ut nineteen years old. She was a very beautiful girl,
of tall and slender build, and exceptionally graceful carriage. Her
features, in their regularity, were of classic Grecian mold. Her eyes
were dark, bright, and expressive. A fine mouth and perfect set of
teeth, added to a luxuriant growth of dark, rebelliously wavy hair,
completed an almost perfect picture of lovely girlhood. Jay Fosdick
resolved to share with his wife the perils of the way. Mrs. Murphy
offered to take care of the infant children of her married daughters,
Mrs. Foster and Mrs. Pike, if they would join the party. The dear, good
mother argued that what the daughters would eat would keep her and the
little ones from starving. It was nobly said, yet who can doubt but
that, with clearer vision, the mother saw that only by urging them to
go, could she save her daughters' lives. With what anguish did Mrs.
Harriet F. Pike enroll her name among those of the "Forlorn Hope,"
and bid good-by to her little two-year-old Naomi and her nursing babe,
Catherine! What bitter tears were shed by Mr. and Mrs. Foster when they
kissed their beautiful baby boy farewell! Alas! though they knew it not,
it was a long, long farewell. Mrs. Eddy was too feeble to attempt the
journey, and the family were so poorly provided with food that Mr. Eddy
was compelled to leave her and the two little children in the cabins,
and go with the party. Mrs. McCutchen also had an infant babe, and Mrs.
Graves employed the same reasoning with her that Mrs. Murphy had so
effectively used with Mrs. Pike and Mrs. Foster. That these three young
mothers left their infant children, their nursing babes, with others,
and started to find relief, is proof stronger than words, of the
desperate condition of the starving emigrants. The Mexican Antoine, the
two Indians Lewis and Salvador, and an Irishman named Patrick Dolan,
completed the fifteen. This Patrick Dolan deserves more than a passing
word. He had owned a farm in Keokuk, Iowa, and selling it, had taken as
the price, a wagon, four oxen, and two cows. With these he joined the
Donner Party, and on reaching the lake had killed his cattle and stored
them away with those killed by the Breens. Dolan was a bachelor, and
about forty years of age. He was possessed of two or three hundred
dollars in coin, but instead of being miserly or selfish, was
characterized by generous openheartedness. "When it became apparent that
there was to be suffering and starvation" (th