Finding it altogether impossible to control the Indians, they compromised the matter. The Indians agreed to only take the loose stock of the company, and not meddle with the teams and wagons, and not make any effort to take their lives. The Indians took the loose stock, amounting to four hundred and eighty head, on the fifty-mile desert beyond the Muddy. The brethren remained with the company, determined to assist in its defense, should the Indians attempt anything more than they had agreed. The company continued their journey safely to California. Brothers Knight and Leavitt returned to the Santa Clara. As soon as possible, I talked with the principal Indians engaged in this affair, and they agreed that the stock not killed should be given up. I wrote to the owners in California, and they sent their agent, Mr. Lane, with whom I went to the Muddy, and the stock was delivered to him as the Indians had agreed. CHAPTER VII In the winter season, my family usually lived at the Santa Clara settlement, thirty miles south of the Mountain Meadows, to which place they moved in the spring, to keep stock during the summer. Late in the autumn of 1857, a company came along on their way to California. They brought a letter from President Brigham Young, directing me to see this company and their effects safely through to California. They were mostly merchants who had been doing business in Salt Lake City, and, anticipating difficulty between the people of Utah and the United States army, were fleeing to the Eastern States by way of California and the Isthmus of Panama. When the company arrived in Cedar City, they sent a messenger ahead of them with the letter to me. Having occasion to go to Cedar City about the same time, I met the messenger. I directed him to return to the company and tell them to come on, and I would be with them in time. I returned to Santa Clara to make some preparations for the journey, and then started to meet the company on the creek, twelve miles from the settlement. When I reached the California road, the company had passed, and was some distance ahead of me. While traveling to overtake it, I found a man who had been traveling alone, also in pursuit of the company, with a view of getting through with it to California. When I found him he was already in the hands of the Indians, and stripped of his clothing. They were making calculations to have a good time with him, as they expressed it, that is, they intended to take him to their camp and torture him. The stranger, seeing I had influence with the Indians, begged me to save his life, and said if I would do so he would serve me as long as he lived. I replied that I did not wish any reward for saving him. In answer to his inquiry, I informed him that I was a "Mormon." "Well," said he, "I am not a Mormon, but I wish you would save my life."