The extreme hardship that sometimes was endured was frequently due to wrong decisions or inadequate outfit; or from going ahead too fast. The born mountaineer and explorer, however, meets with few setbacks because he does not know a setback when he sees it. He fits into the Wilderness without effort, and drifts across it as summer clouds cleave a tranquil sky. Many of the American trappers of this period had been reared to life in the woods of the East; the rifle was their childhood's toy. Through sheer love of adventure they were impelled to the wider Wilderness, and quickly adjusted themselves to new conditions. They could have been anywhere readily distinguished. With compact muscles and solid frame, partners of fresh air, exercise, and simple fare, they had a clear, wide gaze, flinching before neither man nor beast; and unfailing nerve that often whipped prospective disaster to success. The routine of the frontier and especially of the deeper Wilderness precluded any great lapse from physical excellence. When a man was alive he was generally well. Indeed, the average American trapper had a constitution that seemed invincible. Besides this his moral fibre was usually excellent. His word was good, his dealings with his fellows honourable. Money he cared less for than freedom. Cheerfully he risked his life for another. The code of law was unwritten, but it was well understood; punishment for serious offences was swift and certain. Crimes against white men were proportionately less than in a modern city; but when it came to dealings and intercourse with the Amerind conscience was paralysed. They also rated his blood at about the price of water, and out of this, for them and for the nation, came deep and lasting trouble. But, on the whole, they were a class to be much admired; some of their names, like Bridger and Kit Carson, are imperishably woven into history and literature; others, like Jedediah Smith, are to the general reader unknown. [Illustration: Green River Valley. Photograph by C. R. Savage.]