[COYNE] EICHARD MAURICE BUCKE— A SKETCH 163 



At Columbus he was a gardener; near Cincinnati he worked first 

 on a railroad, and then as a farm hand. In the winter of 1854-5 we 

 find him making staves in the cypress swamps of Louisiana. Then 

 for another twelve-month he served as fireman or deck-hand on steam- 

 boats plying on the Mississippi and Ohio rivers. But his longing to 

 know tlie world and men was by no means satisfied. He was now 

 just entering on his twentieth year, in the full vigour of early manhood, 

 ready as ever for anything that promised novelty or adventure. For- 

 tune took him at his word. 



Ascending the ]\Iissouri river to Fort Leavenworth, he determined 

 to cross the plains and mountains to the Pacific. To carry out his 

 purpose he hired with the conductor or manager of a train of twenty- 

 six loaded freight waggons, consigned to a mercantile house in Salt 

 Lake City. Each waggon was drawn by six yokei of oxen, and carried 

 from three to four tons. It was a wearisome, difficult and perilous 

 trail: for in 1,200 miles there were no white inhabitants, except at 

 Fort Carney and Fort Laramie, the roads were bad, the loads heavy, 

 and oxen at best are rather sure than swift as draught animals. The 

 journey occupied five months ; nowadays it would require less than 

 two days. The party found Indian camps near the forts; the Pawnee 

 nation at Fort Carney, and a large party of Sioux at Fort Laramie. 

 They passed through immense herds of buffalo on the Platte, as Park- 

 man had done a few years before. They crossed the Eockies by the 

 South Pass and Green river; the Wahsatch Eange by Echo Canon. 



From the summit of the "Wahsatch he saw spread before him the 

 rich, spacious and beautiful country of the Mormons, with the Great 

 Salt Lake in the blue distance beyond. The splendid picture never 

 faded from his memory. 



The wondrous scenery of the Eockies was a revelation, which the 

 impressionable youth absorbed into his soul. In his later years he 

 recorded with enthusiasm the effect produced iipon him by its grandeur 

 and its beauty. 



7. 



At Salt Lake the party received their five months' pay; but none 

 thought of turning back. Westward still their gaze was fixed, and 

 with eagerness they pressed toward the setting sun. 



Four hundred and fifty miles farther on was Sam Black's trading 

 post, a solitary house, with its sheds and outbuildings on the sink of 

 the Humboldt, and there was no white settler between. On the other 

 hand, the Indians were hostile and in a position to choose their own 

 fighting ground. 



