Early in the morning, when it was frozen hard the cattle could travel it
very well. The snow belt was five or six miles wide, and the snow two or
three feet deep. This was a very good camping place except that we had
to melt snow for all our water, but this being coarse and icy it was not
a great job as we found enough dry juniper trees and twigs to make a
very good fire. Here we also had to kill another ox. This one in its
turn was Arcane's, and left him only two, and Bennett three, but we
think that if we have no accident we shall get them along with us till
we can get other food, as they have very light loads to pack. When the
ox is killed and the meat prepared the mule has, for a time, a larger
load than all the oxen have, but seems content and nips a bite of food
whenever it can see a chance anywhere along the road, giving us no more
trouble than a dog. And by the way, I think I have not mentioned our
faithful camp dog, a worthy member of our party who stood watch always
and gave us a sure alarm if anything unusual happened anywhere about. He
was perhaps only one of a hundred that tried to cross the plains and had
to be abandoned when they reached the upper Platte, where the alkali
dust made their feet so sore they could not travel, and as they could
not be hauled on wagons they were left behind. But this dog Cuff did not
propose to be left behind to starve, and crippled along after us, we
doing all we could for him, and proved as tough as the best of us.
Pages:
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284