Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 13.djvu/275

 "Yes," I said, "I know it would be hard to catch anything after it was in a man's own bread basket." But I never really thought that John had really eaten them.

We made a big fire under a large cedar tree that would turn the rain as well as the best thatch roof that could be made, wrapped ourselves up in our blankets and lay down and slept as sound as we had ever on the road.

We had slept together all the way across the plains. In the morning, got up and made a good pot of coffee. After breakfast, as we called it, I went out and cut what I called a safety pole about ten feet long. I said, "Now, John, if I should slip and fall I am a goner, and you tell my mother that I lost my life in trying to save hers." She was the nearest and dearest and most helpless of any of the family.

But I made no blunder. I would place the pole firmly on the bottom among the boulders, then would brace against the pole and swing out as far as the pole would let me go on the other side; again I would brace myself against the strong current, lift my pole around on the other side, and place it again in the same manner until I reached the shore. We had no big guns or even firecrackers to celebrate the event, but the big cheers that John gave me from the other side and the consolation that I felt in being victorious over the raging river was enough.

Now we had only eight miles more before we met friends and help. So I bounded away like a mountain buck, and in three hours more I was at Foster's. James and John L. Barlow (Doc) were there herding the stock. I told them to mount the best horses they could get and hie away to Oregon City, get some men and eight or ten good horses and be back here at ten o'clock tomorrow morning. All of which they did in good shape. But I had prostrated myself by over-eating, and I thought I had been very cautious. However, I climbed up on one of the horses and started on a lope, and that seemed to help me very much.

We met our hungry emigrant party that evening just at dark. They had been making short moves every day. The The main thing now was to keep them from over-eating; they