Part 2 (2/2)

For a while the river flirts with the great mountain table rising east and west across its course. It cuts in through Flaming Gorge, emerges into a little park where today there are three or four remote ranches, and then wheels left into the mountain. But it does not cut through. The red walls turn it in a half circle, forcing it through a complete U out into the valley again, barely a half mile from where it entered. Powell named this stretch Horseshoe Canyon. In the part of it now called Hideout Canyon there is a foot-bridge across the Green to accommodate pack trains and deer hunters and sheep bands headed for the back country. This canyon gave the expedition its first real thrill- a curving rapid where the water plunged down among rocks. They ran it, at first scared and then exhilarated.

The walls widened out to make another little valley, pinched in to make another canyon. The river was broad and quiet here, and kingfishers playing along a tributary stream gave valley and canyon and stream a name. Just beyond their May 30 camp came a great domed point eroded into thousands of holes where swallows nested. They called it Beehive Point and followed the river around it, changing course from south to east as the river, having cut in close to the heart of the range, turned and ran along it lengthwise.

By now the walls were close to a half mile high, stepping backward in terraces, clean cliff and wooded slope and clean cliff again, to remote rims. Red Canyon they called it; it is one of the spectacular chasms of the Green. Today a tourist can look down into it from several spots on the rim, notably from Green Lake. But the tourist from that height sees only a thread of river, green in low water, reddish in high. He will not see the rapids that for the first time gave Powell and his men a touch of danger and exhausting work, and he will not hear what is perhaps the most nerve-wearing accompaniment of any voyage in these canyons: the incessant, thundering, express-engine roar of the water. In many parts of the canyons it never ceases, day or night. It speeds the heartbeat and deafens the ears and shakes the ground underfoot. It comes from every side, echoed and multiplied by the walls. A man's voice is lost, shouting in it.

The expedition would have plenty of experience with that roar of rapids. What they had of it here was a mere preliminary, for this was still a small river, unaugmented by the large tributaries. The rapids in Red Canyon, though bad enough to force them to line their boats down several times, were not such rapids as they would meet later, and there were stretches of wonderfully fast exciting water. Powell records that they made in one hour, including stops, twelve miles. Some of the men guessed that at times they were doing a mile a minute.

Except in very bad places, the men all preferred running to the laborious technique of lining that Powell devised. He was exas peratingly cautious.6 Going ahead in the Going ahead in the Emma Dean, Emma Dean, he scouted every stretch where the growing roar announced bad water, and as they went along he improvised methods of getting around the danger spots. The lining system that he used at what they named Ashley Falls was typical. Each boat was unloaded completely, and a line attached to bow and stern. The bow line was taken below the fall and secured. Then the boat was let down over the fall by five or six men straining back on the stern line. When they could no longer hold against the rush of water, they let go, the boat leaped the fall, and the rest of the crew snubbed it in below. Then they all got together and lugged the tons of supplies around the rapid and across the rocks. Bradley, whose journal is the only complete diary of the expedition besides Jack Sumner's, was undoubtedly speaking for all of them when he groused that they didn't run enough. he scouted every stretch where the growing roar announced bad water, and as they went along he improvised methods of getting around the danger spots. The lining system that he used at what they named Ashley Falls was typical. Each boat was unloaded completely, and a line attached to bow and stern. The bow line was taken below the fall and secured. Then the boat was let down over the fall by five or six men straining back on the stern line. When they could no longer hold against the rush of water, they let go, the boat leaped the fall, and the rest of the crew snubbed it in below. Then they all got together and lugged the tons of supplies around the rapid and across the rocks. Bradley, whose journal is the only complete diary of the expedition besides Jack Sumner's, was undoubtedly speaking for all of them when he groused that they didn't run enough.

