Camp was pitched in the edge of the beautiful valley, then a reservation belonging to the Nez Percé Indians. Rye-grass was growing as high as the top of the head of a man on horseback; and at one end of the valley, where now is a famous resort for health and pleasure, a number of hot springs were outlined by great columns of steam, which, rising beneath the arid air, hung low over the foot-hills, and, hanging lower yet in the vale below, spread itself like an enormous fleece over a lake of seething water. XXXI _THROUGH THE OREGON MOUNTAINS_ After moving across the Grande Ronde valley through a veritable Eden of untamed verdure, and crossing the Grande Ronde River by ford, our travellers began the ascent of the Blue Mountains. The air was cool and delicious. The cattle, much refreshed by their luscious feed in the bountiful and beautiful valley, moved more briskly than had been their wont, and were soon in the midst of the grand old forest trees, which, at that time untouched by the woodman’s ax, stood in all their native grandeur upon the grass-grown slopes. In the midst of one of these groves of stately whispering pines the company halted for the night near a sparkling spring, with scenery all around them so enchanting that Jean exclaimed in her journal, “Oh, this beautiful world! how big it is compared to the pygmy mortals who roam over its surface; and yet how little it is compared to the countless stars that gaze upon us from above this ‘boundless contiguity of shade’!” For several days she had written little. Her thoughts wandered to the Green River experience that had awakened within her being a new life, from which, for her at least, there was to be no ending. She could not write, so she strolled aimlessly away to a mossy rock in a starlit ravine, at the foot of which a rivulet was singing. “Why can’t I see you, mother dear?” she asked. “And you, Bobbie, can’t you say a word to your sister Jean?” For a long time she sat thus, lost in reverie, while the eternal silence around her was broken only by the low cadence of the whispering pines. Suddenly there came into her inner consciousness a call, unspoken yet heard, “Jean!” She closed her eyes and saw, as plainly as with physical vision, Ashton Ashleigh’s border home; and he was gazing hard at Le-Le, who was kneeling at his feet in beseeching attitude. “Jean!” Gradually, as the demon Doubt aroused her senses, a wild, unreasoning jealousy crept into her heart. She turned her face to the eastward and sent out to him an answering call, “Ashleigh!” She listened eagerly; but no response was felt or heard, and no mental vision reappeared. With her heart like lead, she returned to the wagon and crept into bed. When she awoke the sun was shining, and she could not recall the vision that had distressed her. Had her soul visited the abode of her heart’s idol? Who knows? and who can tell? * * * * *