One fellow said he knew this was the Creator's dumping place where he
had left the worthless dregs after making a world, and the devil had
scraped these together a little. Another said this must be the very
place where Lot's wife was turned into a pillar of salt, and the pillar
been broken up and spread around the country. He said if a man was to
die he would never decay on account of the salt. Thus the talk went on,
and it seemed as if there were not bad words enough in the language to
properly express their contempt and bad opinion of such a country as
this. They treated me to some of their meat, a little better than mine,
and before daylight in the morning I was headed back on the trail to
report the bad news I had learned of the Jayhawkers.
About noon I met two of our camp companions with packs on their backs
following the wagon trail, and we stopped and had a short talk. They
were oldish men perhaps 50 years old, one a Mr. Fish of Indiana and
another named Gould. They said they could perhaps do as well on foot as
to follow the slow ox teams, but when I told them what those ahead of
them were doing, and how they must go, they did not seem to be entirely
satisfied, as what they had on their backs would need to be replenished,
and no such chance could be expected. They had an idea that the end of
the journey was not as far off as I predicted. Mr. Fish had a long
nicely made, whiplash wound around his waist, and when I asked him why
he carried such a useless thing, which he could not eat, he said perhaps
he could trade it off for something to eat.
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