Part 2 (1/2)

7. Green River: A Volunteer of the Tribe of Gilpin Green River: A Volunteer of the Tribe of Gilpin

WELL BEFORE Powell's preparations brought him to the water's edge at Green River, what one may call the Gilpin mentality had taken notice of the Colorado River. It was inevitable that it should have. Distances in the Southwest were so great, gra.s.s and water so uncertain, difficulties of travel so numerous, that the imagination of pioneers was sure to be seized by the possibility of a great river highway from the Rockies to the Pacific. The explorations up from the Gulf of California by Lieutenant Derby and Lieutenant Ives in 1857-58 both had the intelligent object of discovering the possibilities of steamboat navigation on the lower Colorado, and Brigham Young, contemplating in that same decade an empire that would reach from the crest of the Rockies to the crest of the Sierra and from Oregon to the Rio Grande, hoped for an outlet to the sea and a water route to Utah for settlers and supplies. To that end he sent Anson Call to establish the river port of Callville, just above the present Hoover Dam, in 1864, and he kept his apostle to the Lamanites, Jacob Hamblin, busy for years searching out crossings and exploring the possibilities of the Colorado as a thoroughfare. These investigations established the course and nature of the lower river and the resources of the country through which it ran, and they arrived at a logical navigational head just above Black Canyon, near Callville.1 What distinguishes the Gilpin approach from this methodical and factual investigation is the inability to be content with facts, or even to see them: the quality of incorrigible faith, the insistence upon introducing fantasy into geography. It would be a valuable and exciting matter if a practicable water route split the plateau country in two and gave easy access to the Pacific. Therefore it existed, in spite of logic and topography and triply demonstrated fact. There were people who from physiographic inference knew what the Colorado probably probably did between its known headwaters and its known lower course. Its canyons had been peeked into at enough points to prove their continuity over hundreds of miles, the amount of its fall was on record, its rapids were attested both by logic and by spotty observation. But the Gilpin mentality was capable not only of convincing itself, but at times of imposing its fantasy upon a public and government understandably ignorant of the facts. It was the wishfulness of the Gilpin mind that had gotten James White's raft story a respectful hearing the year before, in official as well as unofficial quarters. The same wishfulness at times imposed upon the Colorado some of the legendary properties of the Multnomah and the Buenaventura, those fabled rivers that drained the Great Basin into the Pacific until Jed Smith walked across the Nevada and Utah deserts and proved otherwise. did between its known headwaters and its known lower course. Its canyons had been peeked into at enough points to prove their continuity over hundreds of miles, the amount of its fall was on record, its rapids were attested both by logic and by spotty observation. But the Gilpin mentality was capable not only of convincing itself, but at times of imposing its fantasy upon a public and government understandably ignorant of the facts. It was the wishfulness of the Gilpin mind that had gotten James White's raft story a respectful hearing the year before, in official as well as unofficial quarters. The same wishfulness at times imposed upon the Colorado some of the legendary properties of the Multnomah and the Buenaventura, those fabled rivers that drained the Great Basin into the Pacific until Jed Smith walked across the Nevada and Utah deserts and proved otherwise.

Of all the makers of fantasy who touched the history of the Colorado, few approached Samuel Adams.2 His career is a demonstration of how far a man could get in a new country on nothing but gall and the gift of gab, so long as what he said was what people wanted to believe. He was one of a tribe of Western adventurers and imposters and mountebanks, cousin-german to James d.i.c.kson and Walter Murray Gibson; His career is a demonstration of how far a man could get in a new country on nothing but gall and the gift of gab, so long as what he said was what people wanted to believe. He was one of a tribe of Western adventurers and imposters and mountebanks, cousin-german to James d.i.c.kson and Walter Murray Gibson;3 and if his schemes were not so grandiose as theirs and his imagination not so lurid and his personal ambitions less G.o.dlike, he was still recognizably of that sib. As d.i.c.kson was to Sam Houston, as Gibson was to Brigham Young, so Adams was to Powell - a lunatic counterpoint, a parody in advance, a caricature just close enough to the real thing, just close enough to a big idea, to have been temporarily plausible and limitedly successful. and if his schemes were not so grandiose as theirs and his imagination not so lurid and his personal ambitions less G.o.dlike, he was still recognizably of that sib. As d.i.c.kson was to Sam Houston, as Gibson was to Brigham Young, so Adams was to Powell - a lunatic counterpoint, a parody in advance, a caricature just close enough to the real thing, just close enough to a big idea, to have been temporarily plausible and limitedly successful.

