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Finding a little patch of flood-plain, on which there is a huge pile of driftwood and a clump of box-elders, and near by a mammoth stream bursting from the rocks, we soon have a huge fire. Our clothes are spread to dry; we make a cup of coffee, take out our bread and cheese and dried beef, and enjoy a hearty supper. We estimate that we have traveled eight miles to-day.
At their base lay narrow reaches of sand between which, even at its lowest, the river hurried; and when it was swelled by heavy rains or melting snow, it rushed through boisterously and spat high to right and left against the walls. The western side, with its southern exposure, was the greener. Box-elders belted its foot, growing at a sharp angle to the side.
Carl skipped slowly and unhappily to the group of box-elders beside the workshop and stuck his finger-nails into the cobwebby crevices of the black bark.
One, the new, marking the course of empire in its restless march westward; the other, that of the aboriginal, which, like a dissolving view, was soon to fade away and be forgotten. The box-elders and cottonwoods thinly covering the creek-bottom were gradually donning their autumn dress of russet, and the mirage had already commenced its fantastic play with the landscape.
Late in the afternoon we make a short run to the mouth of another little creek, coming down from the left into an alcove filled with luxuriant vegetation. Here camp is made, with a group of cedars on one side and a dense mass of box-elders and dead willows on the other. I go up to explore the alcove.
But I never saw a town that had such up-and-coming people as Gopher Prairie. Bresnahan you know the famous auto manufacturer he comes from Gopher Prairie. Born and brought up there! And it's a darn pretty town. Lots of fine maples and box-elders, and there's two of the dandiest lakes you ever saw, right near town! And we've got seven miles of cement walks already, and building more every day!
I think of a fringe of box-elders along Paxton Creek, decked in early spring with true maple flowers on thread-like stems, each cluster surmounted by soft green foliage apparently borrowed from the ash, and it seems that no other tree could fit better into the place or the season.
At night we return to our camp under the box-elders by the river side. Here we are to spend two or three days, making a series of astronomic observations for latitude and longitude. June 18. We have named the long peninsular rock on the other side Echo Rock. Desiring to climb it, Bradley and I take the little boat and pull up stream as far as possible, for it cannot be climbed directly opposite.
We camp to-night at the foot of the left fall, on a little patch of flood plain covered with a dense growth of box-elders, stopping early in order to spread the clothing and rations to dry. Everything is wet and spoiling. June 14. Howland and I climb the wall on the west side of the canyon to an altitude of 2,000 feet.
I made camp a few hundred yards from the road by a creek, along the banks of which grew many willows, and some little groves of box-elders and popples, which latter in this favorable locality grew eight or ten feet tall, and were already breaking out their soft greenish catkins and tender, quivering, pointed leaves: in one of these clumps I hid my wagon, and in the midst of it I kindled my camp-fire.
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