The mules were allowed to graze on the little tufts of grass that grew in spots around, where there was enough earth to allow of such a thing. Close by was an occasional stunted tree, from which the boys easily secured all the firewood that was apt to be needed. And how genial that blaze did look in the coming night, as it shone upon the tents, the smiling faces of the scouts, and the general surroundings, so wild and lonely. "Looks like we owned the whole world," remarked Bumpus, "when you just squint around, and see the old Rockies towerin' up to the right and to the left, behind and before. Say, this is what we've been lookin' forward to a long time, ain't it, fellers?" Bumpus seemed to be happier over the situation than any of the others. Really, it was queer how deep an interest the stout youth had always taken in this trip to the Wild Northwest. He it was who first suggested the same, and on every occasion he had fostered the idea. Up in Maine, when they first heard about that rich reward offered for the recovery of the missing valuables that had been stolen from a bank, Bumpus had been the one to declare that they ought to recover them, so as to have plenty of funds in the treasury, to pay the expenses of a grand trip to the backbone of the continent, those glorious mountains which he saw so often in his day dreams, and yearned so much to visit. Of course, by this time every one of his chums had become filled with enthusiasm also, and there was no faint answer to this question on the part of Bumpus. Pretty soon supper was started, and that was a time when the scouts began to be more or less restless. Tired as they might be, when the delicious odors permeated the outermost limits of the camp, no one seemed able to sit still. The fact of the matter was that they were ravenously hungry, and it was tantalizing to get the "smell" of the cooking, with the knowledge that it would be at least half an hour ere they could begin to satisfy their appetites. Any one who knows the make-up of average boys, understands that. "I wouldn't like to be caught in parts of this valley, in a cloud-burst," Davy Jones remarked; "I've been alookin' around some, and there's signs that tell of floods long ago. Guess a feller'd have hike some, to get away if a wall of water came whirlin' down here." "But the hunting ought to be fine, don't you think, Toby?" asked Step Hen, who had begun to have aspirations to equal the record of several of his comrades; and more than once declared that nothing less than a big-horn Rocky Mountain sheep would satisfy his ambition. "I c'n just think I see the jumpers playin' leap-frog up along some of the cliffs that stand out against the sky yonder." "We'll find sheep, sooner or later, all right," asserted the guide, who was engaged in cutting wood for the fire; and more than that he would not say, being a man of words rather than big promises.