Mr. and Mrs. Brier had some pretty hard struggles to get along, and everyone of this party has ever been loud in praise of the energy and determination of the brave little woman of the Brier mess.  All agreed that she was by far the best man of the party.  She was the one who put the packs on the oxen in the morning.  She it was who took them off at night, built the fires, cooked the food, helped the children, and did all sorts of work when the father of the family was too tired, which was almost all of the time.  They all said that he, like other ministers, had fallen out with any work but that of the tongue, and seemed perfectly willing for some one else to do the work.  Mrs. Brier had the sympathy of everyone, and many would have helped her if they could.  She waited on her big husband with untiring zeal, and still had time to care for the children with all of a mother’s love.  It seemed almost impossible that one little woman could do so much.  It was entirely to her untiring devotion that her husband and children lived.  Mr. Brier had but little sympathy or help from any one but her.  Some were quite sarcastic in their remarks about the invalid preacher who never earned his bread by the sweat of his brow, and by their actions showed that they did not care very much whether he ever got through or not.  They thought he ought to have asserted his manliness and taken the burden on himself, and not lean upon his delicate and trusting wife as he seemed to do.  All are sure that it is to his faithful wife the Rev. J.W.  Brier owed his succor from the sands of that desert.

Looking back on the scenes of that day, the way the selfish dispositions of people were made manifest is almost incredible.  Every one seemed to think only of saving his own life, and every spark of human sympathy and kindness seemed extinguished.  A man would drink the last cup of water even if his neighbor choked.

This camp was the same one which the Author mentions in his narrative, to which Rogers and himself crept so silently and carefully at night to ascertain whether the occupants were friends or foes.  They were much pleased to find it was Capt.  Doty of the Jayhawkers and his mess who had remained behind to dry the flesh of an ox they had killed when it could travel no longer.  The others had gone on ahead, following the trail, leaving these to follow.  They staid here two days, and it was while waiting here that the Rev. J.W.  Brier came up as before related, and they all went on together when they moved.

Nearly every man had carried a gun in the early days of the expedition, hoping to kill game, and to be well armed in case of attack by Indians or enemies, but they began to find that they were useless encumbrances, and first one and then another would throw away his fire-arms as a burden too great for a weary man to bear.  There was no game, and the poor weak men hardly deemed their own lives worth defending against an enemy when a day or two of lack of water would end the matter of life at any rate.