"It was a most impressive scene, to witness twenty-two men on a snowy mountain, with bare heads, and hands and eyes upraised to heaven, uttering the solemn vow, 'So help me God!'--and the valley echoed, 'So help me God!' I never, until that moment, realized the awful situation in which I was placed. I remembered the words of the Psalmist, and felt perfectly assured of my final safety. They _wandered in the wilderness in a solitary way_; they found _no city to dwell in_. _Hungry and thirsty their soul fainteth within them, and they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them out of their distresses._ * * * * * "When an animal gave out, he was shot down by the Indians, who immediately cut his throat, and saved all the blood in our camp kettle. This animal was divided into twenty-two-parts. Two parts for Col. Fremont and his cook, ten parts for the white camp, and ten parts for the Indians. Col. Fremont hitherto messed with his officers; at this time he requested that they would excuse him, as it gave him pain, and called to mind the horrible scenes which had been enacted during his last expedition--he could not see his officers obliged to partake of such disgusting food. "The rule he adopted was that one animal should serve for six meals for the whole party. If one gave out in the meantime, of course it was an exception; but otherwise, on no consideration was an animal to be slaughtered, for every one that was killed, placed a man on foot, and limited our chances of escape from our present situation. If the men chose to eat up their six meals all in one day, they would have to go without until the time arrived for killing another. It frequently happened that the white camp was without food from twenty-four to thirty-six hours, while Col. Fremont and the Delawares always had a meal. The latter religiously abstained from encroaching on the portion allotted for another meal, while many men of our camp, I may say all of them, not content with their portion, would, to satisfy the cravings of hunger, surreptitiously purloin from their pile of meat, at different times, sundry pieces, thus depriving themselves of each other's allowance. My own sense of right was so subdued by the sufferings I endured by hunger, and walking almost barefooted through the snow, that while going to guard one night, I stole a piece of frozen horse liver, ate it raw, and thought it, at the time, the most delicious morsel I ever tasted.