their load was heavy. So now they hid their biggest boat in the
willows on an island, at the mouth of the Marias, and dug a _cache_ for
a great deal of their outfit--axes, ammunition, casks of provisions, and
much superfluous stuff. They dug this bottle shaped, as the old fur
traders did, lined it with boughs and grass and hides, filled it in and
put back the cap sod--all the dirt had been piled on skins, so as not to
show. Stores would keep for years when buried carefully in this way.

"So now, lighter of load, but still game--with Cruzatte playing the
fiddle for the men to dance of evenings--on June 12th they 'set out and
proceeded on,' leaving this great and historical fork of the water road
on the morning of June 12th, with Sacagawea so very sick that the
captains took tender care of her all the trip, though they speak
slightingly of Chaboneau, her husband, who seems to have been a bit of a
mutt. One of the men has a felon on his hand; another with toothache has
taken cold in his jaw; another has a tumor and another a fever. Three
canoes came near being lost; and it rained. But they 'proceeded on,' and
on that day they first saw the Rockies, full and fair! And three days
later Lewis found the Great Falls, hearing the noise miles away, and
seeing the great cloud of mist arising above the main fall.

"And then they found the eagle's nest on the cottonwood island, of which
the Minnetarees had told them. And then Sacagawea got well, and gave the
O.K. after her delirium had gone! And then every man, woman, and child
in that party agreed that their leaders were safe to follow!

"It took them one month to get over that eighteen miles portage. That
made five weeks they had lost here out of direct travel. But they never
did lose courage, never did reason wrong, and never did go back one
foot. Leadership, my boys! And both those captains, Lewis especially,
had a dozen close calls for death, with bears, floods, rattlesnakes,
gun-shot, and accidents of all kinds. Their poor men also were in bad
case many a time, but they held through. No more floggings now, this
side of Mandan--maybe both men and captains had learned something about
discipline."

Their leader ceased for the time, and turned, hat in hand, to the ruined
quadrangle of adobe, the remnants of old Fort Benton. The boys also for
a moment remained silent. Jesse approached and touched the sleeve of his
Uncle Dick.

"I wouldn't have missed this for anything," said h