ward with impatience for some able geologist to explore this
sublime but almost unknown region.

It was not until the 25th of April that the two parties of trappers
broke up their encampments, and undertook to cross over the southwest
end of the mountain by a pass explored by their scouts. From various
points of the mountain they commanded boundless prospects of the lava
plain, stretching away in cold and gloomy barrenness as far as the eye
could reach. On the evening of the 26th they reached the plain west
of the mountain, watered by the Malade, the Boisee, and other streams,
which comprised the contemplated trapping-ground.

The country about the Boisee (or Woody) River is extolled by Captain
Bonneville as the most enchanting he had seen in the Far West,
presenting the mingled grandeur and beauty of mountain and plain, of
bright running streams and vast grassy meadows waving to the breeze.

We shall not follow the captain throughout his trapping campaign, which
lasted until the beginning of June, nor detail all the manoeuvres of the
rival trapping parties and their various schemes to outwit and out-trap
each other. Suffice it to say that, after having visited and camped
about various streams with varying success, Captain Bonneville set
forward early in June for the appointed rendezvous at the caches. On
the way, he treated his party to a grand buffalo hunt. The scouts had re
ported numerous herds in a plain beyond an intervening height. There was
an immediate halt; the fleetest horses were forthwith mounted and the
party advanced to the summit of the hill. Hence they beheld the great
plain below; absolutely swarming with buffalo. Captain Bonneville now
appointed the place where he would encamp; and toward which the hunters
were to drive the game. He cautioned the latter to advance slowly,
reserving the strength and speed of the horses until within a moderate
distance of the herds. Twenty-two horsemen descended cautiously into
the plain, conformably to these directions. "It was a beautiful sight,"
says the captain, "to see the runners, as they are called, advancing in
column, at a slow trot, until within two hundred and fifty yards of the
outskirts of the herd, then dashing on at full speed until lost in the
immense multitude of buffaloes scouring the plain in every direction."
All was now tumult and wild confusion. In the meantime Captain
Bonneville and the residue of the party moved on to the appointed
camping grou