第50章 Irving’s Bonneville - Chapter 17(2)

followed on at "long camps, which in trapper's language is equivalent to long stages. On the 6thof

April he met his spies returning. They had kept on the trail like hounds until they overtook theparty

at the south end of Godin's defile. Here they found them comfortably encamped: twenty-twoprime

trappers, all well appointed, with excellent horses in capital condition led by Milton Sublette, andan able coadjutor named Jarvie, and in full march for the Malade hunting ground. This wasstunning

news. The Malade River was the only trapping ground within reach; but to have to compete therewith veteran trappers, perfectly at home among the mountains, and admirably mounted, whilethey

were so poorly provided with horses and trappers, and had but one man in their party acquaintedwith the country-it was out of the question.

The only hope that now remained was that the snow, which still lay deep among themountains of

Godin's River and blocked up the usual pass to the Malade country, might detain the other partyuntil

Captain Bonneville's horses should get once more into good condition in their present amplepasturage.

The rival parties now encamped together, not out of companionship, but to keep an eye uponeach

other. Day after day passed by without any possibility of getting to the Malade country. Subletteand

Jarvie endeavored to force their way across the mountain; but the snows lay so deep as to obligethem to turn back. In the meantime the captain's horses were daily gaining strength, and theirhoofs

improving, which had been worn and battered by mountain service. The captain, also wasincreasing

his stock of provisions; so that the delay was all in his favor.

To any one who merely contemplates a map of the country this difficulty of getting fromGodin to

Malade River will appear inexplicable, as the intervening mountains terminate in the great SnakeRiver plain, so that, apparently, it would be perfectly easy to proceed round their bases.

Here, however, occur some of the striking phenomena of this wild and sublime region. Thegreat

lower plain which extends to the feet of these mountains is broken up near their bases into crests,and ridges resembling the surges of the ocean breaking on a rocky shore.

In a line with the mountains the plain is gashed with numerous and dangerous chasms, fromfour to

ten feet wide, and of great depth. Captain Bonneville attempted to sound some of these openings,but without any satisfactory result. A stone dropped into one of them reverberated against thesides

for apparently a very great depth, and, by its sound, indicated the same kind of substance with thesurface, as long as the strokes could be heard. The horse, instinctively sagacious in avoidingdanger,

shrinks back in alarm from the least of these chasms, pricking up his ears, snorting and pawing,until

permitted to turn away.

We have been told by a person well acquainted with the country that it is sometimesnecessary to

travel fifty and sixty miles to get round one of these tremendous ravines. Considerable streams,like

that of Godin's River, that run with a bold, free current, lose themselves in this plain; some ofthem

end in swamps, others suddenly disappear, finding, no doubt, subterranean outlets.

Opposite to these chasms Snake River makes two desperate leaps over precipices, at a shortdistance

from each other; one twenty, the other forty feet in height.

The volcanic plain in question forms an area of about sixty miles in diameter, where nothingmeets

the eye but a desolate and awful waste; where no grass grows nor water runs, and where nothingis