ail, or
emerging from the "coolies"--dried sloughs--like wolves from the earth.
Enemies could be seen soon enough; but where could the trapper hide on
bare prairie? He didn't attempt to hide. He simply set fire to the
prairie and took refuge on the lee side. That device failing, he was at
his enemies' mercy.

On the plains, the greatest danger was from lack of water. At one season
the trapper might know where to find good camping streams. The next year
when he came to those streams they were dry.

"After leaving the buffalo meadows a dreadful scarcity of water
ensued," wrote Charles MacKenzie, of the famous MacKenzie clan. He
was journeying north from the Missouri. "We had to alter our course
and steer to a distant lake. When we got there we found the lake
dry. However, we dug a pit which produced a kind of stinking liquid
which we all drank. It was salt and bitter, caused an inflammation
of the mouth, left a disagreeable roughness of the throat, and
seemed to increase our thirst.... We passed the night under great
uneasiness. Next day we continued our journey, but not a drop of
water was to be found, ... and our distress became
insupportable.... All at once our horses became so unruly that we
could not manage them. We observed that they showed an inclination
towards a hill which was close by. It struck me that they might
have scented water.... I ascended to the top, where, to my great
joy, I discovered a small pool.... My horse plunged in before I
could prevent him, ... and all the horses drank to excess."

"_The plains across_"--which was a western expression meaning the end of
that part of the trip--there rose on the west rolling foothills and dark
peaked profiles against the sky scarcely to be distinguished from gray
cloud banks. These were the mountains; and the real hazards of free
trapping began. No use to follow the easiest passes to the most
frequented valleys. The fur company brigades marched through these,
sweeping up game like a forest fire; so the free trappers sought out the
hidden, inaccessible valleys, going where neither pack horse nor _canot
a bec d'esturgeon_ could follow. How did they do it? Very much the way
Simon Fraser's hunters crawled down the river-course named after him.
"Our shoes," said one trapper, "did not last a single day."

"We had to plunge our daggers into the ground, ... otherwise we
would s