vening I found my friend in a
terrible state of mental excitement. He said that he had not slept a
minute during the whole of the night before. He had filled the door of
his room with rails, and sharpened one end of a long stick, which he
intended to use if necessary as a weapon of defence. When I arrived he
was again filling the door with rails. I had the gun, pistol and big
knife with me so this was his only means of defence. He said he would
not stay alone another night for all the gold in California.

I was much discouraged by our failures in hunting, and after a lengthy
discussion we decided to make another attempt to cross the mountains and
escape from what then seemed to us certain starvation. This was Thursday
night and we set Monday as the time for starting. By Saturday night
everything was in readiness for the start and Sunday we devoted to Bible
reading, for we each still had a pocket Bible. As much of the flesh of
the wolf and the lamented mule as we thought we could carry had been
thoroughly jerked, and finding that we would not be overburdened by it,
we economized by roasting and eating little scraps of flesh, the marrow
from the bones, and even the head of the mule was roasted, the fragments
of flesh scraped off and eaten, and Field found a rich fatty substance
in behind the eyes, which he ate.

We had a canteen in which our powder was carried, but the powder was
nearly all gone so we emptied it and used the canteen to carry water in.
Early Monday morning we loaded ourselves, mostly with jerked mule and
wolf, leaving many useful things behind, bid adieu to Fort Uinta and
took up our line of march rather reluctantly.

My companion was not strong and we soon found it expedient for me to
take on part of his burden. We rested often and yet long before night he
became so tired that we had to go into camp. Most of the day we had
traveled on an old deserted trail. The nights being cold we were under
the necessity of keeping up a fire as we had left our blankets at the
fort. The next morning we made an early start and rested often. At about
noon we found good shade and water, and the sun being quite hot we
stopped and rested in the shade for more than three hours, then trudged
on till nearly night when we found water, and plenty of old dry timber
for fuel and camped. Field expressed a wish that he had his old mule
again, and I reminded him that he had a portion of it left in his
knapsack, and that turn about wa