The River and I

l I confess it?) we had b

a masterly picture: indeed, an effect worthy of reproduction in Art. You see a Japanese screen done in

hic inwardness a dull, gray-blue, melancholy tone. And when you nibble at the boiled gray-blue meat of an adult crane, you catch yourself w

k) by experience we place not only ourselves but all things in their proper places in the universe. This process of fitting things properly in one's cosmos seems to be o

hat crane soup clung to me all day like t

gravel-bars, and regarded us curiously as we fought our way past them. Now and then a flock of wild ducks alighted several hundred yards from us. We had only a rifle. To shoot a moving duck out of a moving

e, the particular epithet with the inevitable feel about it, with which to describe that monotonous melancholy stretch. Every time I tried, I came back to the word "baconless." The word took on exquisite overtones of gray meaning, and I worked up those overtones until I had a perfectly

orked. A rider mounted on a piebald pony appe

ut the feeling I had was bigger than that. This mounted man

The rider was a youth of about seventeen. One glance at his face told you the story of his rearing.

y. "Say, you know little old New York,

the Old Man's got a grouch at me, and so he sent me 'way out here in this God-forsaken country! Say, what did they make this country for? Got any tailor-made cigarettes about you? How

er crowds, the cafés, faces, faces-anguished faces, eager faces, weary faces, painted faces, squalor, brilliance. Fo

m prose to poetry; that i

In an hour he reappeared with a half strip of the precious stuff. "Take money for it? Not o

n the grease of it! After all, a ba

ade us farewell with a snatch of a song once mor

ile. We had grown very credulous on that subject. Somehow or other an unlimited supply of gasoline was all the engine needed for the complete restoration of its health;

idn't take much imagination to name that creek. The whole country from which it debouches looks like Hell-"with the lights out," as General Sull

couraged us somewhat. A gray mist rolled with the wind, and dull clouds scudded over. We pitched camp in a clump of cott

eil

and Ke

s of the moon. We pushed on up the creek, kicking up clouds of alkali dust as we went. A creek of a burnt-out hell it was, to be sure. It seemed almost blasphemous to call this arid gully a creek. Boys swim in creeks, and

e flowed there once, but surely

rably suited for a witches' orgy. Some bleached bison heads with horns lay scattered about the place, and a cluster of soapweeds grew there-God knows how! They thrust their sere yellow sword-blades

here the melancholy sky touched the melancholy hills, one would come

e. The place was becoming eerie in the gray evening that spread slowly over the dead land. The mist driven by the moaning wind became a

ery feeling. It was as though one groped about a strange dark room and saw, for a brief moment in the spurting glow of a wind-blown sulphur match, the staring face of a dead man. Over us the great wind groaned. Water dripped through the blanket-like tears. We scraped the last damp

which was no

was extinguishe

arkling in e

athless; and

blackening in

t-I thought of it as the Spirit of By

was all the w

set on fire-b

faded-and the

ith a crash-an

apid flame and muffled thunder, it seemed I could hear the dream

oke

quietude on

of a pa

is that piece?"

pers c

mselves among

ss

ght not be some rattles

y ra

raped with their c

hes, and thei

ttle life, an

ockery; then

it grew bright

pects-saw and s

out!" sa

" I a

," said

ames Thomson, the younger, also, there in that "dreadful ni

ght. The soppy gray morning came at length. A midsummer morning after a night of ra

he sun had broken through upon the greengir

he mouth of Milk River but a sandbar, he advised us. But he had some ointment to apply to the wound thus inflicted, in that Glasgow, a town on the Great Northern,

g our absence. The stage trail led through an arid, undulating prairie of yellow buffalo grass. There were creek beds, but they were filled with dust at this season of the year. The Englishman

languages) concerning a certain corn which he possessed. We had been cramped up in a boat for several weeks, and the frequent soakings in the cold water had done little good to our joints. None of us was fit for walking. I kept back a limp until

ut for the Ferry; and it was a sorry, bedraggled trio that limped up to camp eight hours later. We did little m

rowned out; the tent dripped steadily; our blankets got soppy; and

that engine would go! We lay in camp all day-soppy, sore-waiting for the rain to let up. By way of cheering up I read L'Assomoir; and a grim graveyard substitute for cheer it

or it was like conquering an old enemy to go crashing through the

There was a distinct change in the temper of the crew. A vote at

ua

trying to climb over our gunwale. We wallowed in the wash of a bar, and cranked by turns. At the e

we made camp in a clump of scarlet bull-berry bushes; and by the evening fire two talked of railroad stati

sell-and there was no one to buy. The hope without the gasoline was decidedly better than the gasoline without the hope. Whereat the philosopher in me emerges to remark-but who cares? Philosophy proceeds backward, and points out err

we did not put off that night, but huddled up in our blankets close

dling could make headway against that gale. It was Sunday. Everything was damp and chilly. Shivers ran up our backs while we toasted our feet and faces; and the wind-whipped smoke had a way of blowing in every

f. Before the day was done, it was made plain that the Kid and I would travel alone from the mouth of the Yellowst

