It may be well to pause here and estimate its precise results.  It had secured delay.  The herds on Henry’s Fork had thriven better than was expected, and toward the close of April the number of mules in working condition was sufficient to have dragged a train of two hundred wagons.  The dragoon-horses which survived could have been assigned to the artillery-batteries, and the regiment have served as infantry.  With this equipment, slight though it may appear, a rapid movement upon the Valley was possible; and whatever may have been the opinion during the previous autumn, it was the universal opinion in the spring that the force at Camp Scott could have routed any body of militia that might have opposed its advance, although, perhaps, it was not sufficient to subjugate the Territory, in case the Mormons should flee to the mountains.  Provisions, also, were running low in the camp.  The ration of flour had been further reduced.  All the cattle had been slaughtered, and there was every prospect of recourse to mule-meat before the first of June.  Everything, therefore, favored the plan of an early march toward the city; and it is certain that it would have been commenced without awaiting reinforcements from the States, had not the Governor’s scheme for pacification intervened.  Distrustful of its expediency or propriety though General Johnston might have been, he deemed it his duty to await its result.  Neither he nor the Governor being supreme in the direction of affairs, it was the duty of each to defer so far as might be to the action of the other.

In the next place, Mr. Kane’s interposition had produced an irreconcilable difference of opinion between the civil and the military authority.  This is evident from what has already been stated, and there is no need to confirm the fact by argument.  The Governor returned to Fort Bridger in May, believing the Mormons to be an injured people, whose cause was in the main just.  But his position was full of difficulties.  He had been recognized in his official character, it is true; but he was conscious that every Mormon acknowledged a political influence superior to his own, which was directing the emigration southward, and leaving him Governor of empty villages and deserted fields.  The only hope he entertained of checking this exodus was by quashing the indictments for treason which had been found against the Mormon leaders, and by insuring them against contact with the troops.  The first he was powerless to effect; it was a matter beyond his control,—­solely within the cognizance of the courts.  The second he had assumed to be within his power, and had so assured the Mormons; but there he was at variance with General Johnston, who denied his claim to absolute authority over the movements of the army.