The morning call., 1892-06-05

| the dead on the plains. Many a time we
| could not find place to camp by the creek
or stream without camping on graves.
| There was always an effort TO get into the
next camp before too many other trains got
! there so as not to be compelled to pitch the
| tent on new-made graves. Frequently
more than one was buried in the same
grave; strangers WHO died in the same
camp on the same night, OF cholera gen.
orally.
! One absurd thing happened where two
| parties agreed to unite on the same grave.
| But as they bore the dead to the grave one
| party saw that the other had little wooden
| cross made ready to set up.
The bloody OLD Cromwell war was opened
| right there by that open grave, and two new
| graves were dug as compromise measure
| and very wide apart, leaving the company
! grave for the next campers.
An, the dust and the dust, and the dust
from these thousands and thousands of
cloven feet that trudged along day after
day. The cows made better work cattle
than steers; they endured more. About
three out OF four steers would fall down in
the road. sutfOcated in the dust, while the
patient little cows would, as a rule, bend
their necks to the yoke and lrudge along till
night.
IsraePS 30 years in the wilderness. the
march Of the Ten Thousand, even Napo-
Icons retreat from Moscow, for he at least
had water, no, nothing in history can be
found 10 approach the horrors of the last
month OF the six or seven on the plains in
the old immigration days; the women and
the children, hunger, thirst, the utter ex-
haustion, the heat and the dust, and vet no
promised land IN sight. Our train came last.
They calked up old wagon-boxes, tying
water-kegs to the sides to make them float,
when they came to the American FaU3 on
Snake River. and put their sick in these
and sent them on down; while those who
had strength to keep on still trudged along
In the dust with the staggering, choking cat
tie. But, oh, the JOY when from the sum-
nit of the Blue Mountains Mount Hood,
hundreds Of miles away, burst in full Viewl
1t was the braZen serpent, for from the
moment IL was first seen men, women and
children surely grew stronger. We climbed
the mountain wall. We let ourselves down
INTO Oregon (Which was then Oregon, the
Willamette Valley from the mountain tops
by ropes, taking the wagons to pieces and
letting them down great rough precipice
IN fragments; driving the cattle around
rocky spur so narrow that only one brute
or one man could pass at once. And right
here the only big OK We had left caught
glimpse through the boughs of Mount Hood
that hung like moon in the blue heaven
above US, and stopped. He stood long
time. looking and looking ard listening to
the roaring waters tumbling below He
seemed to like the country, and only re-
luctantly finally moved on.
For years and years we wondered what
had been the fate Of those who ventured
down the Snake River in the frail wagon
boxes from the American Falls But when
Idaho was explored then the great
ShoshOne or Snake River Falls were dis
covered And then for the first time we
knew certainly that they had all persisted.
The frail little feet Of sick and dying-I
can see 1t yet with its one little fag-a little
girl leaning over cooling her face in the
swift water. All, did you come the plains
across" JOAQUIN MILLER