We waded far around in the cold water that chilled us to the marrow, but could find neither entrance nor outlet to the pocket in which we found ourselves. Wading ashore, we made a cheerless camp in the brush, leaving the boats stuck in the shallows. For the first time, th

r boats. Packing the camp stuff on our b

epressing. It seemed a thousand miles to the sunrise. The horizon was merely a blue haze-and the endless land was sere. The river ran for days with a succession of regularly occurring right-angled bends to the north and east. Each headland shot out in the same way, with, it seemed, the same snags in the water under it,

town since we left Benton. An odd little burlesque of a town it was; but walking up i

photograph on the incontestable grounds that they were by far the prettiest women I had seen for m

on with little mourning. But in a spirit of fairness, let me record that Charley's biscuits were ma

ine Indi

ine Indi

in the afternoon, and left off only when the cold of night came, relieving us of one discomfort by the substitution of another. Bill, of whom I had come to think as the expatriated turnip, gave me an opp

we were obliged to unload the entire cargo, piling it high in the shal

ling country about it was thickly dotted with horses and cattle. The place looked like home. It was a sight from Pisgah-a glimpse of a

urns from an extended absence. I told at once the purpose of my errand, explaining briefly what we were doing on the river. Why, yes, certainly we could have provisions. But we weren't going any farther that night-were we? The rancher ap

adequate expression of my delight, I should have startled the good mother by turning a somersault or

ecedence. But the supper we ate that evening takes close second. Welcome on every face!-the sort of welcome that the most lavish tips could not buy. And after the dishes were cleared away, they brought out a phonograph, and we

he great houses along Fifth Avenue seemed like that to me. I could walk past them in the night and feel like a ghost. I have seen cottages that I wanted to kneel to; and I'm sure this feeling wasn't due to the vine growing over the porch or the roses nodding in the yard. Knock at the door of such a house, and the chances are in favor of your being met by a quiet, motherly woman-one who will instantly make y

p on a great river. Well, kindness and na

from the senseless walls like an effluvium. Who knows but that every house has its telltale aura, plain to a vision of sufficient spiritual keenness? Per

ntermittent deeps of an inside channel. The outer channel was rolling viciously in that eternal thing, the head wind. We had covered the first six hundred miles with a power boat (called so, doubtless, because it required so much power to s

r, with an exaggerated straw hat shading a face that gripped my attention at once, was looking down at me. It was the face of a

ing in the world just then that I wished for more than my mail; b

ain of the steamer Expansion. At this closer range, the strength of the face was even more impressive, with its eagle

you find

we cordelled m

ton," he said, "and got hung up

er them helter-ske

up the Yellowstone for the great Crane Creek irrigation dam, sixty miles above the mouth. The Expansion was to sail on the following

to flour and beer; and there are no docks on the Yellowstone. The banks were steep, the sun was very hot, and the cargo ha

ked a young Dane of me, as we

at all,

topped to look me over carefully

t the fun of

and looked

I, "that a man will do for nothin

features. After that the Dane treated me with an air of superiori

f rest, the young Dane announced to the others that I was working for nothing; whereat questioning eyes were turned upon me in the dull lantern light. And I said to myself: I can conceive of h

ttle, this old man who has followed the river for over sixty years, pieced out the wonderful story of his life-a story fit for Homer. That story may now be read i

, I went there and found two heaps of stone at the opposite corners of a rectangle traced by a shallow ditch where of old the walls stood. This was all that

e who had been entertained there with his great retinue; of the regality of the haughty Scotchman who ruled there; of Alexander Harvey, who had killed his enemy on the very spot, doubtless, where I lay: killed him as an outraged br

a stronghold forgotten. But the vision wouldn't

ondered how many in that town cared about this spot where so

quoted, with a slight chan

how deep

he batt