II 



THE RAVEN OF THE DESCHUTES 



s our train clung to its narrow foot- 

 ing and crept slowly up the wild 

 canon of the Deschutes, I followed 

 from the rear platform the windings 

 of the milk-white river through its 

 carved course. We had climbed along some sixty 

 ^niles to where the folding walls were sheerest and 

 the towering treeless buttes rolled, fold upon fold, 

 behind us on the sky, when, off from one of the 

 rim-rock ledges, far above, flapped a mere blot 

 of a bird, black, and strong of wing, flying out 

 into midair between the cliffs to watch us, and 

 sailing back upon the ledge as we crawled round 

 a jutting point in the wall and passed from his 

 bight of the deep wild gorge. 



Except for some small birds in the willows of 

 the river, this was the first glimpse of life that I 

 had seen since entering the canon. And I knew, 

 though this was my first far-off sight of the bird, 

 that I was watching a raven. Beside him on the 



