one."

That night at the fireside Uncle Dick saw the boys bending over close together, and looked at them curiously, for they seemed to be writing.

"What's up, young men?" said he.

"Well, we're making our wills," said Rob. "We haven't got much to give to anybody, of course, but you know, in case of any accident, we thought the folks ought to know about it. Not that we're afraid. I was just thinking that so many people were lost here that never were heard of again."

Uncle Dick did not smile at Rob's frank confession, but liked the boys all the more for it.

"Well," said he, "that's all right, too. I'm willing to admit that when I ran the Rock Canyon above the Boat Encampment last year I did a little writing myself and put it in my pocket, and I tied one leg to the boat with a rope, too. But please don't be too much alarmed over anything we've said, for if the canyons should prove too bad we will line down with the boat; and if we can't line down, then we will all take to the woods."

None the less, the boys were all very quiet that night and slept but little.

"I don't like that water at all," whispered Jesse to John. "You can hear it growling and groaning all night long, as though it were gnashing its teeth—I don't like it at all."

And, indeed, even on top of their high bank they could hear the strange noises that come up always from the Columbia River when the high water is on. The stream where they were encamped was several hundred yards in width, but now the run-off waters of the mighty snow-sheds were making the river each day more and more a torrent, full of danger even for experienced men.



XXVII

ON THE RAPIDS

It was cool that night, almost cool enough for frost, and the morning was chill when they rolled out of their blankets. A heavy mist rose from over the river, and while this obtained Leo refused to attempt to go on. So they lost a little time after breakfast before the sun had broken up the mist enough to make it safe to venture on the river. They were off at about nine o'clock perhaps, plunging at once into three or four miles of very fast water.

The boats now kept close together, and at times they landed, so that their leaders could go ahead and spy out the water around the bend. In making these landings with heavy boats, as the boys observed, the men would always let the stern swing around and then paddle up-stream, so that the landing was made with the bow up-stream. The force of the river would very likely have capsized the boat if a landing were attempted with the bow down-stream. "Just like a steamboat-landing," said Jesse.

Leo himself was now very alert. He did not say a word to anybody, but kept his eyes on ahead as though he felt himself to be the responsible man of the party. Certainly he took every precaution and proved himself a wonderful riverman. But he seemed puzzled at last as, when they landed upon a beach, he turned toward Uncle Dick.

"Me no understand!" said he. "Death Eddy up there, but no see 'um!"

"What do you mean, Leo?"

"Well, Death Eddy up there, and we come through, but no see 'um! I s'pose maybe high water has change'. I go look ahead."

He went down the stream for a little way until he could see into the next bend, but came back shaking his head.

"No can make that canyon," said he. "Water she's too high—bad, very bad in there now. Must line down."

"What place did you call this, Leo?" inquired Uncle Dick.

"Call 'um Methodist Canyon. Low water she's all right, now she's bad."

"Out you go, boys," said Uncle Dick. "We've got to line through. How far, Leo?"

"Maybe-so one mile," rejoined the Indian. "S'pose low water, we paddle through here all right!"

Uncle Dick sighed. "Well, I hate to take the time, but I suppose that's what we'll have to do. You boys go on along the shore the best you can, while we let the boats down."

The boys struggled up now on the side of the shelving beach, which was nothing but a mass of heavy rock that had rolled down from the mountainsides. It was a wild scene enough, and the roar of the waters as they crashed through this narrow pass added to the oppressive quality of it.

After a time the water became so bad even close to shore that it was impossible to let the boat down on the line without danger of swamping it. So each boat was lifted out bodily and carried out along the beach for two or three hundred yards until it was safe to launch it again. Part of the time the men were in and part of the time out of the water, guiding the boats among the boulders which lay along the edge.

To make a mile at this work took as much time as twenty miles had the day before, and they were glad enough when Moise proposed to boil the kettle. They did this just above the head of Death Rapids, in a very wild and beautiful spot. Just across the river from them they could see a beautiful cascade some two or three hundred feet in height, and they christened this the Lottie Falls, after a sister of Uncle Dick, which name it has to-day. Now and again the boys would look down the raging stream ahead of them, wondering that any man should ever have tried to run such a rapid.

"Hunderd sixty men drown right here, so they say," commented Leo. He pointed out to them the most dangerous part of the Death Rapids, where the strong current, running down in a long V, ended at the foot of the rapids in a deep, back-curving roller or "cellar-door" wave, sure to swamp any boat or to sweep over any raft.

"S'pose raft go through there, round bend," said Leo, "it must go down there in that big wave. Then her nose go under wave, and raft she sink, and all mans come off in the water. No can swim. No can hang on raft. Many men drowned there. Plenty Chinaman he'll get drowned there, time my father was young man. Chinaman no can swim, no can paddle, no can ron on land—no good. All he do is drown."

"Well, one thing is sure," said Uncle Dick. "I'll not try that rapid, even with our boats, to-day. We'll just line on down past here."

