The Jayhawker crowd seemed to think they could go anywhere and no difficulty could happen which they couldn't overcome.

Bennett's little train turned west from this point and the Jayhawkers went on north, but before night they changed their minds and came following on after Bennett whom they overtook and passed, again taking the lead.
Thus far the country had been well watered and furnished plenty of grass, and most of them talked and believed that this kind of rolling country would last all the way through.

The men at leisure scattered around over the hills on each side of the route taken by the train, and in advance of it, hunting camping places and making a regular picnic of it.

There were no hardships, and one man had a fiddle which he tuned up evenings and gave plenty of fine music.

Joy and happiness seemed the rule, and all of the train were certainly having a good time of it.
But gradually there came a change as the wagon wheels rolled westward.
The valleys seemed to have no streams in them, and the mountain ranges grew more and more broken, and in the lower ground a dry lake could be found, and water and grass grew scarce--so much so that both men and oxen suffered.