232 
The Colorado River 
the fierce river. In the history of expeditions, it is usually 
those who depart from the original plan who suffer most, for 
this plan is generally well considered beforehand, whereas any 
subsequent change is mainly based on error or fear. Running 
on through a couple of small canyons, they discovered on the 
bank some Pai Utes, who ran away, but a little farther down 
they came to another camp where several did not run. Nothing 
could be learned from them about the whites, yet a short dis¬ 
tance below this they came upon three white men and a native 
hauling a seine. They had reached the goal! It was the 
mouth of the Virgen River! The men in the boat had heard 
that the whole party was lost and were on the lookout for 
wreckage. They were a father and his sons, named Asa, Mor¬ 
mons from a town about twenty miles up the Virgen. The 
total stock of food left the explorers was ten pounds of flour, 
fifteen of dried apples, and about seventy of coffee. Powell 
and his brother here said farewell to their companions of the 
long and perilous journey. They went to the Mormon settle¬ 
ments, while the others continued down the river in the boats 
to Camp Mohave. 
This expedition, by hard labour, with good boats had, ac¬ 
complished in about thirty working days the distance from the 
mouth of Grand River down, while White claimed to have 
done it on a clumsy raft in eleven! And where White pro¬ 
fessed to find smooth sailing in his imaginary voyage, Powell 
had discovered the most dangerous river of all. 
Of his companions on this extraordinary journey, Powell 
says' “I was a maimed man, my right arm was gone; and 
these brave men, these good men, never forgot it. In every 
danger my safety was their first care, and in every waking hour 
some kind service was rendered me, and they transfigured my 
misfortune into a boon.” 