"Plenty glad we didn't stop hunt grizzlum no more," said Leo. "She's come up all day long."

Soon they resumed their slow progress, letting the boats down, foot by foot, along the shore, usually three or four men holding to the one line, and then returning for the other boat after a time. Moise did not like this heavy work at all.

"This boat she's too big," said he. "She pull like three, four oxens. I like small little canoe more better, heem."

"Well," said Rob, "you can't get a boat that looks too big for me in here. Look over there at that water—where would any canoe be out there?"

Thus, with very little actual running, and with the boys on foot all the way, they went on until at length they heard coming up from below them the roar of a rapid which sounded especially threatening.

"Priest Rapids!" said Leo. "And he's bad this time too."

"Why do they call this the Priest Rapids, Leo?" inquired Rob.

"I don' know," said Leo.

"That's a fact," added uncle Dick. "No one seems to know why these were called the Priest Rapids. Perhaps because a priest read the burial service over some of the voyageurs here. Perhaps because a priest was saved here, or drowned here—no one seems to know."

They had called a halt here while Leo and Moise walked up on the bank to reach a higher point of view. The boys could see them now, gesticulating and pointing out across the river. Presently they joined the others.

"She's too bad for ron this side," said Moise, "but over on other side, two-third way across, is place where mans can get through. No can line on this side—rock, she come straight down on the river."

"Well," said Uncle Dick, "here is a pretty kettle of fish! I don't like the looks of this in the least. I'm not going to try to take these boys through that rapid over there. Are you sure you can't line down on this side?"

"No can walk," said Leo, "no can ron this side. Other side only place for to go through. She's pretty bad, but maybe-so make 'um."

"Well, I'm not going to let the boys try it," said Uncle Dick. "Now see here, young men, I'll tell you what you have got to do. You see that point below there about two miles, where the forest comes out? Very well; you'll have to get around there somehow. Go back of that shelving rock face the best you can, and come out on that point, and wait for us."

The boys looked at him rather soberly. "Why can't we go with you," asked John, presently, who did not in the least fancy the look of these dark woods and the heavy, frowning mountains that lay back of them. Indeed, they all reflected that here they were many a day's march from Revelstoke, over a country practically impassable.

"You couldn't go in the boats, boys, even if it were safe," said Uncle Dick. "We want them light as we can have them. Go on now, and do as you are told. This is a place where we all of us will have to take a chance, and now your time has come to take your chances, for it's the best that we can do. Each of you take a little pack—one rifle will do for you, but each of you must have his ax and matches and compass and a little something to eat—here, take all the bannocks we have cooked, and this little bit of flour. When you get to the point make a smoke to let us know you're there. If we don't get through you'll have to get on the best way you can."

"Why can't one of you go with us?" inquired John, still anxiously.

"It wouldn't be right for the men left in the boat—it takes two men to run a boat through water like that, my boy. Go on, now. I am sorry to send you off, but this is the best that we can do, so you must undertake it like men."

"It's all right, fellows," said Rob; "come on. We can get around there, I'm sure, and I'm pretty sure too that these men, good boatmen that they are, will run that chute. You're not afraid, are you, Leo?"

But if Leo heard him he said nothing in answer, although he made ready by stripping off his coat and tightening his belt, in which Moise and all the others followed him.

The boys turned for some time, looking back before they were lost to view in the forest. The men were still sitting on the beach, calmly smoking and giving them time to make their detour before they themselves attempted the dangerous run of the rapids.

It was perhaps an hour before the three young adventurers were able to climb the rugged slope which lay before them, and finally to descend a bad rock wall which allowed them access to the long point which Uncle Dick had pointed out to them, far below and at one side of the dreaded Priest Rapids. Here they built their little fire of driftwood, as they had been instructed; and, climbing up on another pile of driftwood which was massed on the beach, they began eagerly to look up-stream.

"The worst waves are over on the other side," said Rob, after a time. "Look, I can see them now—they look mighty little—that's the boats angling across from where we left them! It'll soon be over now, one way or the other."

They all stood looking anxiously. "They're out of sight!" exclaimed Rob. And so, indeed, they were.

"That's only the dip they've taken," said Rob, after a time. "I see them coming now. Look! Look at them come! I believe they're through."

They stood looking for a little time, and then all took off their hats and waved them with a yell. They could see the boats now plunging on down, rising and falling, but growing larger and blacker every instant. At last they could see them outlined against the distant white, rolling waves, and knew that they were through the end of the chute and practically safe.

In a few moments more the two boats came on, racing by their point, all the men so busy that they had not time to catch the excited greetings which the boys shouted to them. But once around the point the boats swung in sharply, and soon, bow up-stream, made a landing but a few hundred yards below where they stood. Soon they were all united once more, shaking hands warmly with one another.

"That's great!" said Uncle Dick. "I'll warrant there was one swell there over fifteen feet high—maybe twenty, for all we could tell. I know it reared up clear above us, so that you had to lean your head to see the top of it. If we'd hit it would have been all over with us."

