But we must resume our Western way.  The evening of the 3rd December found us crossing a succession of wooded hills which divide the water system of the North from that of the South Saskatchewan.  These systems come so close together at this region, that while my midday kettle was filled with water which finds its way through Battle River into the North Saskatchewan, that of my evening meal was taken from the ice of the Pas-co-pee, or Blindman’s; River, whose waters seek through Red Deer River the South Saskatchewan.

It was near sunset when we rode by the lonely shores of the Gull Lake, whose frozen surface stretched beyond the horizon to the north.  Before us, at a distance of some ten miles, lay the abrupt line of the Three Medicine Hills, from whose gorges the first view of the great range of the Rocky Mountains was destined to burst upon my sight; But not on this day was I to behold that long-looked-for vision.  Night came quickly down upon the silent wilderness; and it was long after dark when we made our camps by the bank of the Pas-co-pee, or Blindman’s River, and turned adrift the weary horses to graze in a well-grassed meadow lying in one of the curves of the river.  We had ridden more than sixty miles that day.

About midnight a heavy storm of snow burst upon us, and daybreak revealed the whole camp buried deep in snow.  As I threw back the blankets from my head (one always lies covered up completely), the wet, cold mass struck chillily upon my face.  The snow was wet and sticky, and therefore things were much more wretched than if the temperature had been lower; but the hot tea made matters seem brighter, and about breakfast-time the snow ceased to fall and the clouds began to clear away.  Packing our wet blankets together, we set out for the three Medicine Hills, through whose defiles our course lay; the snow was deep in the narrow valleys, making travelling slower and more laborious than before.  It was midday when, having rounded the highest of the three hills, we entered a narrow gorge fringed with a fire-ravaged forest.  This gorge wound through the hills, preventing a far-reaching view ahead; but at length its western termination was reached, and there lay before me a sight to be long remembered.  The great chain of the Rocky Mountains rose their snow-clad sierras in endless succession.  Climbing one of the eminences, I gained a vantage-point on the summit from which some by-gone fire had swept the trees.  Then, looking west, I beheld the great range in unclouded glory.  The snow had cleared the atmosphere, the sky was coldly bright.  An immense plain stretched from my feet to the mountain—­a plain so vast that every object of hill and wood and lake lay dwarfed into one continuous level, and at the back of this level, beyond the pines and the lakes and the river-courses, rose the giant range, solid, impassable, silent—­a mighty barrier rising-midst an immense land, standing sentinel over the plains and prairies of America, over the measureless solitudes of this Great Lone Land.  Here, at last, lay the Rocky Mountains.