Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/365

 *lity of the reader will be taxed to the utmost limit if he follow my record of the catches of trout made in all these streams. What these catches would have amounted to had there been no herds of horses and mules—we had, it must be remembered, over two thousand when the wagon-trains, pack-trains, Indian scouts, and soldiers were all assembled together—I am unable to say; but the hundreds and thousands of fine fish taken from that set of creeks by officers and soldiers, who had nothing but the rudest appliances, speaks of the wonderful resources of the country in game at that time.

The ambition of the general run of officers and men was to take from fifteen to thirty trout, enough to furnish a good meal for themselves and their messmates; but others were carried away by the desire to make a record as against that of other fishers of repute. These catches were carefully distributed throughout camp, and the enlisted men fared as well as the officers in the matter of game and everything else which the country afforded. General Crook and the battalion commanders under him were determined that there should be no waste, and insisted upon the fish being eaten at once or dried for later use. Major Dewees is credited with sixty-eight large fish caught in one afternoon, Bubb with eighty, Crook with seventy, and so on. Some of the packers having brought in reports of beautiful deep pools farther up the mountain, in which lay hidden fish far greater in size and weight than those caught closer to camp, a party was formed at headquarters to investigate and report. Our principal object was to enjoy the cool swimming pools so eloquently described by our informants; but next to that we intended trying our luck in hauling in trout of exceptional size.

The rough little bridle-path led into most romantic scenery: the grim walls of the cañon began to crowd closely upon the banks of the stream; in places there was no bank at all, and the swirling, brawling current rushed along the rocky wall, while our ponies carefully picked their way over a trail, narrow, sharp, and dangerous as the knife-edge across which true believers were to enter into Mahomet's Paradise. Before long we gained a mossy glade, hidden in the granite ramparts of the cañon, where we found a few blades of grass for the animals and shade from the too warm rays of the sun. The moss-covered banks terminated in a flat stone table, reaching well out into the current and shaded by