a certain Sunday afternoon, we men
decided to make some doughnuts, as we had saved some fat drippings from
the bacon. Not one of us had any idea as to the necessary ingredients or
the manner of compounding them, but we remembered how doughnuts used to
look and taste at home. So we all took a hand at them, trying to imitate
the pattern as well as our ignorance and poor judgment would suggest.
Well, they looked a trifle peculiar, but we thoroughly enjoyed them, for
they were the first we had since leaving home, and proved to be the
last until we were boarding in California.

One thing was sure; our outdoor mode of living gave us fine appetites
and a keen relish for almost anything. And then again, persons can
endure almost any sort of privation as long as they can see a gold mine
ahead of them, from which they are sure to fill their pockets with
nuggets of the pure stuff. What a happy arrangement it is on the part of
Providence that not too much knowledge of the future comes to us at any
one time! Just enough to keep us pushing forward and toward the ideal we
have set for ourselves, which, even though we miss it, adds strength to
purpose as well as to muscle. A worthy object reached for and missed is
a first step towards success.

CHAPTER VI.

"'TIS ONLY A SNOWBANK'S TEARS, I WEEN."

We are now approaching the foot-hills of the Rocky Mountains. The
fertile plains through which we have been passing are being merged into
rocky hills, the level parts being mostly gravelly barrens. The roads
are hard and flinty, like pounded glass, which were making some of the
cattle-teams and droves very lame and foot-sore. When one got so it
could not walk, it was killed and skinned. Other lame ones were lashed
to the side of a heavy wagon, partially sunk in the ground, their lame
foot fastened on the hub of a wheel, when a piece of the raw hide was
brought over the hoof and fastened about the fet-lock, protecting the
hoof until it had time to heal. This mode of veterinary treatment,
although crude, lessened the suffering among the cattle very materially.

The streams along here, the La Barge, La Bonte, and Deer Creek, were all
shallow with rocky bottoms and excellent water. Here we frequently took
the stock upon the hills at night, where the bunch-grass grows among the
sage brush. This grass, as its name indicates, grows in bunches about a
foot high and about the same in diameter, bearing a profusion of yellow
seeds about the