Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/523

Rh grass being good, by that time the stock was looking well.

All this time we were expecting a Mormon train on the other side would cross over and break the road as they were not loaded, but not seeing any sign of them, the wagon-boss got tired of waiting, and hitching up, pulled about twenty miles to the edge of the snow.

We were two days making this twenty miles. Here we stopped, but the wagon-master and I started next morning on foot for the summit. While we were on the mountain we could hear the other train coming so we walked on to meet it and see if we could assist them in any way. They were taking a very wise plan for it; two men riding ahead on horseback, others were driving about forty head of loose stock behind them, all followed by the wagons.

They got to our camp that night about dark. This tram broke the road in good shape for us, and the following morning the boss put all of the oxen to half the wagons and pulled across. It took us nearly all day to get out of the snow on the other side, thereby taking us three days to cross the mountains.

I traveled with the train three days after crossing the mountains, and then I left and rode on to Virginia City, knowing that Boone and Bivian would be anxious for information.

This was the first train of the season, and when it arrived flour was worth one dollar per pound, bacon fifty cents, and everything else in proportion.