LIFE IN THE FAR WEST. 89 



atives of many a land met there. A son of La belle France here 

 Ht his pipe from one proffered by a native of New Mexico. An 

 EngUshman and a Sandwich Islander cut a quid from the same 

 plug of tobacco. A Swede and an " old Virginian" puffed to- 

 gether. A Shawnee blew a peaceful cloud with a scion of the 

 ** Six Nations." One from the Land of Cakes — a canny chiel — 

 sought to " get round" (in trade) a right " smart" Yankee, but 

 couldn't " shine." 



The beaver went briskly, six dollars being the price paid per lb. 

 in goods — for money is seldom given in the mountain market, 

 where " beaver" is cash, for which the articles supplied by the 

 traders are bartered. In a very short time peltries of every de- 

 scription had changed hands, either by trade, or by gambling with 

 cards and betting. With the mountain men bets decide every 

 question that is raised, even the most trivial ; and if the Editor 

 of BelVs Life were to pay one of these rendezvous a winter visit, 

 he would find the broad sheet of his paper hardly capacious enough 

 to answer all the questions which would be referred to his decision. 



Before the winter was over, La Bonte had lost all traces of 

 civilized humanity, and might justly claim to be considered as 

 " hard a case" as any of the mountaineers then present. Long 

 before the spring opened, he had lost all the produce of his hunt 

 and both his animals, which, however, by a stroke of luck, he re- 

 covered, and wisely " held on to" for the future. Right glad when 

 spring appeared, he started from Brown's Hole, with four compan- 

 ions, to hunt the Uintah or Snake country, and the affluents of 

 the larger streams which rise in that region and fall into the Gulf 

 of California. 



In the valley of the Bear River they found beaver abundant, 

 and trapped their way westward until they came upon the famed 

 locality of the Beer and Soda Springs — natural fountains of mine- 

 ral water, renowned among the trappers as being " medicine" of 

 the first order. 



