Page:History of Oregon volume 1.djvu/504

Rh Burnt River to the Dalles was a panorama of suffering and destitution, and the rear of the caravan remained at Whitman's over winter. Shaw, who turned aside to Whitman's station to lay in provisions, left there a family of seven children named Sager, .whose parents had died on the road, the father while the company was at Green River, and the mother two weeks later. These children were adopted by Dr Whitman. Shaw failed to reach the Willamette that season, as some of his family were prostrated by sickness, and he remained until March 1845 at the Dalles, with several other families.

Two or more small mounted parties, the first to reach the Dalles, took the cattle trail round the base of Mount Hood, and arrived safely in the valley. But the later comers feared this route on account of the advanced season. The families were assisted in descending the Columbia by the loan of boats belonging to the Hudson's Bay Company; and the cattle were crossed by swimming to the north side of the river, driven down to Vancouver, and recrossed in