Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 11.djvu/194

180 dueling type, and looking at the father, who was intently watching me, I fired into the air, bowing to him and then to my comrades, who cheered. The Indians looked at me closely, the father quietly smiled, and we hurriedly waved good-bye and breasted the steep trail. My folly, and it certainly was folly, was soon paid for. Two of the Indians dashed up behind me and motioned me to stop, not stopping themselves until they were abreast me. Then one began to sign that he wanted to give me a better horse to cross the mountains on. He showed me that he knew by a mark I had not observed, that my horse was old and would die in crossing the mountains, and that he would give me a younger, stronger horse for the old one and the pistol to boot; he got his trade and I got the poorer horse by the full worth of the boot.

We camped about half way across the Blue Mountains, where the Grand Ronde forms a narrow but beautiful valley; there we found a party of our train who had left us at the Missouri River, and an Indian family whom I have learned to have been that of Esticus, Dr. Whitman's friend, who had piloted the trains of 1843 through that way. As the noises of evening ceased, the hymn with which they closed the day seemed to me the sweetest vocal music I had ever heard. Of course I understood that much of its charm and mellowness came from the mountains surrounding. The singing of that hymn had much the same effect on the emigrant camp as it had on me, apparently, for there was little noise there afterward. In the morning the captain showed that he had not forgotten the harmony of sweet sounds, and himself tried a yodel to waken his sleeping camp; as that ceased the morning hymn of the Indian family arose. It was different, probably from the cooler, less expansive air of the morning. Chief Esticus showed that he was there for a purpose, for he led the way, marking the trail very plainly with the band of horses he had. We on horseback passed him and found no difficulty in following the wagon marks of 1843 to the west edge of the timber of the Blue Mountains where at last we gazed