Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 1.djvu/413

Rh reached. There were the vastness and solitude of the prairies and plains, the transparency of the atmosphere that gave magnificent sweep of view. Along the North Fork of the Platte stood great sentinel rocks with interesting sculptured proportions. Among these are the Lone or Court House Rock, Chimney Rock, Castle Rock, Steamboat Rock, and Scott's Bluff. Farther along on their journey they come to Independence Rock and Devil's Gate on the Sweetwater, one a huge basaltic mound upon which with tar or with iron chisels they would register their names; the other a most unique breach in a granitic range with sides two hundred feet high, through which the Sweetwater flows. A week or two later they w^ould have the exhilarating sense of standing on the backbone of the continent in South Pass, with the towering Wind River Mountains to their right and the Oregon buttes to their left. A few miles on they would drink from the Pacific springs and know they were in what was then called Oregon. Scenery most unique was still before them on their way. Some of it, like the panorama from the divide between the Green and the Bear rivers and the Soda Springs, they would enjoy. But their march from the South Pass on was a retreat. Oxen would fall helpless in their yokes, wagons would become rickety beyond repair. The trail was strewn with wreckage, and the stench from the dead cattle was appalling. The watering places along the Snake were contaminated by the stock that had perished. As soon as they reached the Blue Mountains their stock was safe from starvation, but the exertion required of their way-worn and weak oxen on the steep grades now before them was the last straw often that these creatures now could not bear. They could not let them recruit; the season was as far advanced towards winter; they must press on.