They had thought they were the first into these red rock gorges, but at Ashley Falls, as they would do several times, they crossed the path of history. They were portaging around the foot of the cliff when they came upon an inscription put there by a distinguished predecessor. The bullboat party of General Ashley, forty-four years before, had painted on the rock the words ”Ashley, 1825.” Powell did not know who Ashley was, for Ashley's narrative was not printed until 1918. He thought the inscription was made by a prospector whose story he had heard from the mountain man Jim Baker, and he misread the date as 1855.7 He was not yet opening new country, but he was collecting data as he went, climbing the cliffs at every opportunity to measure alt.i.tudes and take geological sections, and most of all to fill his eye with the view and let the sweep of the Uintas take their place in the map that was forming in his mind. Climbing out to the rim from Red Canyon he looked down the narrowing wedge of forested mountain between the Uinta crest and the gorge of the river, and came close to history again. On the same piney uplands beyond the rims of Red Canyon, Henry Adams would be camping in a little more than a year, formulating in campfire discussions with Arnold Hague and S. F. Emmons8 some of the ideas that would mold a fascinating and cryptic career, and measuring his education against a primeval wilderness. And from the cliffs above Brown's Hole, where Powell climbed two days later, he could look eastward up the valley of the Vermillion through which Fremont had found his way to the parks of Colorado in 1844. some of the ideas that would mold a fascinating and cryptic career, and measuring his education against a primeval wilderness. And from the cliffs above Brown's Hole, where Powell climbed two days later, he could look eastward up the valley of the Vermillion through which Fremont had found his way to the parks of Colorado in 1844.

Ashley, Fremont, the Manly party of Forty-niners,9 Henry Adams, Clarence King and his helpers Hague and Emmons, Powell himself - a curiously diverse history would casually brush that little-known range. From the mountain man's uncomplicated and ferocious dynamism to Adams' dynamo and second law of thermodynamics, ideas significant for the continent's knowledge and use of itself pa.s.sed here. Not too many miles away one of the most incredible and successful hoaxes in our history, the great diamond swindle, would be staged in a little gulch on the south slope of the range. The mentality that permitted public credence of the words of Gilpin and Sam Adams would permit ”investments” in these Uinta diamonds to the tune of $10,000,000 and personally cost a San Francis...o...b..nker, William Ralston, $660,000, and ultimately his life. The salted mine would be exposed by Clarence King, friend of Adams and Powell's later collaborator; the spot would retain its name Diamond Gulch as a reminder of how far the will to believe can go, even in the face of probability, in the land of Gilpin. Henry Adams, Clarence King and his helpers Hague and Emmons, Powell himself - a curiously diverse history would casually brush that little-known range. From the mountain man's uncomplicated and ferocious dynamism to Adams' dynamo and second law of thermodynamics, ideas significant for the continent's knowledge and use of itself pa.s.sed here. Not too many miles away one of the most incredible and successful hoaxes in our history, the great diamond swindle, would be staged in a little gulch on the south slope of the range. The mentality that permitted public credence of the words of Gilpin and Sam Adams would permit ”investments” in these Uinta diamonds to the tune of $10,000,000 and personally cost a San Francis...o...b..nker, William Ralston, $660,000, and ultimately his life. The salted mine would be exposed by Clarence King, friend of Adams and Powell's later collaborator; the spot would retain its name Diamond Gulch as a reminder of how far the will to believe can go, even in the face of probability, in the land of Gilpin.10 Powell was not thinking of history as he camped in Brown's Hole, resting after the canyons, restoring the ears of his party with silence and birdsong, measuring the country he could reach or see. Some history had not happened yet, and some of it he did not know. He might glance up the Vermillion where Fremont had gone, but he glanced more frequently at the frowning gateway where the river, after miles of running down the east-west axis of the Uintas, turned south again and cut straight in. For him this was the real beginning. Up to here he had been antic.i.p.ated by trappers and prospectors. Brown's Hole itself was a vast cattle ranch, there were cabins and herds, and the place had been known years back by trappers on the Seedskeedee. But from here on was something else. Two thousand feet above the Hole, hanging his feet over the cliff, Powell sat and wrote a letter, dated June 7, 1869, which he would send out to the Chicago Tribune Tribune if and when he had the chance. if and when he had the chance.

