About four o’clock the river widened and the walls were broken by lateral canyons that led back darkly and mysteriously into the bowels of the desert.  For half an hour more Milton guided the Ida onward.  Then Enoch cried, “Milton, see that brook!” and he pointed to a tumbling little stream that issued from one of the side canyons.

Milton at once called for a landing on the grassy shore beside the brook.  Never was there a sweeter spot than this.  Willows bent over the brook and long grass mirrored itself within its pebbly depths for a moment before the crystal water joined the muddy Colorado.  The Canyon no longer overhung the river suffocatingly, but opened widely, showing behind the fissured white granite peaks, crimson and snow capped and appalling in their bigness.

“Here’s where we put in a day, boys!” exclaimed Milton.  “I’m sure we can scramble to the top here, somehow, and get a general idea of the country.”

His crew cheered this statement enthusiastically.  The landing was easily made and the boats were beached and unloaded.

“Never thought I could unload a boat again without bursting into tears,” said Enoch, grunting under three bed rolls he was carrying up to the willows, “but here I am, full of enthusiasm!”

“You need a lot of it down here, I can tell you,” growled Forrester, who had skinned his chin badly in a fall that morning.

“You look like a goat, Forr,” said Harden, sympathetically, as he set a folding table close to the spot where Jonas was kindling a fire.

“I’d rather look like a goat than a jack-ass,” returned Forrester with an edge to his voice.

“Forr,” said Milton, “don’t you want to try your luck at some fish for supper?  The salmon ought to be interested in a spot like this.”

Forrester’s voice cleared at once.  “Sure!  I’d be glad to,” he said, and went off to unload his fishing tackle.  When he was out of hearing, Milton said sharply to Harden: 

“Why can’t you let him alone, Hard!  You know how touchy he is when anything’s the matter with him.”

“I’m sorry,” replied Harden shortly.

Enoch glanced with interest from one man to the other, but said nothing, not even when, Milton’s back being turned, Harden winked at him.  And when Forrester returned with a four-pound river salmon, there was no sign of irritation in his face or manner.

This night, for the first time, they sat around the fire, luxuriating in the thought that for the next twenty-four hours they were free of the terrible demands of the river.  Forrester possessed a good tenor voice and sang, Jonas joining with his mellow baritone.  Harden, lying close to the flames, read a chapter from “David Harum,” the one book of the expedition.  Agnew, on request, told a long and involved story of a Chinese laundryman and a San Francisco broker which evoked much laughter.  Then Milton, as master of ceremonies, turned to Enoch: