172 A CALIFORNIA TRAMP. 



had become of his four-footed friend, but, in our then feelings, 

 hoping never to see him again. 



Just before sunset we resumed our march and slowly left our 

 late desolate camping place, with its sad associations, in the 

 distance. Our reason for starting at this time was to avoid the 

 Kingston Spring Indians, it being dangerous to halt among 

 them at night. Our Mormons reported them as of large size 

 and differing in appearance from the Diggers generally. They 

 rarely show themselves by day, but watch from behind the 

 desert rocks the movements of travelers, and should they halt 

 at night, steal or kill their stock. The reader can hardly 

 imagine how we dreaded the loss of animals on the waterless 

 stretches of from thirty to sixty miles, and with what anxiety 

 we watched them at night. Their loss almost involved our 

 own lives. But by traveling much after sundown, and by the 

 judicious treatment our conductors pursued toward the Indians, 

 we went through safely. Lack of pasturage was made up with 

 rations of wheat, which for the emergencies of desert travel 

 had been carried from the settlements. This, however, was 

 running short, and our teams were getting thin and weak. 

 The alternations of yielding sand and jolting stones were trying 

 to passengers as well as teams, as much of the way we were 

 obliged to walk. 



Our road now lay over a sandy tract, the horizon occasionally 

 broken by rocky " buttes " and sand pillars. Not a tree was 

 visible except an occasional yucca, which, wdth horizontal, 

 outstretched arms and extended palms, seemed asking for 

 continued curses on this already over-cursed region. Rising 

 to a height of twenty or more feet, wdth trunks a foot in 

 diameter and of ghostly whiteness, or prone to the ground, 

 decaying in spongy, ill-smelling masses, this nightmare of 

 vegetation gave the landscape a weird look. Grass there was 

 none ; but in its place there came from the sand occasional 

 growths of thorny, repulsive plants. 



