On the 9th of December (1827)[8] they started, probably the first navigators of this part of the river since Alarçon, 287 years before. That night they set forty traps and were rewarded with thirty-six beaver. Such good luck decided them to travel slowly with the current, about four miles an hour, “and trap the river clear.” The stream was about two hundred to three hundred yards wide, with bottoms extending back from six to ten miles, giving good camp-grounds all along. With abundance of fat beaver meat and so many pelts added to their store they forgot their misfortunes and began to count on reaching the Spanish settlements they thought existed near the mouth of the river. Sometimes their traps yielded as many as sixty beaver in a night, and finally they were obliged to halt and make another canoe. So they went slowly down, occasionally killing a couple of hostile natives, or deer, panthers, foxes, or wild-cats. One animal is described as like an African leopard, the first they had ever seen. At length they came to a tribe much shorter of stature than the Yumas, and friendly. These were probably Cocopas. Not a patch of clothing existed in the whole band, and Pattie’s men gave the women some old shirts, intimating, as well as they could, that they ought to wear some covering. These people were well formed, and many of the women had exceptionally fine figures if the judgment of the trappers can be trusted in this respect. When a gun was fired they either fell prostrate or ran away, so little did they know about firearms. The chief had a feast of young dog prepared for his guests, who partook of it with reluctance. All communication was by signs, and when the chief imitated the beating of surf and drew a cow and a sheep in the sand, pointing west, they thought they were at last nearing the longed-for Spanish settlements, and went on their way joyfully. Little did they imagine that the settlements the chief described were far off on the Californian coast. [8] The reader may think I introduce too many year-dates but I have found most books so lacking in this regard that I prefer to err on the other side. The “Navajo Church,” a Freak of Erosion near Ft. Wingate, N.M. The “Navajo Church,” a Freak of Erosion near Ft. Wingate, N.M. The Basin of the Colorado is full of such architectural forms. See Dellenbaugh Butte, p. 269. Gunnison Butte, p. 271. “Hole in the Wall,” p. 41, etc. Photograph by BEN WITTICK.