40 FROM FORT KEARNY TO FORT LARAMIE. 



the whole party wading alongside to incite and guide the mules, 

 lest, from some sudden eccentricity, to which those animals are so 

 constantly prone, a wagon might be capsized or precipitated into a 

 hole. The water was perfectly opake with thick yellow mud, and 

 it required all our care to avoid the quicksands with which the bot- 

 tom is covered. The labour was excessive, on both men and ani- 

 mals, as the river was nearly half a mile wide, and the current from 

 recent rains ran with great rapidity and force. Wading such a 

 stream breast-deep four or five times, with such treacherous foot- 

 ing, was very exhausting, and we were glad to encamp, immedi- 

 ately after crossing, upon the left bank. Both man and beast suf- 

 fered more from this day's exertion than from any day's march we 

 had yet made. About pne and a-half miles above the crossing a 

 new Indian lodge was seen standing entirely alone. A fact so 

 unusual excited our curiosity : upon going to the place, it was found 

 to contain the body of an Indian (probably a chief) raised upon a 

 low platform or bier, surrounded by all the implements believed 

 by these simple children of the forest to be necessary for his use 

 in the spirit-land. The lodge was carefully and securely fastened 

 down at the bottom, to protect its charge from the wolves. It was 

 an affecting spectacle. His last battle fought, his last hunt over, 

 here he lay in the solitude of death, abandoned by wife and child, 

 and all he loved, yet surrounded by the tokens of their parting 

 care, the rude proofs of a love that followed him to an unknown 

 hereafter. We are now, by our measurements, four hundred and 

 seventy-nine miles from Fort Leavenworth, and one hundred and 

 eighty from Fort Kearny. 



Tuesday^ July 3. — Morning cool and delightful; Ther. at sun- 

 rise, 71°; Bar. 26.59; Wind S. W., fresh and bracing. To-day 

 we crossed the ridge between the North and South Forks of the 

 Platte, a distance of eighteen and a-half miles. As we expected to 

 find no water for the whole of this distance, the India-rubber bags 

 were filled with a small supply. The road struck directly up the blufi", 

 rising quite rapidly at first, then very gradually for twelve miles, 

 when we reached the summit, and a most magnificent view saluted 

 the eye. Before and below us was the North Fork of the Nebraska, 

 winding its way through broken hills and green meadows ; behind 

 us the undulating prairie rising gently from the South Fork, over 

 which we had just passed ; on our right, the gradual convergence 

 of the two valleys was distinctly perceptible ; while immediately at 

 our feet were the heads of Ash Creek, which fell off suddenly intQ 



