While
we never stinted ourselves, or cut the allowance of food, the amount
was growing smaller every day, and it was not a question any more
whether we would go out or not, to get provisions, to "rustle" as Bert
called it, but where we would go out. We might go up Cataract Creek or
Ha Va Su Creek, as it is sometimes called. We had been to the mouth of
this canyon on foot, so there would be no danger of missing it. The Ha
Va Supai Indians, about two hundred in number, lived in this lateral
canyon about seven or eight miles from the river. An agent and a
farmer lived with them, and might be able to sell us some provisions;
if not, it would be fifty miles back to our home. The trail was much
more direct than the river. The great drawback to this course was the
fact that Ha Va Su Canyon, sheer-walled, deep, and narrow, contained a
number of waterfalls, one of them about 175 feet high. The precipice
over which it fell was nothing but a mineral deposit from the water,
building higher every year. Formerly this was impassable, until some
miners, after enlarging a sloping cave, had cut a winding stairway in
it, which allowed a descent to be made to the bottom of the fall. A
recent storm had remodelled all the falls in Cataract Creek Canyon,
cutting out the travertine in some places, piling it up in others. A
great mass of cottonwood trees were also mixed with the debris. The
village, too, had been washed away and was then being rebuilt.
Pages:
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240