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Show 16 THE SHORTEST ROUTE TO CALIFORNIA. " The trappers continued down Ogden's River, until they ascertained that it lost itself in a great swampy lake, to which there was no apparent dis-charge. They then struck directly westward, across the great chain of California mountains intervening between these interior plains and the shores of the Pacific.* " For three and twenty days they were entangled among these mountains, the peaks and ridges of which are in many places covered with perpetual snow. Their passes and defiles present the wildest scenery, partaking of the sublime rather than the beautiful, and abounding with frightful precipices. The suf-ferings of the travelers among these savage mountains covered the Ogden's or Mary's River in 1828. One of Mr. Ogden's party took a woman for his wife from among the Indians found on this river, to whom the name of Mary was given. From this circumstance the stream came to be called Mary's River. It is also called Ogden's River, after its dis-coverer." Lieutenant Warren might with more propriety, we think, have said that the stream formerly was called Ogden's or St. Mary's River ; but since the explorations of Fremont in 1845- 46 it has been known, by emigrants and others, entirely as the Humboldt River, the name Fremont gave it. * Irving is here in error. Walker did not go directly west-ward from the swamp ( sink) of the Ogden's River ( the Hum-boldt) across the great chain of California mountains ( the Sierra Nevada) ; but, striking southwardly, continued down along their east side, for nearly five degrees of latitude, before he crossed them near their southern termination, by a pass since known as Walker's Pass. We get this information from Mr. E. M. Kern, the assistant of Fremont, who ten years subsequently was guided by Walker over this very route. |