"She's bad tam, young men," said Moise. "From where we see him she don't look so bad, but once you get in there—poom! Well, anyway, here we are. That's more better'n getting drowned, and more better'n walk, too." And Moise, the light-hearted, used to taking chances, dismissed the danger once it was past.

"Well, that's what I call good planning and good work," said Rob, quietly, after a while. "To find the best thing to do and then to do it—that seems to be the way for an engineer to work, isn't it, Uncle Dick?"

"Yes, it is, and all's well that ends well," commented the other. "And mighty glad I am to think that we are safe together again, and that you don't have to try to make your way alone and on foot from this part of the country. I wasn't happy at all when I thought of that."

"And we weren't happy at all until we saw you safely through that chute, either," said Rob.

"Now," resumed the leader, "how far is it to a good camping-place, Leo? We'll want to rest a while to-night."

"Good camp three mile down," said Leo, "on high bank."

"And how far have we come to-day, or will we have come by that time?"

"Not far," said Leo; "'bout ten mile all."

Uncle Dick sighed. "Well, we're all tired, so let's go into camp early to-night, and hold ourselves lucky that we can camp together, too. Maybe we'd better bail out first—it's lucky, for we only took in three or four pails of water apiece."

"No man I ever know come through Priest Rapids on the high water like this," said Leo. "That's good fun." And he and George grinned happily at each other.

They pulled on in more leisurely fashion now, and soon reached the foot of a high grassy bluff on the left-hand side of the river. They climbed the steep slope here, and so weary were they that that night they did not put up the tents at all, but lay down, each wrapped in his blanket, as soon as they had completed their scanty supper.

"Better get home pretty soon now," said Moise. "No sugar no more. No baking-powder no more. Pretty soon no pork, and flour, she's 'most gone, too."



XXVIII

IN SIGHT OF SAFETY

Once more, as had now been their custom for several days, in their anxiety to get as far forward as possible each day, our party arose before dawn. If truth were told, perhaps few of them had slept soundly the night through, and as they went about their morning duties they spoke but little. They realized that, though many of their dangers now might be called past, perhaps the worst of them, indeed, they still were not quite out of the woods.

Moise, who had each night left a water-mark, reported that the river during the night had risen nearly a foot. Even feeling as they did that the worst of the rapids were passed, the leaders of the party were a trifle anxious over this report, Leo not less than the others, for he well remembered how the rising waters had wiped out such places as the Death Eddy, which once he had known familiarly. They all knew that the rise of a foot here in the broader parts of the river would mean serious trouble in any canyon.

"How far now, Leo?" asked John once more of the Indian guide, on whom they placed their main reliance.

"Maybe-so forty mile, maybe fifty," said Leo. "Maybe not run far now. Down there ten mile, come Tom Boyd farm. Steamboat come there maybe. Then can go home on steamboat, suppose our boat is bust."

"Well, the Bronco isn't quite busted," said Uncle Dick, "but she has sprung something of a leak, and we'll have to do a little calking before we can start out with her this morning. Come on, Moise, let's see what we can do."

So saying, they two went down to repair an injury which one of the boats had sustained on a rock. Of course, in this lining down, with the boats close inshore in the shallower water, they often came in contact with the rocks, so that, although both the boats were practically new, the bottom boards were now ragged and furry. A long crack in the side of the Bronco showed the force with which a boat sometimes could be driven by the swift current, even when the men were taking the best of care to keep it off the rocks.

"Leo doesn't tell much about his plans, does he?" remarked Rob. "I was thinking all the time we'd have to run the whole fifty miles to Revelstoke."

Uncle Dick laughed. "Leo believes in saving labor even in talking," said he, "but I am not complaining, for he has brought us this far in safety. I'm willing to say he's as good a boatman as I ever saw, and more careful than I feared he would be. Most of these Indians are too lazy to line down, and will take all sorts of chances to save a little work. But I must say Leo has been careful. It has been very rarely we've even shipped a little bit of water."

"One thing," said John, "we haven't got much left to get wet, so far as grub's concerned. I'm pretty near ready to go out hunting porcupines or gophers, for flour and tea and a little bacon rind leave a fellow rather hungry. But I'm mighty glad, Uncle Dick, that you came through that rapid all right with the boats and found us all right afterward. Suppose we had got separated up there in some way and you had gone by us, thinking that we were lower down—what would you have done in that case—suppose we had all the grub?"

"Oh, I don't know," replied his uncle, "but I fancy we'd have got through somehow. Men have done that in harder circumstances. Think of those chaps Milton and Cheadle we were talking of the other night; they were in worse shape than we were, for they had no idea where they were or how far it was to safety, or how they were to get there, and they had no guide who had ever been across the country. Now, although we have been in a dangerous country for some days, we know perfectly where we are and how far it is to a settlement. The trail out is plain, or at least the direction is plain."

"Well, I'm glad we didn't have to try to get out alone, just the same."

