18 A CALIFORNIA TRAMP. 



years after, that they are unworthy of notice. I think they 

 were not over four thousand men under General Johnston, 

 commanding the Utah army, the most of which had preceded 

 us. Still their white tents among the greenery of grass and 

 trees, with the moving columns of horse, foot and artillery 

 around them, formed a scene to be remembered. - 



Before we started each man was given a whip, with a lash 

 ten feet long. These were but toys to what supplanted them 

 when they wore out. With a sort of poetic injustice, from the 

 skins of cattle which died of hardship, lashes were cut and 

 plaited five or six yards long, to facilitate the turning of the 

 hides of other oxen into whip material. These scourges were 

 from an inch and a quarter to an inch and a half in thickness 

 at the " swell," one-fourth the way from the stock, from which 

 they tapered each way, with a buckskin " cracker," and in 

 the hands of an expert they did murderous w^ork. 



Each train had a box of medicines which was kept in the 

 train-master's wagon, along with the revolvers and ammunition, 

 which was its proper place. If I remember rightly, the basic 

 matter of the contents was composed of calomel, laudanum 

 and Epsom salts, with a few outlying adjuncts for doing their 

 work. These, in the hands of an ignorant practitioner, were 

 capable of much mischief. I think the quack who had his 

 medicines numbered to suit the ills inherent to flesh, and 

 when he was out of the required number 6, gave numbers 

 2 and 4 as an equivalent and promptly killed his man, was a 

 wagon-master. I knew I fought as shy of that chest as a fox 

 would of a box-trap. When a little out of sorts or low-spirited, 

 the old professionals would make things worse by telling what 

 became of the teamsters when they died, that is, in this world ; 

 for it is pretty easy to tell where most of the " bull-whackers " 

 went, unless orthodox theology is at fault. These Job's com- 

 forters told how the translated unfortunates were buried in 

 scant roadside graves, in boxes made from the sideboards of 



