NARRATIVE OF 1853. 111 
tenant Grover and his party of nine men, on their way to St. Mary's village, bringing the 
intelligence of my safe arrival at Fort Benton. He felt rejoiced that the plan of our operations 
had been successful and the object of the expedition accomplished; asa party from the Atlantic 
and one from the Pacifio— each in search of the other—had met by appointment, after 
traversing thousands of miles of unknown country, at the foot of the dividing ridge between 
the oceans. 
Returning together, they reached Fort Benton on the 12th. We were all greatly rejoiced 
at the arrival of Lieutenant Saxton with information of the country between us and the waters 
of the Columbia. 
MR. TINKHAM’S TRIP. 
Mr. Tinkham reached camp about eight o'clock this evening, accompanied by one of his men, 
leaving his party to come in in the morning. Тһе following are the incidents of his trip: 
. Going up the valley of Milk river on the third and fourth of September, for fifty miles above 
the Bears Paw mountain, Mr. Tinkham found it bordered by the same kind of bluffs as 
further down; steep, irregular broken slopes of clay and sand, destitute of all vegetation, with 
sandstone out-cropping in layers or blocks; the cottonwood growth, growing gradually thinner, 
ceased altogether in the distance of twenty miles, and for thirty miles further perhaps not a 
single tree is to be found on the river banks. The bed of the river, more dry than lower 
down, is five or six hundred feet wide, and but a few feet in depth. Water is rarely found, 
and then only in some hole sheltered by the overhanging bank. All these things, with the 
almost total absence of animal life, the whistling, drifting sand of the dry river bed, gave to 
this portion of Milk river valley. in the chilliness of autumn, the character of desolation and 
dreariness. No point was found so favorable for leaving it as the one at which the main train 
turned southward by the valley of Elder creek. At Mr. Tinkham’s last camp on the river, 
its character was a little improved by the reappearance of cottonwood trees, luxuriant grass, 
and sufficient water in holes. He also noticed detached fragments of lignite in some abundance, 
which may become of value for fuel. 
About twenty-five miles further up Mr. Stanley crossed this river September 12, and 
found it there studded with cottonwood groves and undergrowth, and twelve miles further 
north he crossed a branch of it, then dry, which was said to be the outlet of Lake Pakokee, or 
Bad Water, which was eighteen miles long and five broad. Another dry river sa "е 
lined by scattering cottonwood, elm, wild cherry, and hawthorn. Passing from Milk river 
valley across the south prairie for twenty-eight miles southwest, on the evening of the 5th he 
reached the first of the Three Buttes, and the next morning ascended the two highest and 
most easterly, which occupied him until afternoon, making the latter part of it on foot. By the 
barometer, their height was found to be about 3, 300 feet, or about 6,700 feet above the sea, em 
as he left their summits at sunset the thermometer had fallen to 37°, and was still falling. 
These peaks, standing completely isolated, have long served as watch-towers and — to 
the roving tribes that range over the country for а thousand miles around. Assiniboines, Crows, 
and Blackfeet, have marked their summits with monumental heaps of stone, and retained their 
lodges, in which war parties have awaited the favorable moment to кене down upon the 
unguarded wanderer in the plains below. They are about half covered with a small es € : 
pitch pine and spruce, from eight inches to two feet in diameter; the other half consists о 
grassed slopes, sometimes even extending to the higher peaks, which are covered with a thrifty 