His spiritual relative William Gilpin, after half a lifetime in the West, could see through a gla.s.s eye so darkly that he denied geography, topography, meteorology, and the plain evidence of his senses, and his advice to America and his dream of the future floated upward on the draft of his own bombast. One who had frozen and starved and chewed his swollen tongue in thirst, he could still deny the facts of western deserts and western climate. Samuel Adams - Captain Samuel Adams he chose to call himself -with more actual experience on the Colorado than most men, could still talk of it as a thoroughfare.

He was posing as an authority on the Colorado before either Powell or James White ever saw it. In a letter to Secretary of War Stanton dated March 29,1867, while Powell was still planning his first mountain expedition and had probably not even conceived the notion of exploring the river, Adams named himself and outlined his expert qualifications. He said that in 1865 he and Captain Thomas Trueworthy made a voyage up the Colorado from its mouth in a little sternwheeler for the purpose of ”demonstrating that it was capable of being ascended with steamers for over 620 miles from the mouth.” (Captain George Johnson in the steamer Colorado Colorado and Lieutenant Ives in and Lieutenant Ives in The Explorer, The Explorer, shoving up the Colorado from Yuma, had demonstrated that in 1858.) shoving up the Colorado from Yuma, had demonstrated that in 1858.)4 As a matter of fact, regular steamer service was already established when Adams arrived, as he admitted in the next breath without apparent sense that he was contradicting himself. But this California Navigation Company which by 1865 ran six or eight river steamers between Yuma and Callville was, Adams said, a ruthless monopoly determined to stamp out compet.i.tion, by the ”bullet and the knife” if necessary, or by cutting the timber on both sides of the river to destroy rivals' fuel supply. In spite of a letter of character he had carried there from Governor Low of California, As a matter of fact, regular steamer service was already established when Adams arrived, as he admitted in the next breath without apparent sense that he was contradicting himself. But this California Navigation Company which by 1865 ran six or eight river steamers between Yuma and Callville was, Adams said, a ruthless monopoly determined to stamp out compet.i.tion, by the ”bullet and the knife” if necessary, or by cutting the timber on both sides of the river to destroy rivals' fuel supply. In spite of a letter of character he had carried there from Governor Low of California,5 it appears that Adams' pretensions as an explorer had not made much impression on the lower Colorado. it appears that Adams' pretensions as an explorer had not made much impression on the lower Colorado.

But at least he was now convinced that steamboat navigation was possible as far as Callville, and he went eleven miles above Callville and built a raft and floated down with ease through Boulder Canyon, which he represented to Stanton as the biggest on the river. Before taking to his raft, he climbed the canyon wall and saw ”an open valley, sixty miles in length, extending to the northeast.” That would have been the Valley of the Virgin, now the Virgin Basin of Lake Mead. Beyond it, Adams said, the land had been considered a terra incognita. But from his talks with Indians, his observation of the terrain, and his study of ”maps and correspondence” in the ”Historical Society” in Salt Lake, he had satisfied himself ”that there are none of those dangerous obstructions which have been represented by those who have viewed them at a distance, and whose imaginary canyons and rapids below had almost disappeared at the approach of the steamer.”