"And so am I, but I believe that even if you had been left alone you'd have made it out some way. You had a rifle, and, although game is not plentiful in the heavy forest, you very likely would have found a porcupine now and then—that is to say, a porcupine would very likely have found you, for they are very apt to prowl about the camp almost anywhere in this country. You wouldn't even have been obliged to make a noise like a porcupine if you had used anything greasy around your cooking or left any scraps where they could get at them. Or you might even have tried eating a little pine bark, the way the porcupines do. Again, in almost any clearing this far down to the south you might have run across some of these gophers which you have seen on the grassy banks lately. Not that I would care to eat gopher myself, for they look like prairie-dog, and I never did like prairie-dog to eat. Besides, they tell bad stories about these mountain gophers; I've heard that the spotted fever of the mountains, a very deadly disease, is only found in a gopher country; so I'm very glad you did not have to resort to that sort of diet."

"We might get some goats back there in the mountains if we had to," said Rob, "but goat hunting is hard work, and I don't suppose a fellow would last long at it on light diet."

"Well, I wish we had one or two of those kids that we left up on the mountain at Yellowhead Lake," said John. "Moise says a goat kid is just as good to eat as any kind of meat. And any kind of meat would be better than bacon rind to chew on."

"Never mind, John," said Rob; "we could go two days without anything to eat if we had to, and in two days, at least, we'll be where you can get as square a meal as you like. Maybe even to-day we'll land where we can get supplies, although Leo doesn't seem to tell us very much about things on ahead."

Leo and his silent but hard-working cousin George now came down to the waterside and signified that it was time to start off, as by this time the sun had cleared the mists from the river. As the light strengthened, they could see that the river had lost something of its deep blue or green color and taken on a tawny hue, which spoke all too plainly of the flood-waters coming down from the snow-fields through the many creeks they had passed on both sides of the river.



It took but a few moments now for them to embark, and soon they were plying their paddles once more and passing swiftly down the great river. Although they knew Leo was not very loquacious, and so not apt to say much of dangers on ahead, the general feeling of all the others was that the worst of their route had been traversed and that now they were in close touch with civilization.

They were moving along steadily in the bright, warm sunlight, and John and Rob were assisting with paddles on each side of the boat, when all at once they saw the lead-boat leave the center of the channel and shoot to the left toward a high bluff, which, they could see, was surmounted by several buildings.

"What's the matter?" said Jesse. "Rapids on ahead?"

"No," said Uncle Dick, "not rapids, but houses and barns! This must be the Boyd farm, and, if so, we're very likely done with our boating. Heave ho, then, my hearties, and let's see how fast we can paddle!"

They pulled up presently at the foot of the bluff, where Leo and George lay waiting for them.

"Hallo, Leo! What place is this?" called Jesse.

"This Sam Boyd farm. Steamboat come here—not go more higher," answered Leo. He steadied the bow of the Bronco as they swung in, and soon all were standing on the shore.

"Plenty house here, plenty farm—trail up there, all way to Revelstruck," said Leo.

The boys looked at their boat and at the river, and then gazed up the bank, at the summit of which, as they now learned, lay what might be called the skirmish-line of civilization, the point which practically ended their adventures. A feeling of regret and disappointment came over them all, which was reflected in their countenances as they turned toward their leader.

"I know how you feel, boys," said their uncle, "for I never want to leave the woods myself. But we'll go up and have a look over things, and find out maybe more than Leo has told us about our plans."



XXIX

STORIES OF THE COLUMBIA

When they had climbed to the top of the highest bank they saw before them a clearing of over two hundred acres, a part of which had been made into a hay-field. Immediately in front of them was a yard full of beautiful flowers, kept as well as any flower-garden in the cities. To the left lay a series of barns and sheds, and near by was a vegetable-garden in which small green things already were beginning to show.

"Well, what do you know about this?" demanded John. "It looks as though we certainly had got to where people live at last. This is the finest place we've seen in many a day, and I'll bet we can get something to eat here, too."

Leo raised a shout, which presently brought out of the house a man who proved to be the caretaker of the place, a well-seasoned outdoor character by name of O'Brien. He advanced now and made them welcome.

"Come in, come in," said he, "and tell me who ye may be and where ye come from? Is it you, Leo? I thought you were at the Cache, far above."

"We all were there a few days ago," replied the leader of the party. "We engaged Leo to bring us down the Canoe and the Columbia, and out to Revelstoke—we've crossed the mountains at the Yellowhead Pass, coming west from Edmonton by pack-train."

"Ye're jokin', man!" rejoined O'Brien. "Shure, ye'll not be tellin' me those boys came all that way?"

"Him did," said Leo, with almost his first word of praise. "Boys all right. Kill 'um grizzlum. Not scare' of rapid."

They went on now to explain to O'Brien more details of their journey and its more exciting incidents, including the hunt for the grizzlies and the still more dangerous experiences on the rapids. O'Brien listened with considerable amazement.

