That was their third day and I was consumed with anxiety. A cold, wintry blast was driving down the lake in a direction at right angles to their course. The waves were running high and on the opposite shore we could see the surf flying against the rocks, covering them with glittering masses of ice. It was growing colder every minute, and the night was intensely dark. A driving sleet began to fall. This was dangerous, as it adhered to whatever it touched. Our apprehensions were almost beyond endurance. I knew those men would start that night no matter what perils might be encountered. They had twenty miles to come, in an egg shell boat which had never been tried in rough water. Nothing could live in that icy flood half an hour, if cast overboard. The wind and cold were both increasing constantly. Hour after hour passed. I followed the beach a couple of miles, but finding no traces returned. The Sergeant went in the other direction with like results. We were standing together on the shore despairing when suddenly there was borne to us on the driving blast the sound of boisterous and double jointed profanity. The voice was Starr’s and we knew that the daring, invincible men were safe and successful. We ran to meet them and helped them beach, and unload the few articles that the boat contained. The oars were coated an inch thick and the boat was half full of solid ice. When the three men came in front of the camp fire, they were a sight to behold. Their hair and beards were frozen to their caps and overcoats and they were sheeted with glistening ice from head to foot. The boat had nearly filled three different times, but Applegate, who steered, threw her bow to the waves and held her there while the others bailed her out. They found that she would not bear the cross sea, so they kept her head to the wind, and forced her to make leeway by pulling stronger on the opposite side and working the steering oar to correspond. Thus they battled with the storm hour after hour until they had drifted twenty miles and reached the other shore. We changed clothing with them and after giving them a warm supper made them go to bed at once. The rest of the night we put in drying their clothes, as they soundly slept. On October 31, the boat was cleared of ice by chopping it out with axes, hot ashes were thrown in to dry her out inside, and “slipper poles” were cut and fitted under her to serve as runners. Dragging side poles were also attached to fend her off standing trees in passing. Two mules were hitched to the boat in tandem to drag her, and although progress was slow because the boat frequently became wedged between trees, and the deep snow made travel very difficult for the mules, the Divide was crossed, and “at 9 o’clock at night we left her on the Pacific slope of the Rocky Mountains, and went on with the tired stock into camp.”