While I write [he concluded], I am sitting on the same rock where I sat last spring, with Mrs. Powell, looking down into this canon. When I came down at noon, the sun shone in splendor on its vermilion walls shaded into green and gray when the rocks are lichened over. The river fills the channel from wall to wall. The canon opened like a beautiful portal to a region of glory. Now, as I write, the sun is going down, and the shadows are settling in the canon. The vermilion gleams and the rosy hues, the green and gray tints, are changing to sombre brown above, and black shadows below. Now 'tis a black portal to a region of gloom.And that is the gateway through which we enter [on] our voyage of exploration tomorrow - and what shall we find? 11 11 He dramatized himself somewhat, this one-armed major, and he had perhaps been reading eloquent and rhetorical travelers of the school of Mungo Park. Circ.u.mstances would conspire to a.s.sist in the dramatization. Though he would not know it for months, the rumor of his death and the death of his whole party but one would shortly go out from the mountains, and the place of his reported death, before John Risdon began tampering with geography, was this same canyon beneath his feet.

The rapids Powell saw from the walls had not looked too bad, but they turned out to be sharp, fierce pitches in the riverbed, filled with boulders fallen from the cliffs. Powell went ahead, waving the boats ash.o.r.e at every bad spot, reconnoitering on foot. Until noon they had short stretches of navigable water broken by rapids so furious that Andy Hall, remembering some schoolboy lesson, was led to exclaim, ”Oh how the waters come down at Lodore!” They named it the Canyon of Lodore, to Sumner's disgust. Sumner's reason for carping, confided a little later to his journal, is not only a sharp reminder of the difference between leader and men, but has a quaintly modern sound: ”The idea of diving into musty trash to find names for new discoveries on a new continent is un-American, to say the least.” 12 12 Just at noon on June 7 Powell's boat pulled ash.o.r.e at the head of a bad place, and signaled the freight boats to land. Powell went along sh.o.r.e to scout a practicable portage. Over his shoulder he saw one of the boats pulling in, but when he looked again he saw the No-Name, No-Name, with the two Howlands and Frank Goodman struggling at oars and sweep. Either they had not seen the signal, or had not started digging for sh.o.r.e in time. O. G. Howland later said with the two Howlands and Frank Goodman struggling at oars and sweep. Either they had not seen the signal, or had not started digging for sh.o.r.e in time. O. G. Howland later said 13 13 he could have made sh.o.r.e if he had not been half full of water from running the rapids above. But now the experience Hawkins and Hall had had in easy water the first day was repeated without the laughs. he could have made sh.o.r.e if he had not been half full of water from running the rapids above. But now the experience Hawkins and Hall had had in easy water the first day was repeated without the laughs.

Powell saw the boat hang for a breath at the head of the rapid and then sweep into it. He leaped onto a rock to signal frantically at the last boat, and after a long minute saw it pulling heavily toward sh.o.r.e well above the tongue. The moment he saw that one safe, he ran after the No-Name. No-Name.

It had shot the first fall, only a few feet high, and was rearing down a steep rapid. He saw it strike a boulder and heave up like a bucking horse. All three men were thrown out, but when the boat jammed briefly against the rocks they managed to grab the gunwale, and as she slipped off and started down again Powell watched the dripping boatmen frantically haul themselves in. The boat was full of water; though her watertight compartments kept her afloat, she was unmanageable in the fierce current. She wallowed down through the rapid, pounded into the tail waves and on two hundred yards to a second rapid as wild as the first. There she struck solidly, broadside, and broke completely in two. For a moment the tiny dark heads of the swimming men were visible in the foam, and then the water swept them out of sight.

