While we were examining the spot where the
antelope had stood, a leveret jumped up, and I knocked him
over with my remaining barrel. We fried him in the one tin
plate we had brought with us, and thought it the most
delicious dish we had had for weeks.
As we lay side by side, smoke curling peacefully from our
pipes, we chatted far into the night, of other days - of
Cambridge, of our college friends, of London, of the opera,
of balls, of women - the last a fruitful subject - and of the
future. I was vastly amused at his sudden outburst as some
start of one of the horses picketed close to us reminded us
of the actual present. 'If ever I get out of this d-d mess,'
he exclaimed, 'I'll never go anywhere without my own French
cook.' He kept his word, to the end of his life, I believe.
It was a delightful repose, a complete forgetting, for a
night at any rate, of all impending care. Each was cheered
and strengthened for the work to come. The spirit of
enterprise, the love of adventure restored for the moment,
believed itself a match for come what would. The very
animals seemed invigorated by the rest and the abundance of
rich grass spreading as far as we could see. The morning was
bright and cool. A delicious bath in the Sweetwater, a
breakfast on fried ham and coffee, and once more in our
saddles on the way back to camp, we felt (or fancied that we
felt) prepared for anything.
That is just what we were not. Samson and the men, meeting
with no game where we had left them, had moved on that
afternoon in search of better hunting grounds. The result
was that when we overtook them, we found five mules up to
their necks in a muddy creek. The packs were sunk to the
bottom, and the animals nearly drowned or strangled. Fred
and I rushed to the rescue. At once we cut the ropes which
tied them together; and, setting the men to pull at tails or
heads, succeeded at last in extricating them.
Our new-born vigour was nipped in the bud. We were all
drenched to the skin. Two packs containing the miserable
remains of our wardrobe, Fred's and mine, were lost. The
catastrophe produced a good deal of bad language and bad
blood. Translated into English it came to this: 'They had
trusted to us, taking it for granted we knew what we were
about. What business had we to "boss" the party if we were
as ignorant as the mules? We had guaranteed to lead them
through to California [!] and had brought them into this
"almighty fix" to slave like niggers and to starve.' There
was just truth enough in the Jeremiad to make it sting.
