e cliffs risen above one thousand feet, and the
river had an average fall of five feet to the mile. This was the first
party on record to navigate, for any considerable distance, the canyons
of Grand River. From the Junction they proceeded up the Green, towing
the boat, desiring to reach the Rio Grande Western Railway crossing,
one hundred and twenty miles away. By this time their rations were
much diminished and they allowed themselves each day only one-half
the ordinary amount, at the same time going on up the river as fast as
possible, yet at the end of about eight days, when still thirty
miles from their destination, they were reduced to their last meal.
Fortunately they then arrived at the cabin of some cattlemen, Wheeler
Brothers, who, discovering their plight, put their own ample larder,
with true Western hospitality, at the surveyors' disposal. Thus
opportunely fortified and refreshed, the men reached the railway
crossing the following night.

In reviewing all the early travels through this inhospitable region, one
is struck by the frequent neglect of the question of food-supplies. In
such a barren land, this is the item of first importance, and yet many
of the leaders treated it apparently as of slight consequence. Great
discomfort and suffering and death often followed a failure to provide
proper supplies, or, when provided, to take sufficient care to preserve
them.

On the 25th of May, 1889, Brown's party was ready and started from
the point where the Rio Grande Western crosses Green River. There were
sixteen men and six boats. Five of the boats were new; the sixth was
the one Kendrick and Rigney had used on the Grand River trip. The chief
engineer of the proposed railway was Robert Brewster Stanton, and that
he was not in the very beginning given the entire management was most
unfortunate, for Brown himself seems not to have had a realisation of
the enormous difficulties of the task before him. But the arrangements
were completed before Stanton was engaged. All the men were surprised,
disappointed, dismayed, at the character of the boats Brown had provided
for this dangerous enterprise, and Stanton said his heart sank at the
first sight of them. They were entirely inadequate, built of cedar
instead of oak, only fifteen feet long and three feet wide, and weighed
but one hundred and fifty pounds each. They would have been beautiful
for an ordinary river, but for the raging, plunging, tumultuous Colorado
thei