SHERIFF'S WORK ON A RANCH 



123 



was especially after, I kept by my side in our boat, the other two being 

 put in their own scow, heavily laden and rather leaky, and with only one 

 paddle. We kept them just in front of us, a few yards distant, the river 

 being so broad that we knew, and they knew also, any attempt at escape 

 to be perfectly hopeless. 



For some miles we went swiftly down-stream, the cold being bitter 

 and the slushy anchor ice choking the space between the boats ; then the 

 current grew sluggish, eddies forming along the sides. We paddled on 

 until, coming into a long reach where the water was almost backed up, 

 we saw there was a stoppage at the other end. Working up to this, it 

 proved to be a small ice jam, through which we broke our way only to 

 find ourselves, after a few hundred yards, stopped by another. We had 

 hoped that the first was merely a jam of anchor ice, caused by the cold of 

 the last few days ; but the jam we had now come to was black and solid, 

 and, running the boats ashore, one of us went off down the bank to find 

 out what the matter was. On climbinof a hill that commanded a view of 

 the valley for several miles, the explanation became only too evident — as 

 far as we could see, the river was choked with black ice. The great 

 Ox-bow jam had stopped, and we had come down to its tail. 



We had nothing to do but to pitch camp, after which we held a con- 

 sultation. The Little Missouri has much too swift a current, — when it 

 has any current at all, — with too bad a bottom, for it to be possible to 

 take a boat up-stream ; and to walk meant, of course, abandoning almost 

 all we had. Moreover we knew that a thaw would very soon start the 

 jam, and so made up our minds that we had best simply stay where we 

 were, and work down-stream as fast as we could, trusting that the spell 

 of bitter weather would pass before our food gave out. 



The next eight days were as irksome and monotonous as any I ever 

 spent : there is very little amusement in combining the functions of a 

 sheriff with those of an arctic explorer. The weather kept as cold as 

 ever. During the night the water in the pail would freeze solid. Ice 

 formed all over the river, thickly along the banks ; and the clear, frosty 

 sun gave us so little warmth that the melting hardly began before noon. 

 Each day the great jam would settle down-stream a few miles, only to 

 wedge again, leaving behind it several smaller jams, through which we 

 would work our way until we were as close to the tail of the large one 

 as we dared to go. Once we came round a bend and got so near that 

 we were in a good deal of danger of being sucked under. The current 

 ran too fast to let us work back against it, and we could not pull the boat 

 up over the steep banks of rotten ice, which were breaking off and fall- 