"But I know Leo," he added, "and he'll go annywheres in a boat. 'Tis not the first time he's run this river, bad cess to her! But come in the house now, and I'll be gettin' ye something to eat, for belike ye're hungry."

"We are frankly and thoroughly hungry," said Uncle Dick, "especially John here, who is hungry most of the time. We've reached your place just as our grub was about gone. Can we stock up with you a little bit, O'Brien?"

"Shure, if ye need to. But why not take passage on the steamer—she's due this afternoon at three o'clock, and she's goin' down to-morrow. Ye see, we run a wood-yard here, for the steamboat company owns this farm now, and I'm takin' care of it for them."

"What do you say, boys?" asked their leader. "Shall we make it on down? Or shall we take to the steamer and leave our boats here?"

"Better take to the steamboat," said O'Brien. "True, ye could get down mayhap to the head of Revelstoke Canyon all right, but then ye'd have to walk in about five miles annyway. The steamer can't run the canyon herself, for that matter, and no boat should try it at this stage, nor anny other stage, fer all that. She's a murderer, this old river, that's what she is."

Leo and Moise now helped O'Brien with his preparation of the meal, so that in a little time they were all sitting on real chairs and at a real table, with a real oil-cloth cover—the first of such things they had seen for many a day. Their own tin dishes they left in their boats, and ate from china, coarse but clean. Their meal was well cooked and abundant, and O'Brien gave them with a certain pride some fresh rhubarb, raised in a hotbed of his own, and also fried eggs.

"Wait a little," said he, "and I'll give ye new potatoes and all sorts o' things. 'Tis a good farm we have here."

"But how came you to have a farm like this, up here in the Selkirks?" inquired Rob.

"Well, you see," answered O'Brien, "there's quite a bit of gold-mining up here, and has been more. Those camps at the gold-creeks above here all needed supplies, and they used to pack them in—the pack-trail's right back of our barn yonder. But Sam Boyd knew that every pound of hay and other stuff he raised fifty miles north of Revelstoke was that much closer to the market. This was his farm, you know—till the river got him, as she will every one who lives along her, in time.

"Ye see, Sam was the mail-carrier here, between Revelstoke and the camps above, and, as the trail is a horror, he mostly went by boat. His partner was Tom Horn, a good riverman too, and the two of them in their canoe went up and down together manny a trip. 'Twas a careful man he was, too, Sam, and no coward. But one time, to save them a little walk, I suppose, they concluded to run the Revelstoke Canyon. Well, they never got through, and what became of them no one knows, except that their boat came through in bits. Ye're lucky this fellow Leo didn't want to run ye all through there, with the fine big boats ye've got below. But at least Sam and Tom never made it through.

"Well, the old river got them, as she has so manny. Sam's widow lived on here fer a time, then went to town and died there, and the company took the farm. They have a Chink to keep Mrs. Boyd's flower-garden going the way she did before, for the boys all liked it in the mines. And back in the woods is a whole bunch of Chinks, wood-cutters that supplies the boats. When my Chink is done his gardenin' I make him hoe my vegetables fer me.

"So ye're grizzly-hunters, are ye, all of ye?" continued O'Brien. "And not afraid to take yer own life in your hands? 'Tis well, and anny man must learn that who goes into the wilds. But manny a tale I could tell ye of bould and brave men who've not been able to beat this old river here. Take yon canyon above Revelstoke, fer instance. She'd be but a graveyard, if the tale was told. One time six men started through in a big bateau, and all were lost but one, and he never knew how he got through at all. Once they say a raft full of Chinamen started down, and all were swept off and drowned but one. He hung to a rope, and was swept through somehow, but when they found him he was so bad scared he could not say a word. He hit the ties afoot, goin' west and shakin' his head, and maybe bound for China. No man could ever get him to spake again!

"Now do ye mind the big rapids up there they call the Death Rapids, above the Priest—I'm thinkin' ye lined through there, or ye wouldn't be here at the table now, much as I know how Leo hates to line a boat."

"We certainly did line," said Uncle Dick, "and were glad to get through at that. We lost almost a day there getting down."

"Lucky ye lost no more, fer manny a man has lost his all at that very spot. Once a party of fourteen started down, in good boats, too, and only one man got out alive. Some say sixty men have been drowned in that one rapid; some say a hundred and sixty-five, counting in the Chinamen and Frenchmen who were drowned in the big stampede the time so manny started down to the diggings on rafts. Ye see, they'd shoot right around the head of the bend without sendin' a man ahead to prospect the water, and then when they saw the rapids, 'twas too late to get to either side. 'Tis a death trap she is there, and well named.

"Wan time a Swede was spilled out on the Death Rapids, and somehow he came through alive. He swam for two miles below there before they could catch him with a boat, and he'd been swimming yet if they hadn't caught him, he was that scared, and if they hadn't hit him on the head with a oar. 'Twas entirely crazy he was.

