And now he was face to face with the awful, the glorious, the divinely ordained fact.  It was like standing before the Throne of Grace itself.  Out over that western skyline was a spot, now hidden and defended by all the powers of Satan, where the Ten Tribes would be restored, where Zion would be rebuilt, where Christ would reign personally on earth a thousand years, and from whence the earth would be renewed and receive again its paradisiac glory.  The thought overwhelmed.

“If we could only start at once!” he said to Bishop Wright, who had read the revelation with him.  But the canny Bishop’s religious zeal was henceforth to be tempered by the wisdom of the children of darkness.

“No more travelling in this kind of a time for the Saints,” the Bishop replied.  “We got our full of that when we first left Nauvoo.  We had to scrape snow from the ground and set up tents when it was fifteen or twenty below zero, and nine children born one night in that weather.  Of course it was better than staying at Nauvoo to be shot; but no one is going to shoot us here, so here we’ll tarry till grass grows and water runs.”

“But there was a chance to show devotion, Brother Seth.  Think how precious it must have been in the sight of the Lord.”

“Well, the Lord knows we’re devoted now, so we’ll wait till it fairs up.  We’ll have Zion built in good time and a good gospel fence built around it, elk-high and bull-tight, like we used to say in Missouri.  But it’s a long ways over yender, and while I ain’t ever had any revelations myself, I’m pretty sure the Lord means to have me toler’bly well fed, and my back kept bone-dry on the way.  And we got to have fat horses and fat cattle, not these bony critters with no juice in ’em.  Did you hear what Brother Heber got off the other day?  He butchered a beef and was sawing it up when Brother Brigham passed by.  ’Looks hard, Brother Heber,’ says Brother Brigham.  ’Hard, Brother Brigham?  Why, I’ve had to grease the saw to make it work!’ Yes, sir, had to grease his saw to make it work through that bony old heifer.  Now we already passed through enough pinches not to go out lookin’ for ’em any more.  Why, I tell you, young man, if I knew any place where the pinches was at, you’d see me comin’ the other way like a bat out of hell!”

And so the ardent young Elder was compelled to curb his spirit until the time when grass should grow and water run.  Yet he was not alone in feeling this impatience for the start.  Through all the settlement had thrilled a response to the Lord’s word as revealed to his servant Brigham.  The God of Israel was to be with them on the march, and old and young were alike impatient.

Early in April the life began to stir more briskly in the great camp that sprawled along either side of the swollen, muddy river.  From dawn to dark each day the hills echoed with the noise of many works, the streets were alive with men and women going and coming on endless errands, and with excited children playing at games inspired by the occasion.  Wagons were mended and loaded with provisions and tools, oxen shod, ox-bows renewed, guns put in order, bullets moulded, and the thousand details perfected of a migration so hazardous.  They were busy, noisy, excited, happy days.