MAJOR RADDON’S RANCH. 247 
I could have pistolled the rascal there and 
then, but the mules had to be recovered; so I 
bottled up my wrath, roused all my sleeping 
camp, and we started in pursuit of the missing 
culprits. 
May 4th.—Three days have elapsed. I have 
got the mules together, but three are still absent. 
Again we started. I made a long march, cross- 
ing Cottonwood Creek, through Major Raddon’s 
ranch — one of the finest in California for 
grazing — struck the Upper Sacramento, and 
camped about sundown on a creek called Still- 
water. 
May 5th.—In the night it came on a deluge of 
rain, that regularly soaked through everything; 
but it cleared towards morning, and we dried 
ourselves in the sun as we rode along. 
The next three days we travelled through a 
beautiful parklike. country, very lightly tim- 
bered, covered with grass, and thickly dotted 
with magnificent ranches (farms); we struck 
Pitt river on the fourth day, crossed it safely, 
swam the mules, and ferried over the packs. 
May 9th.—Our journey for the first twelve 
miles lay through a narrow rocky gorge—the 
trail; simply a ledge of rock, barely wide enough 
fora mule to stand upon. Three hundred feet 