"Mayhap ye remember the cabin on the west side, where they're sluicing—that's Joe Howard's cabin. Well, Howard, like everywan else on the river, finds it easiest to get in and out by boat. Wan time he and his mate were lining down a boat not far from shore when she broke away. Howard jumped on a rock, but 'twas so far out he dared not try to swim ashore, fer the current set strong. The other man grabbed the boat and got through the edge of the rapids somehow, but 'twas half a mile below before he got ashore. Then he cuddn't get the boat up again to where Howard was, and 'twas two or three hours of figgerin' he did before Howard dared take the plunge and try to catch the pole which his mate reached out to him. 'Twas well-nigh crazy he was—a man nearly always goes crazy when he's left out on a rock in the fast water that way.

"The Priest Rapids is another murderer, and I'll not say how many have perished there. You tell me that your boats ran it at this stage of water? 'Twas wonderful, then, that's all. Men have come through, 'tis true, and tenderfeet at that, and duffers, at that. Two were once cast in the Priest, and only one got through, and he could not swim a stroke! They say that sixty miners were lost in that rapid in one year.

"To be sure, maybe these are large tales, for such matters grow, most like, as the years go by, but ye've seen the river yerselves, and ye know what the risk is. Take a band of miners, foolhardy men, and disgust them with tryin' to get out of this country afoot—and 'tis awful going on foot through here—and a raft is the first thing they think of—'tis always a tenderfoot's first idea. There's nothing so hard to handle as a raft. Now here they come, singin' and shoutin', and swing around the bend before they see the Death Rapids, or the Priest, we'll say. They run till the first cellar-door wave rolls back on them and the raft plunges her nose in. Then the raft goes down, and the men are swept off, and there's no swimming in the Columbia for most men. There's not annything left then fer anny man to do except the priest—and belike that's why they call it the Priest Rapids."

"I've often wondered," said Rob, "when we were coming down that stream, whether some of those Alaska Indians with their big sea-canoes could not run this river—they're splendid boats for rough water, and they go out in almost any weather."

"And where'll ye be meanin', my boy?" asked O'Brien.

"Along the upper Alaska coast. You see, we live at Valdez."

"Alaska? Do ye hear that now! And that's the place I've been wanting to see all me life! They tell me 'tis foine up there, and plenty of gold, too. But tell me, why do ye come down to this country from so good a place as Alaska?"

"Well, we were just traveling about, you know," said Rob, "and we wanted to see some of this country along the Rockies before it got too common and settled up. You see, this isn't our first trip across the Rockies; we ran the Peace River from the summit down last summer, and had a bully time. The fact is, every trip we take seems to us better than any of the others. You must come up some time and see us in Alaska."

"It's that same I'll be doin', ye may depend," said O'Brien, "the first chance I get. 'Tis weary I get here, all by myself, with no one to talk to, and no sport but swearin' at a lot of pig-tailed Chinks, and not time to go grizzly-huntin' even—though they do tell me there's fine grizzly-huntin' twelve miles back, in the Standard Basin. So 'tis here I sit, and watch that mountain yonder that they've named for pore Sam Boyd—Boyd's Peak, they call it, and 'tis much like old Assiniboine she looks, isn't it? Just that I be doin' day by day, and all the time be wantin' to see Alaska. And now here comes me friend Leo from the Cache, and brings a lot of Alaskans ye'd be expectin' annywhere else but here or there! 'Tis fine byes ye are, to come so far, and I'll be hopin' to meet ye in Alaska one of these fine days, for I'm a bit of a miner myself, as most of us are up here."

"She's good boy," said Moise, who took much pride in his young friends. "She ain't scare' go anywhere on the riviere with Moise and his oncle, or even with Leo and George. I s'pose next year she'll come see Moise again, maybe-so."

The boys laughed and looked at Uncle Dick. "I don't know about that," said Rob, "but we'll be wanting to go somewhere next summer."

"That's a long time off," said their uncle.

O'Brien, after they had spent some time in this manner of conversation, began to look at his watch. "Carlson's pretty prompt," said he—"that's the skipper of the Columbia. We'll be hearin' her whistle before long."

"Then this about ends our trip, doesn't it, Uncle Dick?" said John once more; and his uncle nodded.

"I'm going to give O'Brien one of the boats," said he, "and I'll let the title to the other and the cook outfit rest in Leo and George—they may be coming through here again one way or the other some day. As for us, we've been lucky, and I think we would better wait here a day rather than go on with our boats."

They passed out into the bright sunlight to look about at the fine mountain prospect which stretched before them from the top of the bluff. They had not long to wait before they heard the boom of the steamboat's whistle, and soon the Columbia, thrust forward by her powerful engines, could be seen bucking the flood of the Columbia and slowly churning her way up-stream. She landed opposite the wood-chute of the wood-yard, where a crowd of jabbering Chinamen gathered. Soon our party walked in that direction also, and so became acquainted with Carlson, the skipper of the boat, who agreed to take them down to Revelstoke the following day.



