44 LIFE SKETCHES OF A JAYHAWKER 



with some smart rubbing on the outside, we brought him to. I never had 

 seen the man before he fell in with us— he was nothing to me, but I could 

 not see a man die if it was possible to save him, but it was a close call for 

 him. The next morning he wanted to resume the journey with us, but I 

 told him no, he could not go with us, that he had better go back to Carson. 

 We started early and travelled hard all day, and made the next station 

 about nine o'clock at night, a distance of twelve miles. The weather had 

 turned warm with some rain, which made the snow very soft, and even 

 where there had been a foot trail we could hardly keep on it, and we would 

 slip off the trail and go into the snow to our shoulders, then scramble out 

 and go through the same performance every few rods, and our clothes soon 

 became wet and heaA^y. When arriving at the summit we could only see 

 smoke coming out of the snow here and there. Even the chimneys did not 

 reach through the snow. People were living down there under the snow 

 and had run tunnels from house to house like a lot of gophers. We got 

 some dinner, rested a little and pushed on, and made a little better time 

 from there on, as it was down hill, but we were glad enough to get to the 

 next station, as we were about used up. They said they could feed us, but 

 there were no extra beds, so all the sleep we had was sitting in a chair. 

 The next morning we took an early start and scon got out of the snow. It 

 was still raining, and no teams running, as the roads were impassible. At 

 the next station, three miles away, there had been a landslide the night 

 before, and had taken away the barn, sixteen horses, several stage coaches 

 and all the harnesses, and all that we could see was here and there a shingle 

 or piece of board sticking up in the mud. It came so close to the house as 

 to throw mud all over the kitchen. In traveling that day we were either in 

 sight or hearing of landslides the entire day. There was one that came very 

 near to us some distance above right down a ravine that we were in. We 

 ran as fast as we possibly could to higher ground on a point, and by this 

 time it was passing us, it being the most thrilling sight I ever beheld. It 

 came right down through a dense grove of large sugar pine trees, some of 

 them must have been six and eight feet through, and that landslipe took 

 everything clean to the bedrock. It passed us and went into the American 

 River just a few rods below where we were standing. The river was boom- 

 ing full, but it shut off the water completely for a few seconds, when it all 

 went down stream and carried those great immense trees as if they were 

 nothing more than straws. I must say again it was the grandest sight I 

 ever witnessed. All the people living on the road had abandoned their 

 places and were living in tents upon the ridge above the landslides. The 

 consequence was we travelled all day without any dinner. There were 

 plenty of houses on the road but no people, and another night we had to 

 travel quite late before we could get accommodations. We never met any- 

 one the whole day — no one could travel, only on foot, and that wasn't very 

 pleasant, as it was raining constantly. The next day we travelled on to- 

 wards the valley below and at one point we came to quite a high eminence 

 where we could overlook the Sacramento and San Joaquin Valleys and both 

 were covered with water as far as we could see. The entire country was 

 under water when we arrived at Sacramento, the only land above water 

 being a little strip along the levee and that had been under water, but it 

 had receded about three feet. In the house where I stopped, the water mark 



