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Show 107 from this morning, when we will have to flee from our homes and leave the spoil to them. That is as sure as we commence the game. If we open the ball upon them by slaying the United States soldiery, just so sure they would be fired with anger to lavishly expend their means to compass our destruction, and thousands, and millions if necessary, would furnish means, if the Government was not able, and turn out and drive us from our homes, and kill us if they could.... •<•• But let us begin a fight with the Government troops, and we shall have to leave our buildings and they will possess them, and I am in favor of leaving them before I am obliged to.... This admission was in extreme contrast to the extravagant claims of just six months before. Now Young was ready to drop the bombshell: Where are you going? To the deserts and the mountains. There is a desert region in this Territory larger than any of the Eastern States, that no white man knows anything about. Can you realize that? What is the reason you do not know anything about that region? It is a desert country with long distances from water to water, with wide sandy and alkali places entirely destitute of vegetation and miry when wet, and small, scattering patches of greasewood, and it is a region that the whites have not explored, and where there are but few Indians. There are places here and there in it where a few families could live. Four [three] years ago this spring we sent Bishop David Evans and a company to go to that desert, for we then had too long neglected to explore it. We wanted to plant settlements there in preparation for this day, for we have had foreshadowings and a promise of the scenery now before us. That company did not accomplish the object of their mission; they were absent a few weeks and went to the first mountain, but they did not go to |