ver.

"That's only part. In the shallow water a canoe swept down out of
control. It ran over Whitehouse, another man, on a bar, and nearly broke
his leg; it would have killed him sure if the water had been three
inches shallower. That would have been another man lost.

"Not all yet. A canoe got upset in the shallow water up there on
the Wisdom, and wet everything in it. Result, they lost so much
cargo--foodstuffs, etc.--that they just abandoned that canoe right there
and lost her cargo, after carrying it three thousand miles, for over a
year! All to be charged to the same beaver. Well, you and I have spoken
before about the extreme danger of a land party and a boat party trying
to travel together.

"The next time Lewis left a note, he used a dry stick, and he felt
mortified at not having thought to do that in the first place. Well,
that's my beaver story. It shows how a little thing may have big
consequences--just as this arrowhead that Jesse found points out a long
trail."

"And by that time," said John, bending again over his map, "they were
needing every pound of food and every minute of their time and every bit
of every man's strength. The poor fellows were almost worn out. Now they
began to complain for the first time. We don't hear any more now about
dances at night around the camp fire."

"Yes," said Uncle Dick. "Now they all were having their proving. It
would have been easy for them to turn back; most men would have done so.
But they never thought of that. All the men wanted was to get away from
the boats and get on horseback."

"But they didn't yet know where to go!"

"No, not yet. And now comes the most agonizing and most dramatic time in
the whole trip, when it needed the last ounce and the last inch of
nerve. Read us what Lewis said in his _Journal_, Rob. He was on ahead,
and every man now was hustling, because there were the mountains 'right
at them,' as they say down South."

Rob complied, turning the pages of their precious book until he reached
the last march of Lewis beyond the last forks of the river:

"'Near this place we fell in with a large and plain Indian road
which came into the cove from the N.E. and led along the foot of
the mountains to the S.W. o(b)liquely approaching the main stream
which we had left yesterday. this road we now pursued to the S.W.
at 5 miles it passed a stout stream which is a principal fork of
the ma(i)n stream and falls into it just abov