After days of strenuous tramping and effort, climbing hills, fording streams, cutting through impenetrable brushwood, they finally reached the region of which the Indian had given a fairly accurate description. Nearly two hundred miles from the nearest camp, on the top of a mountain plateau, the country was as wild and desolate as it is possible to imagine. Probably no white man had ever set foot there before. Soon their supplies ran low, and as they advanced further into the wilderness, and game grew scarcer, it became more difficult to find food. In addition to hunger, they suffered severely from the cold, and the jagged rocks tearing their boots made them footsore. Of gold they had seen a few traces, but the ore was not present in such quantities as to encourage them to believe they had stumbled across another El Dorado, or even to make it worth their while to stake out a claim. Branigan, disappointed, was in favor of going back. The Indian was lying, he said. There was danger of getting lost in the mountains. The severe winter storms were about due. Prudence counselled caution. John took an opposite view. They had picked up several lumps of quartz streaked with yellow. If gold was there in minute particles, he argued, it was there also in larger quantities. The only thing was to have patience, to go on prospecting, and ferret out the hiding-place where jealous Nature secreted her treasures. So they had struggled on, hoping against hope, thinking they would soon come across a trapper's hut, fighting for mere existence each inch of the way, becoming more bewildered and demoralized as they realized the gravity of their plight, advancing further and further into the merciless desert, literally stumbling into the jaws of death. Then came the snow, and the faint Indian trails were completely obliterated. This put the climax on their misery. Now there was no knowing where they were. Having no compass, they were hopelessly lost. In clear weather it was possible to find the right direction by the stars, but the sky, long-overcast and menacing, vouchsafed no sign. Even if the road could be found, escape was impossible. Starved and footsore, they were now so weak that they were scarcely able to drag themselves along. Yet move they must; to remain in one spot meant to fall down and go to sleep and perish. They had had nothing to eat for days except snow and some roots which Bill dug up from under the snow. Once they were attacked by wolves. Madison shot one of their pursuers with his revolver, and the rest of the pack turned tail and ran. The dead wolf they ate. They did not stop to cook it, but devoured it raw, like famished dogs worrying a bone. It saved their lives for a time, and then the hunger pangs began again, terrible, incessant.