Powell ran, bursting his lungs, with the other men behind him. Around the bend he came in sight of a swimmer being washed and pounded on a rock to which he clung for his life. O. G. Howland, recognizable by his draggled beard, had made a stony island in mid-rapid and was scrambling out to stretch a pole to the man on the rock, who turned out to be Goodman. Goodman let go the rock, seized the pole, and was hauled out. Further down the island Seneca Howland was dragging himself to the safety of the boulders.

They were safe for the time, but marooned in the middle of a bad rapid. Now the lightness and maneuverability of the Emma Dean Emma Dean proved out. The others lined her down to the foot of the first rapid, and Sumner, a brave man and by now a good boatman, was shoved off from there. Angling across the tail waves that swept almost to the tongue of the second rapid, he made the tip of the island. Then the four men pulled the boat upriver as high as they could go. Standing in water to his shoulders, one held it there while the others climbed in. Then a straining push, a scramble, the men in the stem hauling the pusher aboard, Sumner pulling furiously on the oars, and they made it in to where those on sh.o.r.e could reach them. There was a good deal of handshaking and thumping on the back - as much rejoicing, Powell wrote, ”as if they had been on a voyage around the world and wrecked on a distant coast.” proved out. The others lined her down to the foot of the first rapid, and Sumner, a brave man and by now a good boatman, was shoved off from there. Angling across the tail waves that swept almost to the tongue of the second rapid, he made the tip of the island. Then the four men pulled the boat upriver as high as they could go. Standing in water to his shoulders, one held it there while the others climbed in. Then a straining push, a scramble, the men in the stem hauling the pusher aboard, Sumner pulling furiously on the oars, and they made it in to where those on sh.o.r.e could reach them. There was a good deal of handshaking and thumping on the back - as much rejoicing, Powell wrote, ”as if they had been on a voyage around the world and wrecked on a distant coast.”14 The rapid was not Jim Beckwourth's suck, nor Risdon's whirlpool, but it was a reasonable facsimile. What made the wreck difficult to bear was that one whole boatload of rations, all the extra clothing of the No-Name's No-Name's crew, and a good many instruments, were lost. What made it worse was that by an error all the barometers had been packed in that boat instead of being distributed as they should have been. What made it worst, perhaps, from the leader's point of view, was that the wreck need not have happened at all. A split-second error, a failure to bail fast enough or keep the eyes open, a momentary sluggishness in responding to signals, and they were in trouble. crew, and a good many instruments, were lost. What made it worse was that by an error all the barometers had been packed in that boat instead of being distributed as they should have been. What made it worst, perhaps, from the leader's point of view, was that the wreck need not have happened at all. A split-second error, a failure to bail fast enough or keep the eyes open, a momentary sluggishness in responding to signals, and they were in trouble.15 The loss of clothes was not serious; they needed little except the s.h.i.+rts and drawers they were wearing, and the other men still had spares to lend. But the loss of rations would make them move faster than Powell had planned, and the loss of all the barometers would seriously reduce the scientific usefulness of the expedition. Both the map that Howland was making as they went, and the prediction of where they were on the river's downward grade to tidewater, depended on those tubes of mercury. Powell lay awake that night, half inclined to try making his way out to Salt Lake to order new barometers from the east. But in the morning they saw that the wreck of the No-Name No-Name had washed fifty yards farther downstream. Her stem half had lodged where it might possibly be reached, and there was a chance that something remained in its compartment. Sumner and Hall volunteered to reach her, and did so. From their rummaging in the smashed after cabin they rose up to wave their arms and yell something across the roar of water, and in a few minutes they came back in triumph. No clothes and no rations were among their prizes, but they had found the whole package of barometers, unhurt, as well as a package of thermometers, plus what had inspired their cheers: a keg of whiskey smuggled aboard at Green River without Powell's knowledge. Powell's Report calls it a three-gallon keg; Sumner's journal says it was a ten. Perhaps there was some wishful thinking in both accounts Howland's letter to the had washed fifty yards farther downstream. Her stem half had lodged where it might possibly be reached, and there was a chance that something remained in its compartment. Sumner and Hall volunteered to reach her, and did so. From their rummaging in the smashed after cabin they rose up to wave their arms and yell something across the roar of water, and in a few minutes they came back in triumph. No clothes and no rations were among their prizes, but they had found the whole package of barometers, unhurt, as well as a package of thermometers, plus what had inspired their cheers: a keg of whiskey smuggled aboard at Green River without Powell's knowledge. Powell's Report calls it a three-gallon keg; Sumner's journal says it was a ten. Perhaps there was some wishful thinking in both accounts Howland's letter to the Rocky Mountain News Rocky Mountain News modestly refers to it only as a ”blue keg.” He had reason to be modest. It was his whiskey. modestly refers to it only as a ”blue keg.” He had reason to be modest. It was his whiskey.

