It got quite cold that night, and we were glad to have shelter of
Hite's hospitable roof. In our trip down the river to this point we
had seemed to keep even with the first cold weather. In all places
where it was open, we would usually find a little ice accompanied by
frost in the mornings, or if no ice had frozen the grass would be wet
with dew. In the canyons there was little or no ice, and the air was
quite dry. Naturally we preferred the canyons if we had a choice of
camps.
Loper looked as though he would like to accompany us as we pulled away
the next morning, after having landed him on the south side of the
stream. We, at least, had full confidence in his nerve to tackle the
lower Colorado, after his record in Cataract Canyon. The five
scattered peaks of the Henry Mountains were now to the north-northwest
of us, rugged and snow-capped, supreme in their majesty above this
desolate region.
Signs of an ancient Indian race were plentiful in this section. There
were several small cliff dwellings, walled up in ledges in the rocks,
a hundred feet or so above a low flat which banked the river. At
another place there were hundreds of carvings on a similar wall which
overhung a little. Drawings of mountain-sheep were plentiful; there
was one representing a human figure with a bow and arrow, and with a
sheep standing on the arrow--their way of telling that he got the
sheep, no doubt. There were masked figures engaged in a dance, not
unlike some of the Hopi dances of to-day, as they picture them.
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