Page:History of Utah.djvu/85

 difficulty, after separation from each other and several days' wanderings.

Leaving three men in camp, with four others, including Kit Carson who was present, Frémont on the 8th embarked in a rubber boat and dropped down to the mouth of the stream, which the party found shallow and unnavigable. Next morning they were out on the lake, fearful every moment lest their air-blown boat should collapse and let them into the saline but beautiful transparent liquid. At noon they reached one of the low near islands and landed. They found there, washed up by the waves, a dark brown bank, ten or twenty feet in breadth, composed of the skins of worms, about the size of oats, while the rocky cliffs were whitened by incrustations of salt. Ascending to the highest point attainable they took a surrounding view, and called the place Disappointment Island,16 because they had failed to find the fertile lands and game hoped for. Then they descended to the edge of the water, constructed lodges of driftwood, built fires, and spent the night there, returning next day in a rough sea to their mainland camp. Thence they proceeded north to Bear River, and Fort Hall, and on to Oregon.17  On his return by way of Klamath and Pyramid lakes, Frémont crossed the Sierra to Sutter Fort, proceeded up the San Joaquin into Southern California, and taking the old Spanish trail to the Rio Vírgen followed the Wahsatch Mountains to Utah Lake.

There was a party under Frémont in Utah also in 1845. Leaving Bent Fort in August they ascended the Arkansas, passed on to Green River, followed its left bank to the Duchesne branch, and thence crossed to the head-waters of the Timpanogos, down which stream they went to Utah Lake. Thence