[Frontispiece: AT THAT INSTANT THE BEAR CAME TO LIFE.]
A MOUNTAIN BOYHOOD
_by_ JOE MILLS
Author of "The Comeback"
Illustrated by
ENOS B. COMSTOCK
J. H. SEARS & COMPANY, Inc.
PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK
COPYRIGHT, 1926, BY
J. H. SEARS & CO., INCORPORATED
COPYRIGHT, 1926, BY
THE BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA (INC.)
MANUFACTURED COMPLETE BY THE KINGSPORT PRESS KINGSPORT, TENNESSEE
_United States of America_
TO THE ONE WHO MADE THIS BOYHOOD POSSIBLE MY WIFE
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. GOING WEST II. GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH WILD COUNTRY AND ANIMALS III. FIRST CAMP ALONE--EXPLORING IV. DANCING ACROSS THE DIVIDE V. TRAPPING--MOUNTAIN-TOP DWELLERS VI. A LOG CABIN IN THE WILDS--PRIMITIVE LIVING VII. GLACIERS AND FOREST FIRES VIII. THE PROVERBIAL BUSY BEAVER IX. MOUNTAIN CLIMBING X. MODERN PATHFINDERS XI. OFF THE TRAIL XII. DREAMERS OF GOLDEN DREAMS XIII. THE CITY OF SILENCE XIV. BEARS AND BUGBEARS XV. ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
At that instant the bear came to life . . . . _Frontispiece_
I plunged downward, struggling frantically
I sat down by the fiddler and dozed
I glimpsed his flaming eyes and wide-open, fang-filled mouth
Sheep and rock dropped straight toward me
Never before had the ring of an ax echoed in Silent Valley
"See all fools ain't dead yit," he observed
The memory of that race for life is still vividly terrifying
Every fall I watched Mr. and Mrs. Peg at their repairs
They turned tail and came racing back, straight toward me
Out of the dust of years, we dug the history of a buried past
Table of contents (by pages)
- 1: A Mountain Boyhood by Joe Mills
- 2: For the frontier teemed with game
- 3: Leaving the brass kettle behind him
- 4: There was a wild race through the aspens
- 5: At nine thousand feet altitude
- 6: While still more could be seen up above naked timberline
- 7: So far as wariness was concerned
- 8: Occasionally I heard a queer squee ek
- 9: Giving a defiant squee ek as he went
- 10: But there was a strange bird above timberline
- 11: My reappearance reassured the marmot
- 12: The marmot gave a second whistle
- 13: I also recognized coyote tracks
- 14: This first camp was just below timberline
- 15: Its crest was above timberline
- 16: Again they bulged and overflowed like streams at high water
- 17: Crashed through the tangle at timberline
- 18: Leveling their tops to timberline
- 19: The interest of the grouse increased
- 20: Hold my given altitude above timberline
- 21: Lord Dunraven tried to scare them off
- 22: From timberline I surveyed the prospect ahead and hesitated
- 23: Flattop mountain is shaped like a loaf of bread
- 24: For the old fiddler had marvelous powers of endurance
- 25: Ole Buffler Bill Buffler Bill
- 26: When Carson first beheld their mountain fastness
- 27: Caught on the snags or bowlders
- 28: Once the coyote reached that slide
- 29: Greeted me with an enthusiastic squee ek
- 30: Every one of his band possessed miraculous eyesight
- 31: Elk and even wary sheep were their victims
- 32: A section passing on either side of the bowlder
- 33: They had knocked down the dummy
- 34: Holding the camera at arm's length
- 35: Overlooking the ruins of Kit Carson's own cabin
- 36: Using the floor before the hearth instead
- 37: Timberline always interested me and those vast
- 38: It keeps Bunny Cottontail moving to outwit his many enemies
- 39: Above timberline were the ptarmigan
- 40: And the needles and the deadwood
- 41: Illustration See all fools ain't dead yit
- 42: Why were some snowdrifts perennial
- 43: Its surface was split by numberless yawning crevasses
- 44: I discovered the crevasse was blocked with ice
- 45: Flaming lanes that smoldered at the edges
- 46: Two beavers splashed downstream
- 47: Thus making it difficult to locate their runways
- 48: And came to have a real neighborly affection for them
- 49: All the near by aspens had been cut
- 50: Other beavers worked in the aspen grove
- 51: Feeling sympathy for the beavers
- 52: The rancher accepted his proposal
- 53: But especially hazardous when the climber is weary and
- 54: Deep canyons and abrupt precipices
- 55: Sought a foothold in the cramped rock chute
- 56: I dived headlong behind a bowlder
- 57: Creeping up treacherous glacier ice
- 58: No climber may expect to survive many such reckless steps
- 59: Welton lost her life upon the Peak in 1884
- 60: Explorers and mountain climbers
- 61: We were to spend the day above timberline
- 62: Who wished to make a night climb up Long's Peak
- 63: Though Lanky and I paddled around and across
- 64: Lanky turned a superior deaf ear
- 65: They admired to have flapjacks
- 66: Of a sudden out walked Ole Curiosity
- 67: Was climbing toward Chasm Lake
- 68: For ten minutes that coyote howled
- 69: Tack and loop around unscalable cliffs
- 70: Pluckily Miss Broughm worked her way down
- 71: We dropped back down below Keyhole and
- 72: Coyotes yip yipped their salutations to the sailing moon
- 73: I stepped from behind the stump
- 74: There they had cached some left over supplies
- 75: Nearly every prospector has a little pack burro
- 76: Of two old prospectors who were always quarreling
- 77: Wiry little old man leading a burro
- 78: Shorty was heading for Central City
- 79: Grass grown road that ran along the bottom of the gulch
- 80: I made out the outline of a burro
- 81: Were filed copies of mining claims
- 82: There are many such in the mountains of Colorado
- 83: The burro plodding patiently behind
- 84: I broiled several trout for my supper
- 85: And the creaky slab door banged shut
- 86: Still watching warily for the bear
- 87: And ever since Lewis and Clark saw the first one
- 88: The grizzly displayed extreme caution
- 89: He hibernated about one third of the year
- 90: He sometimes turns cattle killer
- 91: The grizzly struck out right and left
- 92: When we visited the gulch again
- 93: A mother grizzly had stepped into my trap
- 94: At the Denver City Zoo we were welcomed by the keeper
- 95: But Johnny found the open cage door
- 96: In administering the National Parks