XXX

THE END OF THE TRAIL

Although O'Brien offered them beds in his house, and Carlson bunks on board the Columbia, Rob, John, and Jesse all preferred to sleep out-of-doors as long as they could, and so made their beds on the grass-plot at the top of the bluff, not putting up any tent, as the mosquitoes here were not bad. They were rather tired; and, feeling that their trip was practically over, with little excitement remaining, they slept soundly and did not awake until the sun was shining in their faces.

"Come on, fellows," said Jesse, kicking off his blankets. "I suppose now we'll have to get used to washing in a real wash-basin and using a real towel. Somehow I feel more sorry than happy, even if it was rather rough work coming down the river."

This seemed to be the feeling of both the others, and they were not talkative at the breakfast-table, where O'Brien had supplied them with a fine meal, including abundance of fresh-laid eggs from his own farm-yard.

After breakfast they employed themselves chiefly in making themselves as tidy as they could and in packing their few personal possessions in shape for railway transportation. Most of their outfit, however, they gave away to the men who were to remain behind them. Toward noon the whistle of the steamboat announced that she was ready to take up her down-stream trip; so the young Alaskans were obliged to say good-by to O'Brien, in whose heart they had found a warm place.

"Good luck to ye, byes," said he, "and don't be diggin' all the gold up in Alaska, for 'tis myself'll be seein' ye wan of these days—'tis a foine country entirely, and I'm wishin' fer a change."

Leo and George, without any instructions, had turned in to help the boat crew in their work of pushing off. Moise, once aboard the boat, seemed unusually silent and thoughtful for him, until Rob rallied him as to his sorrowful countenance.

"Well," said Moise, "you boy will all go back on Alaska now, and Moise she's got to go home on the Peace River. I'll not been scare of the horse or the canoe, but this steamboat and those railroad train she'll scare Moise plenty. All the time I'm think she'll ron off the track and bust Moise."

"You mustn't feel that way," said Rob, "for that's Uncle Dick's business—finding places for railroads to run. That's going to be my business too, sometime, as I told you. I think it's fine—going out here where all those old chaps went a hundred years ago, and to see the country about as they saw it, and to live and travel just about as they did. Men can live in the towns if they like, but in the towns anybody can get on who has money so he can buy things. But in the country where we've been, money wouldn't put you through; you've got to know how to do things, and not be afraid."

"S'pose you boys keep on," said Moise, "bime-by you make voyageur. Then you come with Moise—she'll show you something!"

"Well, Moise," continued Rob, "if we don't see you many a time again it won't be our fault, you may be sure."

"I'm just wondering," said Jesse, "how Leo and George are going to get back up to the Tete Jaune Cache. They told us they meant to go up the Ashcroft trail and home by way of Fort George and the Fraser River and the 'choo-choo boat.' But that seems a long way around. I suppose you'll come to the hotel with us, down to Revelstoke, won't you Leo?" he added.

"No like 'um," said Leo. "My cousin and me, we live in woods till time to take choo-choo that way to Ashcrof'."

"Well, in that case," said John, "I think we'd better give you our mosquito-tent; you may need it more than we will, and we can get another up from Seattle at any time."

"Tent plenty all right," said Leo. "Thank." And when John fished it out of the pack-bag and gave it to him he turned it over to George with a few words in his own language.

George carried it away without comment. They were all very much surprised a little later, however, to discover him working away on the tent with his knife, and, to their great disgust, they observed that he was busily engaged in cutting out all the bobbinet windows and in ripping the front of the tent open so that it was precisely like any other tent! John was very indignant at this, but his reproof had little effect on Leo.

"Tent plenty all right now," said he. "Let plenty air inside! Mosquito no bite 'um Injun."

When they came to think of it this seemed so funny to them that they rolled on the deck with laughter, but they all agreed to let Leo arrange his own outfit after that.

They passed steadily on down between the lofty banks of the Columbia, here a river several hundred yards in width, and more like a lake than a stream in many of its wider bends. They could see white-topped mountains in many different directions, and, indeed, close to them lay one of the most wonderful mountain regions of the continent, with localities rarely visited at that time save by hunters or travelers as bold as themselves.

Carlson, the good-natured skipper of the Columbia, asked the boys all up to the wheelhouse with him, and even allowed Rob to steer the boat a half-mile in one of the open and easy bends. He told them about his many adventurous trips on the great river and explained to them the allowances it was necessary to make for the current on a bend, the best way of getting off a bar, and the proper method of making a landing.

"You shall make good pilot-man pratty soon," he said to Rob, approvingly. "Not manny man come down the Colomby. That take pilot-man, too."

"Well," said Rob, modestly, "we didn't really do very much of it ourselves, but I believe we'd have run the rapids wherever the men did if they had allowed us to."

"Batter not run the rapid so long you can walk, young man," said Carlson. "The safest kind sailorman ban the man that always stay on shore." And he laughed heartily at his own wit.

The boat tied up at the head of the Revelstoke Canyon, and here the boys put their scanty luggage in a wagon which had come out to meet her, and started off, carrying their rifles, along the wagon-trail which leads from above the canyon to the town, part of the time on a high trestle.

