Cameron County press. [volume] (Emporium, Cameron County, Pa.) 1866-1922, 1902-01-16
CHAPTER VI.-CoNTINUED.

CHAPTER ' \l.-JONTINUED.
Here was the battlefield upon
which Macpherson had elected to
fight for his kingdom. 1t was we'll
chosen. Unlike the SiX-Mile, whose
walls were perpendicular cliffs, the
upper canyon was a tortuous gulch
with precipitous slopes rising sharp
Iy from the waters edge. Below the
settlers dam the wedge-lille rift
widened and narrowed again, leav-
ing a natural basin between noun
tain and "hog-bacll" which would
serve admirably as a reservoir for
the great irrigation ditch. In this
basin the stream had deposited a bar
of silt and glistening mica-schist and
white quartz pebbles, the agc-old
washings of it's swift rush down the
canyon; and this was doubtless the
placer-ground upon which Macpher-
son had filed a claim as discovcrcr.
His outline of the status quo be-
came clearly Ineligible. A dam at
the final narrowing of the gulch
would submerge the bar; and above
the basin it would have to be car
N-shaped chasm to retain a suf-
ficiently large body of water. | re-
membered the stereotyped reply of
the Mexican yaqueros to the Grin
go" pioneers and the Santa Fe trail
ers: "Carrajo! POGO mesa riot" and
wondered how much farther up the
river the engineer of the Glenlivat
company would have to 90 to find
Macpherson's "ready-made' site for
the dam.
1t was at this point in the medita-
tive excursion that the fire Of Curl
osity was lighted, and Macpherson's
air of mystery added its armful of
fagots. There was no good reason
why a sick man who was at best but
a transient onlooker should trouble
himself about the matter, but curl
osity knows not age, sex, or previous
conditions of servitude to maladies,
incurable or otherwise. Wherefore
the onlooker must needs slide tremu-
lousy from the saddle, tether the
clubfooted beast to a stunted tree
growing from a cleft in nearby
bowlder, and make toilful way up the
canyon.
Wykamp's alternative came into
view beyond the second elbow in the
wedge-shaped gorge. 1t was another
scooped-out basin, similar to the one
below; and a blazed fr-tree with
blue-pencil markings proved that the
engineer had already made his pre-
Hminary reconnaissance. But the in
surmountable obstacle to which Mac
pherson's mysterious hint pointed
was altogether. unapparent. Aside
from the added expense of tunneling
a spur of the mountain for an outlet,
the upper basin seemedquite asprom-
Using as the lower-more promising,
in fact, since less masonry would be
required. Was there anything in the
topography of the canyon to forbid
the construction of the dam at this
point? To be sure, the steep slopes
were inclined planes of crumbling
shale; but the native granite could
not be far to seek in eXcavating. And
with the everlasting mountains for
his dam-anchorages, the engineer
might surely possess his soul in Sc
curity.
The sharp-pitched ACTIVITY was
slippery with an overlaying OF
broken shale and dry fir-needles. ]
climbed a little higher to a shallow
niche where projecting rock
promised a foothold, and sat down to
try to puzzle it out and to gather
breath for the return. The thin
Tipped breeze, with the kiss of the
snow-caps lingering in its breath
swept softly down from the bald
summit of Jim's mountains; and the
minimized thunder of the stream be.
came the sub-bass in a great organ
symphony in which the Whispering
frs played the sibilant treble. From
the wider world below, the voice OF
q woman rose clear and strong in a
prolonged double syllable-some
farmers wife or daughter calling her
cow-and the familiar cry was a re-
minder that the day was done II
one would not have a soft-hearted
giant and his following out securing
the valley for a stray invalid, one
must scramble back and mount and
ride.
The deed, or at least the bepin.
ming of it, fitted itself to the thought
But in the act of rising, the crum.
bling foothold gave way, and 1 shot