LIFE IX THE FAR WEST -Gl 



Their numbers were soon reduced by want and 

 disease. When too late, they often wished themselves 

 back in the old country, and sighed many a time for 

 the beer and bacon of former days, now preferable to 

 the dry buffalo meat (but seldom obtainable) of the 

 Far West. 



Evil fortune pursued the Mormons, and dogged their 

 steps. The year following, some struggled on towards 

 the promised land, and of these a few reached Oregon 

 and California. Many were killed by hostile Indians ; 

 many perished of hunger, cold, and thirst, in passing 

 the great wilderness ; and many returned to the States, 

 penniless and crest-Mien, and heartily cursing the 

 moment in which they had listened to the counsels of 

 the Mormon prophet. The numbers who reached their 

 destination of Oregon, California, and the Great Salt 

 Lake, are computed at 20,000, of whom the United 

 States had an unregretted riddance. 



One party had followed the troops of the American 

 Government intended for the conquest of New Mexico 

 and the Californias. Of these a battalion was formed, 

 and part of it proceeded to Upper California ; but the 

 way being impracticable for waggons, some seventy 

 families proceeded up the Arkansa, and wintered near 

 the mountains, intending to cross to the Platte the 

 ensuing spring, and join the main body of emigrants 

 on their way by the South Pass of the Rocky Moun- 

 tains. 



In the wide and well-timbered bottom of the Arkansa, 

 the Mormons had erected a street of log shanties, in 



