74 LIFE IN THE FAR WEST. 



to the trappers, an island, from which rises a chain of lofty 

 mountains, nearly divides the north-western portion of the 

 lake, whilst a smaller one, within twelve miles of the 

 northern shore, rises six hundred feet from the level of the 

 water. Kube declared to his companions that the larger 

 island was known by the Indians to be inhabited by a race 

 of giants, with whom 110 communication had ever been 

 held by mortal man ; and but for the casual wafting to 

 the shores of the lake of logs of gigantic trees, cut by axes 

 of extraordinary size, the world would never have known 

 that such a people existed. They were, moreover, white 

 as themselves, and lived upon corn and fruits, and rode on 

 elephants, &c. 



Whilst following a small creek at the south-west ex- 

 tremity of the lake, they came upon a band of miserable 

 Indians, who, from the fact of their subsisting chiefly on 

 roots, are called the Diggers. At first sight of the whites 

 they immediately fled from their wretched huts, and made 

 towards the mountains ; but one of the trappers, galloping 

 up on his horse, cut off their retreat, and drove them like 

 sheep before him back to their village. A few of these 

 wretched creatures came into camp at sundown, and were 

 regaled with such meat as the larder afforded. They ap- 

 peared to have no other food in their village but bags of 

 dried ants and their larvae, and a few roots of the yampah. 

 Their huts were constructed of a few bushes of grease- 

 wood, piled up as a sort of breakwind, in which they hud- 

 dled in their filthy skins. During the night they crawled 

 up to the camp and stole two of the horses, and the next 

 morning not a sign of them was visible. Now La Bonte 

 witnessed a case of mountain law, and the practical effects 

 of the " lex talionis " of the Far West. 



The trail of the runaway Diggers bore to the north-west, 

 or along the skirt of a barren waterless desert, which 

 stretches far away from the southern shores of the Salt 

 Lake to the borders of Upper California. La Bonte, with 

 three others, determined to follow the thieves, recover 

 their animals, and then rejoin the other two (Luke and 

 Rube) on a creek two days' journey from their present 