Lieutenant Ives and his men would have been interested to hear this, for there, in one look and one sentence, went the whole canyon and plateau country that they had labored across on foot after being forced to abandon the river in 1858. It was imaginary. There went the Grand Canyon and Marble Canyon and Glen and Cataract and Labyrinth Canyons, there went the abysmal chasms into which Coronado's men had peered fearfully and which so impressed Baron von Egloffstein, Ives' topographer and artist, that his ill.u.s.trations for the Ives report look like the landscapes of nightmare. There went the barrier canyons that had held in the southern edge of Brigham Young's empire, to join the Great American Desert that other Gilpins were busily dissolving. Down this misrepresented and maligned highway of the Colorado, Adams said, must come the ties and rails and supplies for the building of the southern railroad. The Colorado must become for the Pacific Coast what the Mississippi was for the Midwest. The whole rumor of impa.s.sable canyons and rapids was a flagrant lie of the corporations now entrenched on the river and jealous of possible compet.i.tion.

The yeasty schemes stirring in Adams' head must have generated gases to cloud his eyesight. Eastward from that same canyon rim from which he looked up the Valley of the Virgin he could not have failed to see even at that distance the towering, level, four-thousand-foot rampart of the Grand Wash Cliffs, where the river emerges from the Grand Canyon into relatively open country. Those cliffs are the dominating element in the landscape Adams viewed. In ma.s.s and import they are enormously impressive - and the river, as Adams ought to have been able to see, either had to run along the cliffs or come straight out of them. Yet they did not impress him as a ”dangerous obstruction.”

All Adams got for his letter to Stanton in 1867 was a resolution of thanks from the House of Representatives. But that was something. It was symptomatic. More might be had.

What Captain Adams did for the next two years, aside from writing letters, does not seem to be known. But early in May, 1869, as Sumner and the trappers were waiting in camp on the Green for Powell to return with the boats, a young man of impressive presence and a fast tongue climbed off the Union Pacific's pa.s.senger train and made himself at home in camp. He said that he was to accompany the expedition in a scientific capacity; his mouth was full of big names. He had letters and orders which he would present to Major Powell as soon as he arrived.

The trappers, still concentrating on their quarrel with Jake Fields' forty-rod whiskey, shrugged and let him stay - ”a young scientific duck,” Billy Hawkins called him, part of Powell's incomprehensible busy-ness. He was not so different from the other young scientific ducks they had had half a year's experience with. And he spoke with confidence and particularity of his explorations on the lower river. He seemed to have qualifications, though they found him a finicky camper, and took a gentle pleasure in ribbing him.

When Powell arrived with the boats on May 11 Adams presented himself as one who had authorization from ex-Secretary of War Stanton to accompany the expedition. He might even have got away with his bluff if, as he thought, the expedition had been sponsored by the government. But Powell, who had himself planned and organized every detail of the trip, saw no reason why a retired Secretary of War should forcibly impose a recruit upon him, especially a lordly recruit who acted like the commander. He asked to see Adams' papers, and Adams brought them out: letters from Stanton and others thanking him kindly for his communication and wis.h.i.+ng him success in the exploration he contemplated. Powell said later6 that he read the letters and sent Adams about his business, but Billy Hawkins, whose reminiscences show more liveliness and more will to aggrandize Hawkins than to report the sober truth, had another version of Adams' departure. He said that Adams was hard to please at meals, and complained a good deal about Hawkins' cooking. One night Jack Sumner remarked something confounded queer about the coffee, and Hawkins, across the fire, reached down with his bowie and forked up one of Walter Powell's black and dripping socks from where it had been soaking in a kettle. It looked to Adams as if the sock had come out of the coffeepot, and that finished his desire for frontier adventure. that he read the letters and sent Adams about his business, but Billy Hawkins, whose reminiscences show more liveliness and more will to aggrandize Hawkins than to report the sober truth, had another version of Adams' departure. He said that Adams was hard to please at meals, and complained a good deal about Hawkins' cooking. One night Jack Sumner remarked something confounded queer about the coffee, and Hawkins, across the fire, reached down with his bowie and forked up one of Walter Powell's black and dripping socks from where it had been soaking in a kettle. It looked to Adams as if the sock had come out of the coffeepot, and that finished his desire for frontier adventure.

