The Young Alaskans in the Rockies Part 10

"A great many men crossed the Athabasca Pa.s.s, but not so many took the Yellowhead route. Even as late as 1839 the traders preferred the Athabasca Pa.s.s to this one. Father de Smet took that route in 1846. I shouldn't wonder if the mountain called Pyramid Mountain was the one originally called De Smet Mountain.

"There was an artist by the name of Paul Kane that crossed west by the Athabasca Pa.s.s in 1846. In those days the Yellowhead Pa.s.s was little used. It came into most prominence after the Cariboo Diggings discoveries of gold. Parties came out going east as early as 1860 from the gold-mines. About that time Sir James Hector was examining all this country, and he named a lot of it, too. More than a hundred and fifty miners went west through this pa.s.s in '62 bound for the Cariboo Diggings. They didn't stop to name anything, you may be sure, for they were in a hurry to get to the gold; but in 1863 Viscount Milton and Dr. Cheadle went across here and wrote a book about it which is very useful even yet. They named a lot of mountains. I don't know who named that wonderful peak Mount Robson, but it was named after Premier Robson of British Columbia in 1865.

"n.o.body knows much about this country, for the early travelers did not make many maps or journals. But about 1872 they began to explore this country with a view to railway explorations, and from that time on it has been better known and more visited, although really very few persons have ever been right where we are sitting now."

"Well," said Rob, thoughtfully, after a time, "after all, the best way to learn about a country is to go and see it yourself. You can read all about it in books, but still it looks different when you come to see it yourself."

"Wait till I get my map done," said John, "and many a time after this we'll talk it all over, and we can tell on the map right where we were all the time."

"Well, you're at the summit now at this camp," said Uncle d.i.c.k.

"Yonder to the east is Miette water. Over yonder is the Fraser. It's downhill from here west, and sometimes downhill rather faster than you'll like. We've come a couple of hundred miles on our journey to the summit here, and in a little more than fifty more we'll be at the Tete Jaune Cache. That's on the Fraser--and a wicked old river she is, too."

"How's the trail between here and there, Uncle d.i.c.k?" asked Jesse, somewhat anxiously.

"Bad enough, you may depend."

"And don't we get any more fishing?"

Uncle d.i.c.k smiled. "Well, I'll tell you," said he; "we'll probably not have a great many chances for trout as good as we'll have to-morrow.

It's only two or three miles from here to Yellowhead Lake, and I think we'll find that almost as good a fishing-place as Rainbow Lake was the other day."

XII

THE WILDERNESS

"It's cold up here, just the same," said Jesse, when he rolled out of his blanket early on the following morning, "and the woods and mountains make it dark, too, on ahead there. Somehow the trees don't look just the same to me, Uncle d.i.c.k."

"They're not the same," said Uncle d.i.c.k, "and I am glad you are so observing. From here on the trees'll get bigger and bigger. They always are, on the Pacific side of the Rocky Mountains. The east side is far more dry and barren. When you get down into the Columbia valley or the Fraser country you'll see Douglas firs bigger than you ever thought a tree could grow."

"Yes, and devil's-club, too," said Rob. "I stepped on one just a little while ago, and it flew up and hit me on the knee."

Uncle d.i.c.k laughed. "You'll see devil's-club aplenty before you get done with this trip," said he. "In fact, I will say for all this upper country, it doesn't seem to have been laid out for comfort in traveling. The lower Rockies, in our country, say in Wyoming and Colorado, are the best outdoor countries in the world. It's a little wet and soft up here sometimes, although, fortunately, we've had rather good weather.

"From now on," he continued, "you'll see a change in the vegetation.

You can still see the fireweed--it seems a universal plant all the way from the Saskatchewan to the Peace River and west even to this prairie here. That and the Indian paint--that red flower which you all remember--is common over all the north country. Then there is a sort of black birch which grows far up to the north, and we have had our friends the willows and the poplars quite a while. Now we'll go downhill into the land of big trees and devil's-club."

"So that's the last of the Yellowhead Pa.s.s for this trip," said Rob, turning back, as within the hour after they had arisen they were in saddle once more for the west-bound trail.

"Yes," said Uncle d.i.c.k, "one of the most mysterious of all the pa.s.ses.

I often wonder myself just what time it was that old Jasper Hawse first came through here."

"Was it really named after him, and who was he?" inquired John.

"Some say he was an Iroquois Indian who had red hair--in which case he must have been part white, I should say. Others say he was a Swede. Yet others say that 'Tete Jaune,' or 'Yellowhead,' was an old Indian chief who had gray hair. Now, I've seen a few white-haired Indians--for instance, old White Calf, down in the Blackfoot reservation--and their hair seems rather yellow more than pure white when they are very old. At any rate, whoever the original Tete Jaune was, we are bound now for his old bivouac on the Fraser, fifty miles below, the Tete Jaune Cache.

