Ma, that horse had something on his mind
all the way to Humboldt.--[S. L. C. to his mother. Published in
the Keokuk (Iowa) Gate city.]--

So they had to push, and most of that two hundred miles through snow and
sand storm they continued to push and swear and groan, sustained only by
the thought that they must arrive at last, when their troubles would all
be at an end, for they would be millionaires in a brief time and never
know want or fatigue any more.

There were compensations: the camp-fire at night was cheerful, the food
satisfying. They bundled close under the blankets and, when it was too
cold to sleep, looked up at the stars, while the future entertainer of
kings would spin yarn after yarn that made his hearers forget their
discomforts. Judge Oliver, the last one of the party alive, in a recent
letter to the writer of this history, says:

He was the life of the camp; but sometimes there would come a
reaction and he could hardly speak for a day or two. One day a pack
of wolves chased us, and the hound Sam speaks of never stopped to
look back till he reached the next station, many miles ahead.

Judge Oliver adds that an Indian war had just ended, and that they
occasionally passed the charred ruin of a shack, and new graves: This was
disturbing enough. Then they came to that desolation of desolations, the
Alkali Desert, where the sand is of unknown depth, where the road is
strewn thickly with the carcasses of dead beasts of burden, the charred
remains of wagons, chains, bolts, and screws, which thirsty emigrants,
grown desperate, have thrown away in the grand hope of being able, when
less encumbered, to reach water.

They traveled all day and night, pushing through that fierce, waterless
waste to reach camp on the other side. It was three o'clock in the
morning when they got across and dropped down utterly exhausted. Judge
Oliver in his letter tells what happened then:

The sun was high in the heavens when we were aroused from our sleep
by a yelling band of Piute warriors. We were upon our feet in an
instant. The pictures of burning cabins and the lonely graves we
had passed were in our minds. Our scalps were still our own, and
not dangling from the belts of our visitors. Sam pulled himself
together, put his hand on his head as if to make sure he had not
been scalped, and then with his inimitable drawl said: "Boys, they
have left us our scalps. Let's gi