Part 10 (2/2)

------ Oxide of calcium 4.2 Water and loss.. 2.5

100.0 Water and loss.. 5.2 ----- ----- 100.0 100.0

These a.n.a.lyses were made by Professor Augustus Steitz, a.s.sayer of the First National Bank of Helena, Mont.]

[Footnote W: On our return home, finding that no tidings of Mr. Everts had been received, Jack Baronette and George A. Prichett, two experienced trappers and old mountaineers, were provided with thirty days' provisions and dispatched in search of him, and by them Mr. Everts was found on October 16th, after wandering in the forest for thirty-seven days from the time he was lost. From the letter of Mr.

Prichett addressed to Mr. Gillette, myself and others, I quote: ”We found him on the 16th inst. on the summit of the first big mountain beyond Warm Spring creek, about seventy-five miles from Fort Ellis. He says he subsisted all this time on one snow bird, two small minnows and the wing of a bird which he found and mashed between two stones, and made some broth of in a yeast powder can. This was all, with the exception of thistle roots, he had subsisted on.”

The narrative of Mr. Everts, of his thirty-seven days' sojourn in the wilderness (published in Scribner's Magazine for November, 1871, and in volume V. of the Montana Historical Society publications), furnishes a chapter in the history of human endurance, exposure, and escape, almost as incredible as it is painfully instructive and entertaining.]

[Footnote X: Our general line of travel from the southwest estuary of the lake (Thumb) to the Firehole river was about one mile south of the present stage route. The tourist who to-day makes the rapid and comfortable tour of the park by stage, looking south from Shoshone Point, may catch a glimpse of a portion of the prostrate forest through and over which we struggled, and thus form some idea of the difficulties which beset us on our journey from the lake to the Firehole river.]

[Footnote Y: Called now Kepler's cascade.]

[Footnote Z: An incident of so amusing a character occurred soon after my return to Helena, that I cannot forbear narrating it here. Among the specimens of silica which I brought home were several dark globules about the size of nutmegs. I exhibited these to a noted physician of Helena, Dr. Hovaker, and soon after the return of Mr. Gillette from his search for Mr. Everts, I called upon him at his store and exhibited to him these specimens of silica. At the same time I took a nutmeg from a box upon the store counter, and playfully asked Gillette, in the presence of Dr. Hovaker, if he had found any of those singular incrustations. Dr. Hovaker, believing of course that the specimen I held in my hand came from the Yellowstone, took the nutmeg, and with wonder exhibited in every feature, proceeded to give it a critical examination, frequently exclaiming: ”How very like it is to a nutmeg.” He finally took a nutmeg from a box near by, and balanced the supposed incrustation with it, declaring the former to be the lighter. Asking my permission to do so, he took the nutmeg (which he supposed to be an incrustation) to a jeweler in the vicinity, and broke it. The aroma left him no doubt as to its character, but he was still deceived as to its origin. When I saw him returning to the store, in antic.i.p.ation of the reproof I should receive, I started for the rear door; but the Doctor, entering before I reached it, called me back, and in a most excited manner declared that we had discovered real nutmegs, and nutmegs of a very superior quality.

He had no doubt that Yellowstone lake was surrounded by nutmeg trees, and that each of our incrustations contained a veritable nutmeg. In his excitement he even proposed to organize a small party to go immediately to the locality to gather nutmegs, and had an interview with Charley Curtis on the subject of furnis.h.i.+ng pack animals for purposes of transportation. When, on the following day, he ascertained the truth, after giving me a characteristic lecture, he revenged himself by good naturedly conferring upon the members of our party the t.i.tle, by which he always called them thereafter, of ”Nutmegs.”

N.P. LANGFORD.]

[Footnote AA: James Bridger was famous for the marvelous stories he was accustomed to relate of his mountain life and experiences. He once told me that he had seen a river which flowed so rapidly over the smooth surface of a descending rock ledge in the bottom of the stream, that the water was ”hot at the bottom.” My experience in crossing the Firehole river that day, leads me to believe that Bridger had had, at some time, a similar experience. He well knew that heat and fire could be produced by friction. Like other mountain men, he had doubtless, many a time, produced a fire by friction; and he could not account for the existence of a hot rock in the bed of a cold stream, except upon the theory that the rapid flow of water over the smooth surface evolved the heat, by friction.

N.P. LANGFORD.]

[Footnote AB: This lake is now called ”h.e.l.l's Half-acre;” and from the lower lake the ”Excelsior” geyser has burst forth.]

[Footnote AC: The fountain and jets here referred to are those of the Lower Geyser Basin, and the larger column of water which we saw is undoubtedly the ”Fountain” geyser, named by Dr. Hayden in 1871.]

[Footnote AD: In the course of a recent correspondence with Mr.

Stickney, I asked him if he recalled this incident. Under date of May 20, 1905, he wrote me from Sarasota, Florida: ”The maple sugar incident had almost faded from my memory, but like a spark of fire smouldering under rubbish it needed but a breath to make it live, and I recall my reflections, after my astonishment, that you did so many quaint things, that it was quite in accordance with them that you should produce maple sugar in a sulphurous region.”

N.P. LANGFORD.]

[Footnote AE: This stream was afterwards named ”Gibbon river.”]

APPENDIX.

It is much to be regretted that our expedition was not accompanied by an expert photographer; but at the time of our departure from Helena, no one skilled in the art could be found with whom the hazards of the journey did not outweigh any seeming advantage or compensation which the undertaking promised.

The accompanying sketches of the two falls of the Yellowstone, and of the cones of the Grand and Castle geysers, were made by Walter Trumbull and Private Moore. They are the very first ever made of these objects.

Through an inadvertence in the preparation of the electroyped plates for the printer, they did not appear in their proper places in this diary.

Major Hiram M. Chittenden, in his volume ”The Yellowstone Park,” says of the two sketches made by Private Moore: ”His quaint sketches of the falls forcibly remind one of the original picture of Niagara, made by Father Hennepin, in 1697.”

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