Page:Historic highways of America (Volume 6).djvu/67

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THE FIRST EXPLORERS
67

these we made our Shoes and Moccosons."

On the twenty-third the party was on the Kentucky River, where Walker found a sycamore which measured forty feet in circumference—almost, it will be seen, the size of the tree Washington found on the Great Kanawha—upon which he marked his initials, "T. W." On the day after, he found another sycamore thirty feet in circumference. These trees, it would naturally be inferred, marked the location of fertile soil. On the twenty-sixth the "Dogs roused a large Buck Elk, which we followed down to a Creek. He killed Ambrose Powell's Dog in the Chase, and we named the Run Tumbler's Creek, the Dog being of that Name."

"31st. We crossed 2 Mountains and camped just by a Wolf's Den. They were very impudent and after they had twice been shot at, they kept howling about the Camp. It rained till Noon this day."

"June ye 1st. We found the Wolf's Den and caught 4 of the young ones." It was very common for frontiersmen to invade the dens of wolves without any opposition on the part of the old wolves.