Actually Adams' desire for adventure and exploration was not in the least quenched, either by Powell's harsh judgment of his character and claims or by Hawkins' coffee. He was a hard man to quench. In Arizona Territory, his legal domicile, he had run for delegate to Congress in three consecutive elections, getting 31 votes the first time, 168 the second, and 32 the third. Now, swearing that he was misunderstood and abused, he climbed on the train and headed for Colorado Territory. If Powell would not accept his honestly proffered services, there were those who would.

There were, too. The Colorado was the natural highway, the beckoning door, of an empire rich in precious metals, timber, agricultural land, that empire of the Gilpin fantasy where fell not rain nor hail nor any snow, nor ever wind blew loudly. It would take more than a rebuff from Powell to discourage Adams from leading the nation into Canaan.

Let him go. We shall hear of him again.

8. The Green: Green River to the Uinta Valley The Green: Green River to the Uinta Valley

AT NOON on May 24, 1869, the population of Green River gathered on the bank, and an hour later they watched the four boats of the Powell Expedition spin out into the current1 - the - the Emma Dean, Emma Dean, the the Maid of the Canyon, Maid of the Canyon, the the Kitty Clyde's Sister, Kitty Clyde's Sister, and the No-Name, all but the pilot boat heavy and low in the water with their loads. The men jumped to oars and sweeps, the Major swung his hat from the and the No-Name, all but the pilot boat heavy and low in the water with their loads. The men jumped to oars and sweeps, the Major swung his hat from the Emma Dean. Emma Dean. In two or three minutes the current carried them left, then right, and one after another they disappeared around the bend. The crowd stood around a little, squinted at the rising river, pa.s.sed predictions, and dispersed. In two or three minutes the current carried them left, then right, and one after another they disappeared around the bend. The crowd stood around a little, squinted at the rising river, pa.s.sed predictions, and dispersed.

That was the last anybody heard of Major Powell and his nine men for thirty-seven days, until June 30. On that day the Corinne Reporter, Reporter, mouthpiece for the sinful railroad camp at the north end of Great Salt Lake, reported that all of the party except the gun-smith had drowned in the terrible rapids of the Green. mouthpiece for the sinful railroad camp at the north end of Great Salt Lake, reported that all of the party except the gun-smith had drowned in the terrible rapids of the Green.

Newspaper intelligence along the line of the Union Pacific was, in spite of the telegraph, closely related to rumor. Those expecting word of Powell's party waited uncertainly, unwilling to believe. Then on July 2 and 3 the Omaha Republican Republican ran a lengthy but confused story of the disaster which it had got from a trapper named Riley, who said he had met Jack Sumner in Fort Bridger and from him, the only survivor, obtained the facts. Riley said that Sumner, detailed to a job on sh.o.r.e, had watched helplessly as all the laden boats plunged one after another over a twelve-foot fall in the first canyon south of Brown's Hole and were swept to destruction in the raging rapids below. There were those who wagged their heads and believed, remembering Jim Beckwourth, that loud and lying mountaineer, and his terrible ”suck,” ran a lengthy but confused story of the disaster which it had got from a trapper named Riley, who said he had met Jack Sumner in Fort Bridger and from him, the only survivor, obtained the facts. Riley said that Sumner, detailed to a job on sh.o.r.e, had watched helplessly as all the laden boats plunged one after another over a twelve-foot fall in the first canyon south of Brown's Hole and were swept to destruction in the raging rapids below. There were those who wagged their heads and believed, remembering Jim Beckwourth, that loud and lying mountaineer, and his terrible ”suck,” 2 2 which was fabled to swallow any boat that entered it. which was fabled to swallow any boat that entered it.

