Six hundred miles of treeless prairie without a house brought us to the adobe dwellings at Fort Laramie, and 400, more or less, were the long miles to Mormondom, still more than 700 miles from the Pacific Coast.

Passing over this wilderness was like going to sea without a compass.
Hence it will be seen that when we crossed a stream that was said to flow to the Pacific Ocean, myself and comrades were ready to adopt floating down its current as an easier road than the heated trail, and for three weeks, over rocks and rapids, we floated and tumbled down the deep canon of Green River till we emerged into an open plain and were compelled to come on shore by the Indians there encamped.

We had believed the Indians to be a war-like and cruel people, but when we made them understand where we wanted to go, they warned us of the great impassable Colorado Canon only two days ahead of us, and pointed out the road to "Mormonie" with their advice to take it.

This was Chief Walker, a good, well meaning red man, and to him we owed our lives.
Out of this trouble we were once again on the safe road from Salt Lake to Los Angeles, and again made error in taking a cutoff route, and striking across a trackless country because it seemed to promise a shorter distance, and where thirteen of our party lie unburied on the sands of the terribly dry valley.

Those who lived were saved by the little puddles of rain water that had fallen from the small rain clouds that had been forced over the great Sierra Nevada Mountains in one of the wettest winters ever known.