Intent upon the success of the expedition, and perhaps (though neither he nor any other diarist ever suggests it) wondering if Howland's error of the day before might have been caused by that same keg, Powell might have risked the entire trip by throwing the keg back in the river. But the men were f.a.gged, three of them had had a good scare and a good ducking and bruising, all of them had lost clothes, guns, outfit, and Howland had lost all his notes made up to that point. They were in need of a little morale building. Powell good-naturedly admitted that the river was cold, and accepted the keg as medicine.

Presumably it served its medicinal function. They were days getting past this portage, nearly a mile long, and letting the boats down successive rapids. At the bottom they lay over two more days to dry their spoiling rations, which had now become a worry. The wreck had sobered their exuberance, which in the fast water above had left them feeling, as Sumner said, ”like sparking a black-eyed girl - just dangerous enough to be exciting.” Now they encountered evidence of another wreck before their own - a broken boat, the lid of a bake oven, an old tin plate. Powell thought this might be Ashley's boat. n.o.body has ever determined whose in fact it was. But it helped emphasize the prudence that Powell had emphasized from the beginning. It did not take sucks or Niagaras to wreck a boat or drown a man.

Lodore was not a succession of rapids such as they had pa.s.sed before, but as Bradley wrote in his journal, one continuous rapid. The sh.o.r.es were cluttered boulders, without level ground on which to camp. b.i.t.c.hing like a good army man, Bradley remarked on June 11 that the Major had as usual chosen the worst campsite available. ”If I had a dog,” Bradley said, ”that would lie where my bed is made tonight I would kill him and burn his collar and swear I never owned him.” That same day, to give him better cause to grouse, he fell on the portage and cut his eye badly, so that thereafter, down the canyon where the river ”roars and foams like a wild beast,” he went sullenly with a notable black eye. Bedraggled, soaked, muddy, their s.h.i.+rttails dragging and their drawers clinging to their goosepimpled legs, they were all in Bradley's mood.

There are characteristic discomforts on a river voyage. Not the least is the incessant wetting and the sharp alternation of heat and cold. On a bright day a boatman swiftly sunburns the backs of his hands, the insteps of his feet if they are bare, every unexpected spot exposed by long sitting in one position. In the shade, in soaked clothes, the wind is often icy. And worse than either sun or wind is the irritation of sitting long hours on a hard wet board in sopping pants or drawers. The water is full of silt and sand, and so, consequently, are the clothes one wears. After a few hours there grows a sensation as if one has been gently coasting his seat back and forth across fine sandpaper. After a few more hours a boatman likes to stand whenever the river will let him.

Their clothes, even in the valises and carpetbags stowed under the cabin decks, were soaked. Their flour was wet and souring, their bacon gritty with silt, their coffee damp, their beans sprouting. Their muscles were sore and their bodies bruised and their tempers tried. When they took a rest on June 13 the saturnine Bradley commented that it was the first Sunday they had paid any attention to and he was inclined to believe that n.o.body but himself even knew it was the Sabbath. As they spread the spoiling rations out to dry on the rocks he prophesied dourly that they would soon be sorry they had taken no better care of them. ”If we succeed,” he said, ”it will be dumb luck, dumb luck, not good judgment that will do it.” not good judgment that will do it.”

