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Show MRS. AUGUSTA TABOR. 225 passed the evening over a game of whist by the light of our camp-fire. " The fourth day in the park we came late at night to Salt creek. Tried the water and found that we could not let the cattle drink it, neither could we drink it. We tied the oxen to the wagon and went supperless to bed. The night was very cold, and a jack came to our tent and stood in the hot embers until he burned his fetlocks off. He stayed with us to the end of our trip, and carried me many miles upon his back. " We moved on the next day to fresh water, and camped on Trout creek. Knowing that a party of men had left Denver a few days before we did, and feeling anxious to come up with them, the men shouldered their rifles and started out in search of foot-prints, each going in a different direction. The one who came upon the trail was to fire off his gun as a signal to the others. All day long I listened for the report of a gun. The men had not arrived when night's shadows gathered around, and I felt desolate indeed. The little jack came into the tent, and I bowed my head upon him and wept in loneliness of soul. " The men had gone farther than they expected, and were somewhat bewildered, and only for the camp-fire that I kept bla_zing, they could not have found their way back. "As they did not find the trail, we concluded to follow the way a stick might fall. It fell pointing southwest, and we went in that direction. "Finding what we»thought a good fording place in the Arkansas river, we decided to cross, as the road seemed better on the other side. 15 |