100 
NARRATIVE AND ITINERARY-CASCADE MOUNTAINS. 
accuracy. At places about two railes from the mountain, both before reaching and after 
leaving it, the variation, as usual in this region, was about 18° east. At the top of the great 
precipice encountered about a mile before reaching the mountain, it was only 11° east, while 
on the summit it was 16° west. The needle was thus actually disturbed 34° by some abnormal 
cause. It, however, settled readily. The mountain was principally composed of slate and 
basalt, like those around it, and we could see no indication of iron or other local cause of 
disturbance in the vicinity. 
During the remainder of the day’s march, the trail followed a knife-like ridge between two 
great canons east and west of us, to avoid the fallen timber in them, and it was very mount¬ 
ainous in its character. After a steep descent we toiled up another peak, two miles distant from 
the first and very similar to it. From the summit we could look many miles down the 
great westerly ravine, and distinctly see the blue hills of the Willamette valley beyond its 
mouth. This peak was separated from the next one of the ridge by a canon connecting the 
two great ravines. This we crossed with difficulty, and continued to follow the narrow ridge, 
toiling up and down several more steep peaks risingfrom.it, until the sun was only a few 
minutes high. Some of our exhausted animals were far behind, and the Indian said that we 
were still a long way from the “ Stone House,” where he had expected to.encamp. Fie knew, 
however, a spring not far off, where we could get water, but no grass. W T e reached it on the 
steep eastern side of the ridge just as the sun set. Its bed was dry. We were all feverish 
from fatigue and thirst, and it was a bitter disappointment; still, to advance was impossible, 
and our animals were unpacked and tied to the trees as they gradually came in. Two had 
broken down entirely, and been abandoned on the way. In the meantime the Indian had 
disappeared. When he returned he quietly remarked that he had discovered water. We 
rushed to it, and found a little spring, which flowed almost drop by drop from under a rock in 
the thick bushes. There was enough for the men, but none for most of the suffering animals, 
and their cries from hunger and thirst were incessant through the night. 
October 11.—This morning we took a westerly course, which led us over the ridge that we 
had been following, into a third great ravine heading near us and winding out of sight to the 
northwest. The descent was about seven hundred feet, and very abrupt. In the ravine we 
found a fine stream of water and a small lake, bordered by some good grass, which, however, 
had been eaten so short by Indian horses that our animals could get none. This place Sam 
called the “ Stone House.” The origin of its name I could not discover, but probably there is 
a cave in the vicinity. It is a great Indian whortleberry camp, and we found the bushes still 
loaded with berries. The lake is doubtless the source of a branch of Sandy river. Disappointed 
in finding grass for the animals, we toiled up a steep precipice of compact slate, 1,000 feet in 
height, to the summit of the western side of the ravine, and obtained an extended view of the 
surrounding country. On every side nothing could be seen but fir-clad ridges and frightful 
canons ; most of our animals were on the point of giving out from fatigue and hunger ; and, 
to crown our misfortunes, Sam quietly informed me that he had only travelled between the 
“Stone House” and Willamette valley once, and that was when he was a child. He had a 
vague recollection of many mountains and a great scarcity of grass on the way. Under these 
happy auspices we pushed desperately on towards the west. After following a narrow ridge 
thinly covered with trees, until we had travelled a little more than six miles from camp, we 
fortunately found a small opening, in which the ground was wet from numerous springs and 
thinly dotted with grass. We had hardly encamped, when a rain storm that had been threat- 
