Young Charley Arcane had been getting better for some days. No medicine
had been given him, and it was no doubt the change of air and water that
had begun to effect a cure. Arcane had a hard time of it to keep the
brush from pulling George and Melissa off of Old Crump into the water.
It was indeed one of the hardest day's work of the whole journey, but no
one was low spirited, and all felt very well. The camping place was in a
deep canon, surrounded by thick brush, so that no wind came in to chill
us. Everybody was cook and nobody was boss. Not a cent of money among
us, nor any chance to use any if we had possessed it. We had nice,
sweet, fat meat, cooked rare or well done as each one preferred, and no
complaints about the waiters. The conditions were so favorable, compared
with the terrible Death Valley and its surroundings that every one
remarked about it, and no one felt in the least like finding fault with
the little inconveniences we were forced to put up with. It might cure
an inveterate fault-finder to take a course of training in the desert.
The next day we did not wade half as much, and after a few hours of
travel we suddenly emerged from the brush into a creek bottom which was
much wider, with not a tree to obstruct our way. The soil was sandy and
covered more or less with sage brush, and the stream which had been
strong and deep enough to make us very wet now sank entirely out of
sight in the sandy bottom. The hills were thinly timbered on the left
side but quite brushy on the right, and we could see the track of cattle
in the sand.
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