While the brethren were making preparations for the night, five men armed with guns rode into camp, and insolently told the brethren they would "catch hell before morning." "And their oaths," says Joseph, "partook of all the malice of demons." The Jackson mob assembled opposite the mouth of Fishing River, and one scow-load--forty in number--was sent over. By this time the sun was but little more than an hour high, and the camp observed a small cloud coming up from the west. "It wasn't any larger than your hat when I first saw it," said one [A] who was present, and described the occurrence to me; "but in about twenty minutes the whole heavens were inky blackness, which now and then seemed split by the vivid streams of lightning." All the artillery of heaven seemed to be in action. The wind blew and the rain and hail fell in torrents. The hailstones--unusually large ones--cut down the corn crop and other vegetation. Large limbs were wrenched from sturdy oaks and twisted into withes by the fierce wind. [Footnote A: This was the late Judge Joseph Holbrook of Davis County, who personally related the circumstance to me.] The tents in the camp were blown down, and the most of the brethren took refuge in an old church house near their camp ground. Big Fishing River, that was not more than six inches deep before the storm arose, was about forty feet deep the next morning; and the mob swore that Little Fishing River rose thirty feet in that many minutes. This storm prevented the mob from collecting as arranged. The scow that had ferried over part of the Jackson mob, in returning for more, was met by the storm and only after much difficulty about dark reached the Jackson side. Those that had been shipped across were exposed to the pitiless pelting of the storm all night, which cooled their desire to "kill Joe Smith and his army." "Instead of continuing a cannonading which they commenced, * * * they crawled under wagons, into hollow trees, and filled one old shanty." [B] The next morning they were as anxious to reach the Jackson side of the Missouri as they had been the night before to get at "Joe Smith's" camp. The other parts of the mob who were to give the brethren "hell before morning" met with a fate equally unpleasant. Their horses were frightened, broke away from their masters, and wandered over the prairies in some instances several days. Their plans for the destruction of Zion's Camp were frustrated, and the brethren rejoiced. [Footnote B: Joseph's history under date of 19th of June, 1834.] CHAPTER XXII. NEGOTIATIONS.