"Every man who wants to do mountain exploring has heard of the Tete Jaune Cache on the Fraser River. It has been one of the most inaccessible places in the Rockies. But now it will be easy to get there in a year or so, and I am sure on this beautiful Yellowhead Lake just ahead of us somebody will put up a hotel one day or other, and they will make trails around in these mountains and kill all these goats and bear."

"How far is it down to the lake?" inquired Jesse, pushing up his riding-pony alongside the others.

"About half an hour," replied his uncle. "Not too good a trail, and about a hundred feet drop from the summit down."

Surely enough, they had gone but a little distance over the winding and difficult blazed route when they came out into an open spot whence they could see Yellowhead Lake lying before them. It was a lovely sheet of water about four miles long, with bold mountains rising on either side.

"Now, young men," said their leader, as they paused, "we'll not take the liberties with these mountains that some of the earlier travelers did. We'll call that big mountain on the south side of the lake Mount Fitzwilliam. On the north side is old Bingley, but I presume we'd just as well call it Yellowhead Mountain now. Some called it Mount Pelee, but we'll call it Yellowhead, because it seems too bad the pa.s.s and mountain should not have the same name from the same man--whoever he was. That's the guardian of the pa.s.s from this side, at any rate. It looks as though it shut up the pa.s.s, because, you see, it bends around the foot of the mountain. I've climbed that mountain in my time--none too easy a job. In that way you can see the headwaters of the Fraser River, and glaciers twenty miles south of here. From the top of Yellowhead you can see Mount Geikie, although we are past it now."

"When are we going to do our fishing?" inquired John, in his practical fashion.

"Well, I'll tell you," said his uncle; "if you'll be good and travel steadily, we'll make camp at the side of this lake and fish this afternoon."

"Agreed," said John; "go ahead."

They found it not so easy to go ahead as might have been supposed, for the trail pa.s.sed through some very rough and troublesome country, made the worse by burned timber which had blown down. At last, however, they made their way along the northwest sh.o.r.e and neared the narrows at the lower end of the lake. Here they found a low peninsula jutting out into the lake, where there was a little gra.s.s and good clean footing as well as the fine shade of some tall pines.

"Here we are," said the leader of the party; and soon they had off-saddled and the horses were grazing, while the others prepared for the bivouac.

"Now, if we had a boat," said Rob, "I believe we would get some trout in this lake, and good ones, too."

"They're here, all right," said Uncle d.i.c.k, "as I can testify, but boats don't grow in the Rocky Mountains this high up. You'll have to try it from the sh.o.r.e."

"But could we not make a raft? I see some pretty good cedar timber lying along here. And I've got some hay-wire in my war-bag--I never travel without it." Rob was eager.

"And a very good thing it is to have in camp, too. Well, try your raft if you like, but be careful."

All three of the young Alaskans, more experienced than most boys of their age in outdoor work, now fell at the task of making themselves a raft or float. Soon they had half a dozen cedar logs lying side by side in the shallow water, their limbs trimmed off closely with the axes. Under Rob's instructions they now lashed two crosspieces on top of the logs, using the wire to bind them fast to each. So in the course of half an hour they had quite a substantial raft ready for use. Securing a couple of long poles to use as push-poles, they set boldly out into the shallow bay that lay before them. They took only one rod along, a.s.signing to John the task of doing the angling while the others endeavored to keep the raft steady.

"This is as far as we can go," said Rob after a while. "Fifteen feet of water, and my pole won't touch any longer."

"Well, it looks fishy," said John. "Hold on, fellows, and I'll begin to cast."

He did so, standing as best he could on the uncertain footing under which the green water, clear as gla.s.s, showed the sandy bottom plainly below them. Ordinarily it would have been impossible to catch trout in water so clear, but the trout of the Yellowhead Lake at that time were hungry and unskilled. Therefore John had hardly cast a dozen times before he saw a great splash and felt a heavy tug at his line. As a matter of fact, a four-pound rainbow had taken the fly.

"My, he's a whopper!" said John, as he struck, and endeavored to stop the first rush of the big fish.

But he scarcely finished his last words, for as he stepped back in his excitement, his foot slipped on the wet bark of one of the logs, and over he went backward into the deep green water underneath!

It happened so quickly that neither Rob nor Jesse for the moment could understand it. They could see their companion clearly in the water, struggling and twisting as he went down, and surrounded on all sides by a ma.s.s of white bubbles, which almost obscured him from view.

"Look out, there!" cried Uncle d.i.c.k, from sh.o.r.e, who had seen it all perfectly. At the same time he cast off his coat and was tugging at his shoes, making ready to swim out.

But just at that time the head and face of John appeared above the surface, his face distorted with fright and discomfort. He struck out boldly for the raft just at the instant when Rob held out to him the end of the push-pole.

"Catch hold of this, John," said he, quietly.

An instant later the puffing swimmer was at the raft.