By July 4 the story had moved eastward. Chicago papers reported the arrival in Springfield of John A. Risdon, the only survivor of the Powell Expedition, and gained from him a circ.u.mstantial account of the disaster, the names of all the victims, and the story of Risdon's difficult struggle to make his way out to civilization 3 3 The next day the Detroit The next day the Detroit Post Post published a letter from Emma Powell denouncing Risdon as an impostor. No such man had ever been with her husband's party, and moreover she had received letters from her husband dated May 22, though Risdon said the wreck had taken place on May 8. published a letter from Emma Powell denouncing Risdon as an impostor. No such man had ever been with her husband's party, and moreover she had received letters from her husband dated May 22, though Risdon said the wreck had taken place on May 8.

So here, hard on the heels of Sam Adams, came another impostor quite as cavalier with the truth and a good deal more ghoulish. His purpose was apparently no more than to get a free ride east, using his sad story for a pa.s.senger ticket. Like other liars, he may even have got to believing his own story as he repeated and embellished it, for he carried it brazenly back to Springfield and told it to Governor Palmer of Illinois, and he footnoted it with great particularity. For the adorning of his tale he invented a whole geography of rivers and canyons and army posts, all from the land of fable, and he put it over on Governor Palmer so thoroughly that the Governor publicly called him an ”honest, plain, candid man,” who told his story straightforwardly and seemed reliable. (In the same way Governor Low of California had borne testimony for Adams, and Brigham Young had given to Walter Murray Gibson a piece of paper that Gibson parlayed into a barbaric crown in the Sandwich Islands.) A character out of fiction, an incontrovertible Duke of Bilge-water or poor lost Dauphin, Risdon wept as he carried his story eastward along the Union Pacific, and in general made such an unregenerate and conscienceless show of his lie that Byers in the Rocky Mountain News, Rocky Mountain News, summarizing the extent of Risdon's wickedness, first clamored for him to be hung and then came around to treating him almost with admiration for his ill.u.s.tration of man's capacity to ”lie without object or provocation.” summarizing the extent of Risdon's wickedness, first clamored for him to be hung and then came around to treating him almost with admiration for his ill.u.s.tration of man's capacity to ”lie without object or provocation.”

Risdon had a talent. From a few garbled rumors he had made a coherent fiction, invented a geography, created various people named Andrew Knoxson, T. W. Smith, William S. Dolton, Charles Sherman, and so on, plus a half-breed guide called Chic-a-wa-nee. The only name he got right was that of Durley, of the 1868 group, but he didn't know Durley's first name and so he doubled it, transforming the original Lyle into brothers named William and Charles. He took this motley crew of twenty-five, with teamsters and wagons, to a ”small Indian settlement” on the Colorado called Wil liamsburg. There he kept them for seven or eight days making observations before he started them down the river to explore two tributaries known as the Big Black and the Deleban.

There is a certain advantage to living before maps have petrified geography. Risdon could give himself plenty of elbow room. He brought the Big Black and the Deleban into the Colorado within a mile and a quarter of each other, and in that distance gave the Colorado a drop of 160 feet. Powell, said Risdon, ordered him ash.o.r.e to explore a way of getting up the Deleban, while the remaining twenty-five men packed themselves aboard a bark canoe, called a ”yawl” by the Indians, and laughingly pushed off to paddle across the roaring Colorado. They had with them all the surveying instruments and all the Major's papers and notebooks. The Major stood in the stem steering, while seven paddlers dug water. Risdon shouted to them to be sure and come back in time for dinner, and they shouted back, ”Goodbye, Jack, you will never see us again!” A moment later a whirlpool seized the yawl, spun it around, and swallowed it. The last man the astonished Risdon saw was Powell, still standing erect and brave at his post in the stern.

