LIFE IN THE FAR WEST. 121 



CHAPTEE VI. 



THE trail to Oregon, followed by traders and emigrants, 

 crosses the Rocky Mountains at a point known as the South 

 Pass, where a break in the chain occurs of such moderate 

 and gradual elevation as to permit the passage of waggons 

 with tolerable facility. The Sweet Water Valley runs 

 nearly to the point where the dividing ridge of the Pacific 

 and Atlantic waters throws off its streams to their respec- 

 tive oceans. At one end of this valley, and situated on 

 the right bank of the Sweet "Water, a huge isolated mass 

 of granitic rock rises to the height of three hundred feet 

 abruptly from the plain. On the smooth and scarped 

 surface presented by one of its sides, are rudely carved the 

 names and initials of traders, trappers, travellers, and 

 emigrants, who have here recorded the memorial of their 

 sojourn in the remote wilderness of the Far West. The 

 face of the rock is covered with names familiar to the 

 mountaineers as those of the most renowned of their hardy 

 brotherhood; while others, again, occur, better known to 

 the science and literature of the Old World than to the 

 unlearned trappers of the Rocky Mountains. The huge 

 mass is a well-known landmark to the Indians and moun- 

 taineers ; and travellers and emigrants hail it as the half- 

 way beacon between the frontiers of the United States and 

 the still distant goal of their long and perilous journey. 



It was a hot sultry day in July. Not a breath of air 

 relieved the intense and oppressive heat of the atmosphere, 

 unusual here, where pleasant summer breezes, and some- 

 times stronger gales, blow over the elevated plains with the 

 regularity of trade- winds. The sun, at its meridian height, 

 struck the dry sandy plain, and parched the drooping 

 buffalo-grass on its surface ; and its rays, refracted and 

 reverberating from the heated ground, distorted every ob- 

 ject seen through its lurid medium. Straggling antelope, 

 leisurely crossing the adjoining prairie, appeared to be 

 gracefully moving in mid-air ; whilst a scattered band of 



