224 CAMP FIRE REMINISCENCES 
after which it flows in a southwesterly direction 
until meeting the south fork, forming the Snake 
River, which eventually joins the Columbia and 
ends in the Pacific Ocean. 
One morning in August I found myself at the 
little town of Spencer on the Oregon Short Line 
Railway. Having secured a wagon with a pair 
of horses, we started at eleven on our drive to 
the river, some fifty miles to the east. We were 
soon out on a rolling sagebrush plain, intersected 
in places by old lava streams, and this was the 
character of a great deal of the country through 
which we passed. 
In the evening, we arrived at a small creek called 
Sheridan, and here we camped for the night. The 
valley in which we were had tolerably high moun- 
tains to the north, and low sage-covered hills on the 
other sides, while a certain amount of cultivation 
prevailed in it. In fact, wherever we saw a little 
creek, there we found the primitive home of some 
frontiersman. As we still had a couple of hours of 
daylight, we scattered ourselves over the country 
with guns, and proceeded to beat for sage hens. 
These birds were very numerous, so we had fair 
sport, but this huge grouse rises in such a clumsy 
way and flies so slowly and straight that it is very 
easy to kill on the wing. The young birds are 
splendid in August, before they begin to eat the 
sage, and we had a fine bag of them for the cook by 
dinner time. 7 
The heat of the afternoon was only surpassed by ~ 
the cold of the night, and not having nearly enough 