Thus the enlisted man about his commander, ad infinitum. infinitum.

Lodore continued to rub its lessons in. They had barely started from their enforced rest camp on June 15 before the Maid of the Canyon, Maid of the Canyon, allowed to swing a little too far out into the current in the tongue of a rapid, smoked her line through the palms of the men holding her and broke clean away down the rapid and out of sight. Their spirits went down with her, for with only two boats they would be badly overloaded and underrationed. But they chased along sh.o.r.e, hoping against probability, and found her rotating with dignity in an eddy, unharmed except for a bruise or two. allowed to swing a little too far out into the current in the tongue of a rapid, smoked her line through the palms of the men holding her and broke clean away down the rapid and out of sight. Their spirits went down with her, for with only two boats they would be badly overloaded and underrationed. But they chased along sh.o.r.e, hoping against probability, and found her rotating with dignity in an eddy, unharmed except for a bruise or two.16 Still that was not enough. Accidents it seemed must happen by threes. A day after the breaking loose of the Maid, Maid, Powell climbed with Howland up the cliff above camp, which was pitched in willows and cedars on a bar. A few minutes later he looked down on pandemonium. With characteristic carelessness Hawkins had built his cooking fire too close to the dead willows. A whirlwind swept upriver, tore across the bar, and scattered burning sticks in every direction. Willow and cedar smoldered and burst into flame which in the stiff wind grew almost instantly into a conflagration. Trapped on the bar, the men had no escape except the river as the wind swooped tongues of flame across the camp. They jumped for the boats. Hawkins grabbed what he could carry of the mess kit, and ran with his arms full of kettles and bake ovens, but at the bank he stubbed his toe, and without a pause or a cry dove head first into the Green. He came up strangling and cussing, and without the mess kit. Powell climbed with Howland up the cliff above camp, which was pitched in willows and cedars on a bar. A few minutes later he looked down on pandemonium. With characteristic carelessness Hawkins had built his cooking fire too close to the dead willows. A whirlwind swept upriver, tore across the bar, and scattered burning sticks in every direction. Willow and cedar smoldered and burst into flame which in the stiff wind grew almost instantly into a conflagration. Trapped on the bar, the men had no escape except the river as the wind swooped tongues of flame across the camp. They jumped for the boats. Hawkins grabbed what he could carry of the mess kit, and ran with his arms full of kettles and bake ovens, but at the bank he stubbed his toe, and without a pause or a cry dove head first into the Green. He came up strangling and cussing, and without the mess kit.

By that time the whole point was ablaze. Their hair and beards were singed and the boats in danger. There was nothing to do but cut loose. From up on the cliff Powell watched the boats full of smoking, slapping men pour down the river and through a stiff rapid for almost a mile before they got under control and made sh.o.r.e. Their knives, forks, spoons, tin plates, and some of their kettles remained behind them in Lodore, along with the cryptic wreckage they themselves had found, to be a warning to careless travelers.

As if the lessons were now finished, the river relented, and on the morning of June 18 they floated down into a cliff-walled park where the Yampa flowed smoothly in, carrying more water at this stage than the Green. In a gra.s.sy, sunny bottom ”the size of a good farm” they camped and rested and sent their voices against the cliffs that sent them back in diminis.h.i.+ng echoes, six or eight echoes, or echoes of echoes. Behind them, as Powell now wrote in a fourth letter to the Chicago Tribune,17 lay ”a chapter of disasters and toils,” but Lodore was ”grand beyond the power of pen to tell. Its waters poured unceasingly from the hour we entered it until we landed here. No quiet in all that time; but its walls and cliffs, its peaks and crags, its amphitheaters and alcoves, told a story that I hear yet, and shall hear, and shall hear....” With an ear c.o.c.ked for the public sound of his voice, he could still sound perilously like Mungo Park. lay ”a chapter of disasters and toils,” but Lodore was ”grand beyond the power of pen to tell. Its waters poured unceasingly from the hour we entered it until we landed here. No quiet in all that time; but its walls and cliffs, its peaks and crags, its amphitheaters and alcoves, told a story that I hear yet, and shall hear, and shall hear....” With an ear c.o.c.ked for the public sound of his voice, he could still sound perilously like Mungo Park.

