The outside world of ordinary people has pushed in and taken possession of Fort Yellowstone in the fortnight since I left here, and the invasion of the rest of the Park will speedily follow. Two hundred labourers for road work and the first installment of the hotel help arrived last night and today they are swarming over the formations, gaping into the depths of the springs, and setting nails and horseshoes to coat and crust in the mineral-charged water as it trickles down the terraces. Irish and Swedes predominate among both waitresses and shovel-wielders, and as they flock about, open-mouthed with wonder and chattering at the tops of their voices, they remind one of a throng of immigrants just off the steamer. More of the same kind are due today, and still more tomorrow. Then, worst of all, in another week will come the tourists. But Lob, the good god of the snows and all his works will be gone by then, thank heaven, and so shall I. Today there has come a letter from "Yankee Jim" stating that he has located a boat which he reckons will do for a start down the Yellowstone. He fails to say what he reckons it will do after it starts, but I shall doubtless know more on that score at the end of a couple of days. CHAPTER IV RUNNING "YANKEE JIM'S CANYON" Thirty or forty years ago, before the railway came, "Yankee Jim" held the gate to Yellowstone Park very much as Horatius held the bridge across the Tiber. Or perhaps it was more as St. Peter holds the gate to heaven. Horatius stopped all-comers, while Jim, like St. Peter, passed all whom he deemed worthy--that is to say, those able to pay the toll. For the old chap had graded a road over the rocky cliffs hemming in what has since been called "Yankee Jim's Canyon of the Yellowstone," and this would-be Park tourists were permitted to travel at so much per head. As there was no other road into the Park in the early days, Jim established more or less intimate contact with all visitors, both going and coming. As there were several spare rooms in his comfortable cabin home at the head of the Canyon, many, like Kipling, stopped over for a few days to enjoy the fishing. The fishing never disappointed them, and neither did Jim.