Year: 1859




ate breakfast. There were two or thre


men sleeping in wet blankets on the grass


who rose and made FIRE on our appear


ance. The grocery was irregularly con


structed of boxes which had once con


tained goods, but, having fulfilled tha
end. we're thus made useful afresh.


suppose it was. six feet high and five b.


eight in diameter, though no two of it


sides were of the same hight An ole


tent cloth for covering completed the ed


iice, from which we obtained sardines


canned lobster, and prepared coffee which


was said to contain sugar and cream, buI


which was voted by our drinkers a swim.


ding humbug. | believe these articles


exhausted the capabilities of the concern;
but as We had no bread, we needed no


more. Some Of our party thought other


wise. however; they called for whiskey or
some kindred beverage, and were indig-


nantly disgusted at its non-production.-
They had become Injured to groceries con-
tanning nothing that could by possibility
be eaten, but grocery devoid of some
kind of "rot," as the fiery beverage was
currently designated, was to them a nov
el and most distasteful experience. How
ever, mau was at once dispatched across
the creek to similar establishment, but
more happily furnished, whence be soon
returned with the Indispensable fluid
(price So for flask containing perhaps a
pint and half of some diabolic alcohol
ic concoction, wherein the small modicum
of genuine whiskey had taken to itself
seven other devils worse than the 6rst).
and our breakfast was finished to gener-
al satisfaction.


A word here on the Liquor traffic
throughout this region. A mercantile
firm in this city, in order to close out
promptly its extra stock of liquors, offers
to sell whisky at the extraordinarily low
price of S3 so per gallon. | believe the
common price from Laramie westward to
the Sierra Nevada is IS per gallon; but it
is usually sold to consumers by the bot
tie, holding less than quart, for which
the charge is So up to So so, but seldom
below So 50. And such liquor! True,
| have not tasted it; but the smell [ could
not escape, and am sure a more whole.
some potable might be compounded of
spirits Of turpentiDe, aqua fortis, and
stepped tobacco. Its look alone would
condemn it-soapy, ropy, turbid, it is
within bounds to say that every pint ofit
contains as much deadly poison as a gal
Ion of pure whisky. And yet fully half
the earnings of the working men (not iu-
cluding the Mormons. of whom | have
seen little) of this whole region are fooled
away on this abominable witchbroth and
its foster-brotber tobacco, for which they
pay 81 to $24 per pound The trader
at Weber. of whom our boys bought
their next supply of rot, aYologetically
observed, There amt nothing bad about
this whisky; the only fault is, it isn't
good" back that assertion with my
W hole heart


Fordiug Bear River-here swift,
rocky -bottomed creek, now perhaps forty
yards wide, but hardly three feet deep
We rose gradually through grassy val
ley, partially inclosed by high, perpendic-
ular stone Buttes, especially on the right.
The stone evidently once clay) outposts
Of one OF the Buttes are known as "The
Needles" We thence descended long
steep bill into the valley of Loss Creek"
.aohy "lost," | could not divine, as the
creek is plainly there-a fair trout brook
runriug through grassy meadow, be-
tween high hills, over which We made our
way into the head of "Echo Canon"
down which we logged some twenty miles
to Weber River.


This Canon reminded me afresh that e.
vii and good are strongly interviewer in
our earthly lot. Throughout the desolate
region which stretches from the Sweetwa-
ter nearly or quite TO Bridger, we had in
the main the best natural road l ever
travelled dusty, indeed, and in places
abrupt and rough, but equal iu the aver
age to the carefully made and annually
repaired roads of New. England. But in
this fairly grassed ravine, hemmed in by
steep. picturesque bluffs, with springs is
suing from their bases and gradually gath
eriug into trout brook as we neared the
Weber, we found the going decidedly
bad, and realized that in the dark it could
not but be dangerous. For the brook,
with its growing fringe of willow, choke
cherry. service berry, and other shrubs,
rigzagged from side to side of
the Canon. compelling us to descend and
ascend its precipitous banks and cross its
miry bed, often with smart
chance of breaking an axle or upsetting.
We stopped to feed and dine at the site
Of seen. Wells Camp" during the Nor
non war of 1878, and passed ten miles
below, the fortifcations constructed under
his orders in that famous campaign.-
They seemed childish affairs, more suited
10 the genius of Chinese than of civilized
warfare. | cannot believe that they
would have stopped the Federal troops, if
even to!erably led for more than an boar.


We reached our next station on the
Weber little after S p. m, and did not
esve till after an early breakfast next
yesterday morning. The Weber is,
nerbans a little LARGER fha the Bear and