CHAPTER XVIII. 



THROUGH AN EXTINCT HELL! 



ANOTHER HERD OF BUFFALOES AN UNUSUAL EXPERIENCE A GRAND 

 LEAP FOR LIFE PURSUING THE HERD BACK THROUGH THE BAD 

 LANDS BLACK-TAIL DEER STILL AFTER THE BUFFALOES DE- 

 FEATED MORE SPORT CLOSE QUARTERS THE BISON YIELDS 

 THE HUNT IS UP. 



WE awoke on Friday morning, September 24th, to find a 

 raw, cold, northwest wind blowing, accompanied by a rain 

 that seemed to wet us, even through our heavy rubber suits. 

 Truly a bad day for our business, but time was precious with 

 most of us, and we had journeyed too far to waste any of it 

 lying in camp waiting for fair weather, so we struck tents, 

 packed up, and pulled out for Beaver creek on our return to 

 Camp Mclntosh. 



At about five miles from Fennel station we again entered 

 the Cabin creek bad lands. As we halted on the margin of 

 the prairie overlooking this valley it seemed folly to attempt 

 to cross them with our teams. Here were abrupt hills, 

 gullies, buttes, rocky precipices, gulches, canyons, extinct 

 craters, great heaps of scoria and debris of various kinds, all 

 mixed and jumbled together in an indescribable and almost 

 indiscernible mass. How on earth could any human being 

 ever find a passage through this extinct hell (as General Sully 

 termed it) on foot ? And if such a feat seemed impossible 

 how were we to make the passage with our heavily-loaded 

 teams ? There was no trail, and no evidence that any man 

 or body of men had ever crossed through here, yet Major Bell 

 11 161 