Risdon cried like a baby. Later he went up and down the river (why up not even the sardonic Byers could figure out) looking for bodies or remains. All he found was a carpetbag containing Powell's papers and records. After four days' searching Risdon gave up, took the two teams and what remained of the party's supplies, and drove off through the timber toward civilization. About June 1 he reached Leroy, a small military post deep in that Gilpin-Adams-Risdon land on a stream called the Red River. Here he reported to Colonel Smith, commanding, and was a.s.sisted to St. Louis. All of Major Powell's baggage, including the carpetbag, he said he had sent to Mrs. Powell.

In the long run, perhaps Powell should have been grateful to Risdon. His report of disaster could have been believed only by those who knew nothing about the country, the expedition, or its members, and the flurry of indignation when Risdon was exposed most certainly t.i.tillated interest in what was actually happening as the explorers went deeper into the canyons. For a brief while Risdon's yarn may have brought anxiety to Powell's wife and others, not because they ever credited its truth but because it named an eventuality that was perfectly possible. Knowing nothing except that Risdon lied, Emma had to wait, and the public had to wait, until some more authentic report should come out.

The next word, though more authentic than Risdon's tale, was not rea.s.suring. On July 15 the Cheyenne Argus Argus reported the experiences of Colonel Jackson, chief of a silver prospecting company, in the upper canyons of the Green. Jackson had headed down river by land six days before Powell's group. He reported that he had gone 160 miles, and had found the river pa.s.sage utterly impracticable. Deep in the canyons, forty miles below where the Powell party was supposed to have been lost, Jackson's men were overtaken by the shattered remnants of a boat expedition which had started three weeks reported the experiences of Colonel Jackson, chief of a silver prospecting company, in the upper canyons of the Green. Jackson had headed down river by land six days before Powell's group. He reported that he had gone 160 miles, and had found the river pa.s.sage utterly impracticable. Deep in the canyons, forty miles below where the Powell party was supposed to have been lost, Jackson's men were overtaken by the shattered remnants of a boat expedition which had started three weeks after after Powell, determined to prove that if Powell could run the river they could. The leader of that reckless excursion, Frederick Hook, was now buried among the boulders in Red Canyon. Powell, determined to prove that if Powell could run the river they could. The leader of that reckless excursion, Frederick Hook, was now buried among the boulders in Red Canyon.4 Returning together toward Green River, the Hook-Jackson parties had seen no trace of Powell or his men - not a footprint on the beach, not a dead campfire, not a rag in a rapid. The canyons had swallowed the ten of them; Jackson felt that they could not be alive. Returning together toward Green River, the Hook-Jackson parties had seen no trace of Powell or his men - not a footprint on the beach, not a dead campfire, not a rag in a rapid. The canyons had swallowed the ten of them; Jackson felt that they could not be alive.

But two days later the Rocky Mountain News Rocky Mountain News was able to run two letters from its old employee Oramel Howland. One was dated from the mouth of the Yampa on June 19, the other from the mouth of the Uinta (modern Ouray, Utah, in the Uinta Ute Reservation) on June 30. And the same wilderness mail that brought Howland's letters out from the Uinta Ute Agency brought a letter from Andy Hall to his brother and letters from Major Powell himself to the Chicago was able to run two letters from its old employee Oramel Howland. One was dated from the mouth of the Yampa on June 19, the other from the mouth of the Uinta (modern Ouray, Utah, in the Uinta Ute Reservation) on June 30. And the same wilderness mail that brought Howland's letters out from the Uinta Ute Agency brought a letter from Andy Hall to his brother and letters from Major Powell himself to the Chicago Tribune, Tribune, dated from Flaming Gorge, Brown's Hole, and the mouth of the Yampa. dated from Flaming Gorge, Brown's Hole, and the mouth of the Yampa.5 The party had come down the Green for 160 miles, survived all the canyons that Jackson had called impa.s.sable, and run clean through the Uintas into the broad Wonsits or Uinta Valley of Utah. It was camped, when the last letters were written, less than two miles upriver from the mouth of the White, which it had visited the winter before. It was, in fact, temporarily in safe and known country. How it had got that far was news the papers would copy. The party had come down the Green for 160 miles, survived all the canyons that Jackson had called impa.s.sable, and run clean through the Uintas into the broad Wonsits or Uinta Valley of Utah. It was camped, when the last letters were written, less than two miles upriver from the mouth of the White, which it had visited the winter before. It was, in fact, temporarily in safe and known country. How it had got that far was news the papers would copy.

