NARRATIVE OF 1853. 177 
Gaining a high point of the river, it was seen that for thirty miles above the Gate of the 
Mountains, from the point where the Missouri breaks through the belt range between the two 
Prickly Pear creeks, the country is one immense bed of mountains, extending southward 
along the Missouri to its three forks for one hundred and fifty miles, and fifteen miles wide, 
making it necessary to range for a road to turn westward and northward of this range or bed. 
These mountains are mostly well wooded, with an abundant and large growth of pine, and the 
rock formation is principally granite. In the preceding November Mr. Tinkham had very cold 
and snowy weather during his journey up this part of the river, but it did not continue, nor 
interfere with his crossing of the mountains. After the middle of March Lieutenant Mullan 
found no snow on any part of his route, and had beautiful weather on his return trip from Fort 
Benton. Even at this early day of the spring the grass in the bottoms was putting forth; and 
returning with the same animals that he had taken from Cantonment Stevens, they were fat 
and strong, subsisting only upon the grass found at each night’s camp. Wood, water, and 
grass throughout the whole distance, from Fort Benton to the foot of the divide, was found at 
suitable and convenient points, a measured line of 150 miles. 
From the small Prickly Pear creek to the divide the country was an easily rolling prairie, 
with occasional strips of timber on either side. On the seventh night from Fort Benton, 
including the time occupied in the making of the road, he encamped at the foot of the mountains. 
On the morning of the eighth day he crossed the mountains with no difficulty whatever, found 
no snow upon their summits, and the divide itself nothing more than a low prairie hill. He 
says: ‘‘Indeed, the ascent and descent were so exceedingly gradual that not only was it not 
necessary to lock the wheels of the wagon in descending, but it was driven with the animals 
trotting.’ 
For a railroad line it would involve a cut of one hundred feet deep and half a mile long, 
which was the measured distance from base to base. He hardly imagined that he was on the 
waters of the Columbia until he recognized the distinctive and marked features of the valley 
of the Little Blackfoot. Leaving the divide, he followed down the broad and easy valleys of 
the Little Blackfoot and Hell-Gate to the junction of the latter with the Bitter Root, finding no 
difficulty along the whole line. All the streams being easily forded at this season, and the 
forest being open, with little or no undergrowth, required but little work. For a good and 
permanent road, to be travelled at all seasons, the bridging of the Little Blackfoot and Hell- 
Gate would be required at all the present crossings. 
In fourteen days from Fort Benton he reached Cantonment Stevens with his wagon—thus 
proving its complete practicability; and having measured the distance by an odometer, found 
his line only forty miles longer than that followed by Donelson, through Cadotte’s Pass. 
In view of the easy grade, the small amount of work required to first put it in good condi- 
tion for an emigrant line, and to maintain it in that condition, the abundance of grass, wood, 
and water. and its direct connexion with practicable lines to the east and west, he regards it 
as the best route he examined in the mountain region. 
Mr. Doty, in charge of a detached reconnoitring party, retracing ашый Mullan’s steps in 
July following, remarks of the same pass: ‘‘The divide is mainly a high and R prairie, the 
ascent and descent so gradual as to afford a first rate wagon road.” 
Lieutenant Mullan’s barometer having become broken, he was unable to run a profile or give 
its exact elevation above the sea, but deems an instrumental survey over this pass to be of the 
23 s 
