a deep stream will not always have the time to stop or the means to
make any of the boats that have been described. Should their luggage be
such as to become seriously injured by a wetting, and there be an
India-rubber or gutta-percha cloth disposable, or if even a green beef
or buffalo hide can be procured, it may be spread out upon the ground,
and the articles of baggage placed in the centre, in a square or
rectangular form; the ends and sides are then brought up so as entirely
to envelop the package, and the whole secured with ropes or raw hide.
It is then placed in the water with a rope attached to one end, and
towed across by men in the same manner as the boats before described.
If hides be used they will require greasing occasionally, to prevent
their becoming water-soaked.

[Illustration: CROSSING A STREAM.]

When a mounted party with pack animals arrive upon the borders of a
rapid stream, too deep to ford, and where the banks are high and
abrupt, with perhaps but one place where the beasts can get out upon
the opposite shore, it would not be safe to drive or ride them in,
calculating that all will make the desired landing. Some of them will
probably be carried by the swift current too far down the stream, and
thereby endanger not only their own lives, but the lives of their
riders. I have seen the experiment tried repeatedly, and have known
several animals to be carried by the current below the point of egress,
and thus drowned. Here is a simple, safe, and expeditious method of
taking animals over such a stream. Suppose, for example, a party of
mounted men arrive upon the bank of the stream. There will always be
some good swimmers in the party, and probably others who can not swim
at all. Three or four of the most expert of these are selected, and
sent across with one end of a rope made of lariats tied together, while
the other end is retained upon the first bank, and made fast to the
neck of a gentle and good swimming horse; after which another gentle
horse is brought up and made fast by a lariat around his neck to the
tail of the first, and so on until all the horses are thus tied
together. The men who can not swim are then mounted upon the best
swimming horses and tied on, otherwise they are liable to become
frightened, lose their balance, and be carried away in a rapid current;
or a horse may stumble and throw his rider. After the horses have been
strung out in a single line by their riders, and every thin