Luckily for the Powell Expedition's unpractised boatmen, the Green for sixty miles south of Green River is a relatively mild stream, flowing through broken badlands. Though there are low bluffs, there are no real canyons, and though the current is insistent and swift, there is nothing that can be called a rapid. In those sixty miles they had a chance to discover how their boats handled. Hall and Hawkins, heavily laden, found that when they wanted to land they had better start making preparations at least two hundred yards above the proposed landing place. They complained to Powell that their Maid of the Canyon Maid of the Canyon was nine inches closer to the bottom of the river than the others, and got a redistribution of the load. They learned too what every man who has ever handled a boat on Green or Colorado or San Juan learns: how trivial a mistake can lead to trouble. The rivers are not ”treacherous.” They are only forever dangerous. One who has not tried it finds it hard to believe the instant and terrible force that such a current exerts on a broadside boat out of control on a sandbar or rock. On the San Juan it is possible in places to sit on the bottom, close to sh.o.r.e where the current is not nearly so strong as in the main channel, and with the hands grasping the ankles be sledded along the bottom at a coasting clip. On any of the rivers a spilled boatman, an upset boat, is swept off downstream as if by an avalanche. Powell's men, running aground, breaking an oar, spinning in eddies, learned respect for the river before it got dangerous. They took three days running down to the mouth of Henry's Fork, at the foot of the Uintas, where they had cached barometers and rations earlier in the spring on their way out from White River. The cache was untouched; they raised it and camped the third night in sight of the flaring red gateway they named Flaming Gorge, where for the first time the river broke directly into the barrier range. was nine inches closer to the bottom of the river than the others, and got a redistribution of the load. They learned too what every man who has ever handled a boat on Green or Colorado or San Juan learns: how trivial a mistake can lead to trouble. The rivers are not ”treacherous.” They are only forever dangerous. One who has not tried it finds it hard to believe the instant and terrible force that such a current exerts on a broadside boat out of control on a sandbar or rock. On the San Juan it is possible in places to sit on the bottom, close to sh.o.r.e where the current is not nearly so strong as in the main channel, and with the hands grasping the ankles be sledded along the bottom at a coasting clip. On any of the rivers a spilled boatman, an upset boat, is swept off downstream as if by an avalanche. Powell's men, running aground, breaking an oar, spinning in eddies, learned respect for the river before it got dangerous. They took three days running down to the mouth of Henry's Fork, at the foot of the Uintas, where they had cached barometers and rations earlier in the spring on their way out from White River. The cache was untouched; they raised it and camped the third night in sight of the flaring red gateway they named Flaming Gorge, where for the first time the river broke directly into the barrier range.

Because they were an exploring party and not merely a group of thrill-hunters, they did not plunge directly in. For three days they sat outside the gate, mending barometers, measuring the height of the cliffs (1200 feet), climbing the walls to look around. The peaks of the Wasatch notched the west, the barren Wyoming plateau northward swelled up toward South Pa.s.s and the snowy Wind River Mountains. Wind River Mountains. Below their lookout rim was the valley of Henry's Fork, old trapper country, and the lodge of Jim Baker, a squawman who had established a ranch against the mountain. And they could see the gorge of the Green with the river at its bottom splitting the red cliffs. Below their lookout rim was the valley of Henry's Fork, old trapper country, and the lodge of Jim Baker, a squawman who had established a ranch against the mountain. And they could see the gorge of the Green with the river at its bottom splitting the red cliffs.