RUSTLINGS IN THE ROCKIES. 2*7 



there on that lonely trail, my old friend L. A. Huffman, the 

 Miles City photographer, who accompanied me to the Big 

 Horn country last year and to whom I am indebted for most 

 of the views with which this volume is embellished. He was 

 just returning from the National Park, where he had been 

 making stereoscopic views of the natural wonders of that great 

 wonderland. We halted for dinner and plied him with the 

 most earnest solicitations to turn back with us, to which he 

 finally yielded. 



Talk about the strange coincidences of life, but here is 

 certainly one of the strangest. That we should botfr have 

 happened to choose that same trail across a stretch of 

 country hundred of miles in extent, where there were plenty 

 of other game trails as plain and good as the one we were 

 on that, without any previous arrangement or knowledge 

 of each other's whereabouts, he should have started from 

 away off in the National Park and we from the Northern 

 Pacific railroad and should both have timed our movements 

 just so as to meet here (for he was going to leave this trail that 

 evening and strike east to Pryor's Gap), was certainly one of 

 the strangest freaks of fortune on record. He and his com- 

 panion were almost the first white men we had seen since 

 leaving the Yellowstone, and we were the first they had seen 

 since leaving the Park. To say that we were all delighted is 

 to draw it mildly, for we felt that Huffman was a man that, 

 now we had found him, we could not possibly do without on 

 this trip. The two Crows came up at this time with their fish, 

 and we were also joined by an old medicine-man of the tribe. 

 Altogether, we made quite a formidable if not respectable 

 looking picnic party. 



After dinner Huffman's companion took two of his horses 

 and pursued his way toward the railroad, while Huffman took 

 the other four and turned back with us. 



