242 ELDORADO 



do so, but that he had started for California, and he 

 intended to go through or die. Not a man turned 

 back. Worn out with their continual skirmishing, 

 they were surrounded at the Mohave settlements, on 

 the Colorado river, and a desperate battle began. 

 The swarming savages attempted charge after charge, 

 but the handful of whites lying behind the few rocks 

 they had thrown around them as a breast-work, drove 

 them back each time with terrible slaughter. Man 

 after man fell within the slight fortification, and 

 when night came. Smith determined, with the seven 

 men left, to cut his way through the lines of the ene- 

 my and attempt escape by flight. As soon as it was 

 dark. Smith told his comrades of his determination, 

 showing them the folly of lying behind their insuffi- 

 cient protection, where eventually all would be killed ; 

 and they agreed to the desperate suggestion. Look- 

 ing to the charges in their rifles, they secured the am- 

 munition of their dead companions, and burst furious- 

 ly upon one side of the savage line. This gave way 

 after a brief stubborn contest, and the white broke 

 through, having lost four of their number at this 

 point. Smith, with these two surviving comrades. 

 Turner and Galbraith, after a thousand perils entered 

 California close to the Mexican line, in December, 

 and were there arrested under the suspicion that they 

 intended mischief, or had designs upon the govern- 

 ment. They were carried before General Echandia, 

 who was located at San Diego, and here this invading 

 force of three almost naked men was subjected to a 

 rigid interrogation as to their aims and business in 

 entering the country. Their answers, though strictly 