In this Echo Park at the mouth of the Yampa Howland too wrote up their adventures, and Sumner, Powell, and Bradley brought their journals up to date, Bradley so secretly that n.o.body on the expedition, then or later, suspected he was keeping one. A moody man, he holed up alone away from the others and talked to his thoughts. Walter Powell, just as moody, rang his fine ba.s.s voice off the cliffs in song, especially in renderings of ”Old Shady.” He sang that song so much they called him Old Shady himself. The hunters, for whose skill Bradley had the most acid contempt, made no inroads on the game supply, but Bradley got personally irritated by fish that kept breaking his hooks, rigged up a quadruple-strength line, and brought in a ten-pounder. This was their first experience with the ”Colorado River salmon,” a sluggish and overgrown variety of minnow that often reaches four feet in length and thirty to forty pounds in weight. Jack Sumner remarked when they cooked Bradley's catch that it tasted like a paper of pins cooked in lard oil.

They had a pleasant camp, a good rest, a sense of having come to a place they knew, for they had camped on the Yampa many times, and crossed its canyon farther up. A comfortable sense of having pa.s.sed perils with only moderate bad luck shows through the letters and journals they wrote here. Their morale was high. In his letter to the News News Howland, the best reporter of the lot, put it for all of them: Howland, the best reporter of the lot, put it for all of them: Our trip thus far has been pretty severe: still very exciting. When we have to run rapids, nothing is more exhilarating ... and as a breaker dashes over us as we shoot out from one side or the other, after having run the fall, one feels like hurrahing. It must be something like the excitement of battle at the point of victory.... A calm, smooth stream, running only at the rate of five or six miles per hour, is a horror we all detest now.... As soon as the surface of the river looks smooth all is listlessness or grumbling at the sluggish current, unless some unlucky goose comes within range of our rifles. But just let white foam show itself ahead and everything is as jolly and full of life as an Irish ”wake.” ...18 They were all feeling good as they camped in Echo Park and established alt.i.tude and lat.i.tude and longitude for the junction of the rivers - all but Bradley, the loner, and Goodman, the outsider whom n.o.body knew well and n.o.body much liked. Since his near-drowning, he had been looking thoughtful.

For a good many days it seemed that their prediction of better water ahead, and their belief that Lodore was as bad as anything they would hit on the river, were sound. Below Echo Park they portaged a couple of stiff little rapids, but in the main the river ran very swiftly and without serious obstacles - the kind of running they all most appreciated. Where a creek came in clear and cold, they had their first mess of trout. The hunters were given a chance to get up on the rims, and ”wonderful to relate,” as Bradley said, Hawkins shot a buck. It was the only fresh meat they had had, except for geese and ducks and fish, since Hawkins had trailed a band of mountain sheep on the second day out and thrown a lamb down the cliff. Bradley found ripe currants growing, and picked a gallon in the mountain pocket they named Island Park. Through the longitudinally cut spur that Powell christened Craggy Canyon 19 19 they boomed along well-fed and sa.s.sy, making, by their measurement, thirty miles in a day. they boomed along well-fed and sa.s.sy, making, by their measurement, thirty miles in a day.

On the morning of June 26, slightly more than a month after their embarkation, they bounced down a lively little riffle toward a hollow-worn cliff of smooth salmon-colored sandstone, pulled stoutly to avoid being carried under the cliff, and rounded a bend to the right to see wide open sky, a quiet river fringed with cottonwoods meandering south and west through a great valley.

This again was known country, the Wonsits or Uinta Valley, the wid

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