When they came abreast of the canyon they were well in advance of the men, who also were walking in, and they concluded to go to the brink of the canyon and look down at the water.



It was a wild sight enough which they saw from their lofty perch. The great Columbia River, lately so broad and lakelike, was compressed into a narrow strip of raging white water, driven down with such force that they could see very plainly the upflung rib of the river, forced above the level of the edges by the friction on the perpendicular rock walls. From where they peered over the brink they could see vast white surges, and could even distinguish the strange, irregular swells, or boils, which without warning or regularity come up at times from the depths of this erratic river. They quite agreed that it would have been impossible for a boat to go through Revelstoke Canyon alive at the stage of the water as they saw it. Rob tried to make a photograph, which he said he was going to take home to show to his mother.

"You'd better not," said John. "You'll get the folks to thinking that this sort of thing isn't safe!"

The boys stood back from the rim of the canyon after a while and waited for the others to come up with them.

"We think this one looks about as bad as anything we've seen, Uncle Dick," said Rob. "A man might get through once in a while, and they say Sam Boyd and Tom Horn did make it more than once before it got them. It doesn't look possible to me to run it."

"The river is a lot worse than the Peace," said John. "Of course, there's the Rocky Mountain Canyon, which nobody can get through either way, and there isn't any portage as bad as that on the whole Columbia Big Bend. But for number of bad rapids this river is a lot worse than the Peace."

"Yes," assented the others, "in some ways this is a wilder and more risky trip than the one we had last year. But we've had a pretty good time of it just the same, haven't we?"

"We certainly have," said Rob; and John and Jesse answered in the same way. "I only wish it wasn't all over so soon," added Jesse, disconsolately.

The boys, hardy and lighter of foot even than their companions, raced on ahead over the few remaining miles into Revelstoke town, leaving the bank of the river, which here swung off broad and mild enough once it had emerged from its canyon walls. Before them lay the town of Revelstoke, with its many buildings, its railway trains, and its signs of life and activity.

In town they all found a great budget of mail awaiting them, and concluded to spend the night at Revelstoke in order to do certain necessary writing and telegraphing. They had several letters from their people in Alaska, but none announcing any word from themselves after they had arrived at Edmonton, so that some of the letters bore rather an anxious note.

"What would it cost to send a telegram from here to Seattle, and a cablegram up the coast, and then by wireless up to the fort near Valdez?" inquired Rob. "That ought to get through to-morrow, and just two or three words to let them know we were out safe might make them all feel pretty comfortable. It's a good thing they don't know just what we've been through the last few days."

"Well, you go down to the station and see if it can be done," said Uncle Dick, "and I'll foot the bill. Get your berths for the next Transcontinental west to Vancouver, and reserve accommodations for Moise and me going east. Leo and George, I'm thinking, will want to wait here for a while; with so much money as he has as grizzly premiums and wages, Leo is not going to leave until he has seen something of the attractions of this city. In fact, I shouldn't wonder if he got broke here and walked back up to O'Brien's and took his boat there up the Columbia. They always get back home some way, the beggars, and I'll warrant you that when we all go to the Tete Jaune Cache by rail, a couple of years from now, we'll see Leo and George waiting for us at the train as happy as larks!"

"I wonder if my pony'll be there too?" said John.

"He will, unless something very unusual should happen to him. You'll find the word of an Indian good; and, although Leo does not talk much, I would depend on him absolutely in any promise that he made. We will have to agree that he has been a good man in everything he agreed to do, a good hunter and a good boatman."

"We may go in there and have a hunt with him some time after the road comes through," said Rob. "In fact, all this northern country will seem closer together when the road gets through to Prince Rupert. Why, that's a lot closer to Valdez than Vancouver is, and we could just step right off the cars there and get off at Leo's, or even go up to Yellowhead Lake and get another goat."

"Or find the place where John fell off the raft," added Jesse, laughing.

"Or go on across to where Uncle Dick may be working, one side or other of the summit. I wish he didn't have to go back to Edmonton, and could come on home with us now. But we can tell them all about it when we get home."

"Where'd you like to go the next time, if you had a chance, Rob?" asked John.

"There are a lot of places I'd like to see," said Rob. "For one thing, I've always wanted to go down the Mackenzie and then over the Rat portage to the Yukon, then out to Skagway—that'd be something of a trip. Then I've always had a hankering to go up the Saskatchewan and come up over the Howse Pass. And some day we may see the Athabasca Pass and the trail above the Boat Encampment. The railroads have spoiled a lot of the passes south of there, but when you come to read books on exploration you'll find a lot of things happened, even in the United States, in places where the railroads haven't gone yet. We'll have to see some of those countries sometime."

"How is your map coming on, John?" inquired Uncle Dick, a little later, when once more they had met in their room at the hotel.

"I've got this one almost done," said John.

THE END



TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:

Minor changes have been made to correct typesetters' errors; otherwise, every effort has been made to remain true to the author's words and intent.