Nicely cut roasts of beef and pork, bottles of wine, and sundry parcels lay around in sweet confusion. It took some time to gather them up and pack them in place in that parchment-sided, primitive vehicle; and all this time his owner was discoursing on Pat's good qualities--"were it not for his big load he would take the lead," etc. After a time everything was adjusted again, and on we went, camping that night among the rolling hills west of Blindman's River. Another "stingo" night and away long before day. Roads heavy, snow deep, day so cloudy and stormy that the promised view of the Rockies failed to realize. There were some of us in the party who had travelled far and wide in the North-West for from five to fifteen years, and as yet had not seen the mountains. We were now looking keenly for the first glimpse of them, but the third night came, and still because of cloud and storm we had not beheld them. Our camp that night was made on the wooded summit of a foot-hill. We were climbing the world fast. If it had been moonlight or clear daylight we would have looked upon a sea of mountains, but darkness and storm and smoke were our portion instead. The smoke from our camp-fire found no vacuum in the overhanging atmosphere, but on the contrary was pressed to the ground about our camp. In fact the conditions were such that I think of that "hill summit camp" as one of the more disagreeable experiences of my frontier life. Gladly we left it while hours of the long night were still unspent, and as daylight came we were ascending another big foot-hill, from the summit of which I first beheld the glorious old Rockies.