This was the largest disaster we met with during the years 1858 and 1859. [Illustration: A ROUGH TRAIL.] In 1857 the Indians attacked the herders who had charge of about one thousand head on the Platte River, west of Fort Kearney, which is now called Kearney City, in Nebraska, killing one of the herders and scattering the cattle to the four winds. These were also a complete loss. We had very little trouble with the Indians in 1857, 1858, and 1859 in any way, owing to the fact that Johnston's army, consisting of about five thousand regulars, besides the teamsters, making in all about seven thousand well-armed men, had passed through the country in 1857, and they had seen such a vast army, with their artillery, that they were completely intimidated, and stayed at a very respectful distance from the road on which this vast number of wagons and teams traveled. Each one of our wagons was drawn by six yoke, or twelve oxen, and contained from five to six thousand pounds of freight, and there was but one wagon to each team. The time had not yet come when, what was afterward adopted, trail wagons were in use. This means two or three wagons lashed together and drawn by one team. Twenty-five of our wagons and teams formed what was called a train, and these trains were scattered along the road at intervals of anywhere from two to three miles, and sometimes eight to ten miles, and even greater distances, so as to keep out of the way of each other. The road, until we reached the South Pass, was over the finest line of level country for traveling by wagons, with plenty of water and grass at almost every step of the way. Crossing the South Platte at what was then called Julesburg, and going across the divide to North Platte, at Ash Hollow, we continued in the valley of the North Platte to the mouth of the Sweetwater, and up that stream until we passed through the South Pass. After passing that point it was somewhat more difficult to find grass and water, but we were fortunate enough all along the road to get sufficient subsistence out of nature for the sustenance of our animals, and were not obliged to feed our oxen. They did the work allotted to them, and gathered their own living at nights and noon-times.