Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 13.djvu/262

 254 WILLIAM BARLOW He would go to their camps, call for their chief, get down off his horse, take off his saddle, and give his horse and lariat to the chief, who would send him out with some young boy to good grass. He would talk, smoke and eat with the chief, and his horse would be brought up in the morning looking fine. The boy always was given a plug of tobacco and the old chief several plugs. But if the old gent had sneaked off and tried to hide, the Indians would most likely have stolen his horse and maybe killed him. But this did not happen. After he got to The Dalles, father went on to Tygh Valley to look for a starting point for going through the Cascade mountains with his wagons. We had hired Steve Meek, brother of Joe Meek, to pilot the emigrants clear through to The Dalles, for one dollar a wagon and board. He said he knew every trail and camping ground from Fort Laramie to Vancouver, west of the Cascade mountains. But he proved himself to be a reckless humbug from start to finish. All he had in view was to get the money and a white woman for a wife before he got through. He got the wife and part of the money. He and his company then went on and made a stand at the mouth of the Malheur river, which empties into the Snake River, where, he said, he could make a cut-off that would take them to The Dalles before we could get to the Grand Ronde Valley. This route, he said, would give them plenty of wood, water and grass all the way, and there would be no Blue Mountain to cross, which he described as almost impassable. The result was the whole emigration had gone clear through the Dalles six weeks before this company was heard of. He had got lost and did not know where he was. He told those with him he would fetch them through all right and they were afraid to desert him or discharge him, for fear they would all perish. Finally, after they had all lost a portion of their stock, and a large number of the people had perished, they came in sight of the Deschutes river. But the perpen- dicular basaltic walls prevented them from reaching the water, so they had to follow down the river on top of the bluff for miles before they could get a drink of water to cool their