STUCK IN THE CANYON 51 



a long canyon, expecting to reach a deserted house where 

 quarrymen sometimes stopped. Coming up the canyon 

 with four horses on, for the going was bad enough, the 

 wagon suddenly dropped down to the axles in a hole. No 

 amount of pulling, or digging and blocking up of wheels, 

 sufficed to get us out, as the horses were up to their bellies 

 as well. So we had to unhitch them and unload everything 

 in the wagon. Then by hitching the horses to a long 

 rope and prying up the wheels with levers we got the 

 wagon out and upon a drier spot some 300 yards ahead, 

 and we started in to bring up all our stuff by hand, some 

 of which was pretty heavy. It was nine o'clock before 

 the tent was pitched and all the stuff under cover, either 

 in the tent or the wagon, and we turned to getting supper. 

 Before that was over it had begun to rain again. 



On getting out next morning to see where we were, we 

 found ourselves between the 200- to 300-foot walls of a 

 narrow canyon in an ancient lava flow, with a deep slough 

 behind and another in front, and the rain descending 

 steadily. 



Half a mile ahead we came upon an old quarry where the 

 trap rock was fissured in parallel seams, and at some time 

 a large quantity had been worked out in thick flags, which, 

 however, had never been taken from the canyon, but still 

 stood in large piles. Against the face of the opposite 

 cliff was built an old stone house, perhaps sixty feet long, 

 by ten feet wide and seven feet high. This was divided 

 into a series of rooms each lined with bunks. In places 

 all through the canyon the road had been extensively 

 worked, the creek being crossed with stone bridges, and 

 where it had climbed upon the slopes, the lower side was 

 walled up to some height. We had heard of an old road 

 formerly considerably traveled by freighters before the 

 steamers plied along the coast, and now we had come upon 

 one of the ancient stations, which must formerly have been 

 of great importance, judging from the work done about 



