going and returning.  Such was the severity of the labor that nearly two-thirds of the animals became poor, and their backs so sore as to be unfit for work.  This trip was made from the Dalles, in Oregon, to Salmon Falls, on the Columbia River.  Anderson asserts it, as the result of his experience, that, in packing fifty mules a distance of three hundred miles with two hundred and fifty pounds, the animals will be so reduced at the end of the journey as to require at least four weeks to bring them into condition again.  This also conforms with my own experience.

In 1857, there was started from Fort Laramie, Nebraska Territory, to go to Fort Bridger with salt, a train of forty mules.  It was in the winter; each mule was packed with one hundred and eighty pounds, as near as we could possibly estimate, and the train was given in charge of a man of the name of Donovan.  The weather and roads were bad, and the pack proved entirely too heavy.  Donovan did all he could to get his train through, but was forced to leave more than two-thirds of it on the way.  At that season of the year, when grass is poor and the weather bad, one hundred and forty or one hundred and fifty pounds is enough for any mule to pack.

There were also, in 1857, regular pack trains run from Red Bluffs, on the Sacramento River, in California, to Yreka and Curran River.  Out of all the mules used in these trains, none were packed with over two hundred pounds.  To sum up, packing never should be resorted to when there is any other means of transportation open.  It is, beyond doubt, the most expensive means of transportation, even when the most experienced packers are employed.  If, however, it were necessary for the Government to establish a system of packing, it would be a great saving to import Mexicans, accustomed to the work, to perform the labor, and Americans to take charge of the trains.  Packing is a very laborious business, and very few Americans either care about doing it, or have the patience necessary to it.

CHAPTER V. PHYSICAL CONSTRUCTION OF THE MULE.

I now propose to say something on the mule’s limbs and feet.  It will be observed that the mule has a jack’s leg from the knee down, and in this part of the leg he is weak; and with these he frequently has to carry a horse’s body.  It stands to reason, then, that if you feed him until he gets two or three hundred pounds of extra flesh on him, as many persons do, he will break down for want of leg-strength.  Indeed, the mule is weakest where the horse is strongest.  His feet, too, are a singular formation, differing very materially from those of the horse.  The mule’s feet grow very slow, and the grain or pores of the hoof are much closer and harder than those of the horse.  It is not so liable, however, to break or crumble.  And yet they are not so well adapted for work on macadamized or stony roads, and the more flesh you put on his body, after a reasonable weight, the more you add to the means of his destruction.