On the 20th of August they resumed their march, keeping along the prairie parallel to Snake River.  The day was sultry, and some of the party, being parched with thirst, left the line of march, and scrambled down the bank of the river to drink.  The bank was overhung with willows, beneath which, to their surprise, they beheld a man fishing.  No sooner did he see them, than he uttered an exclamation of joy.  It proved to be John Hoback, one of their lost comrades.  They had scarcely exchanged greetings, when three other men came out from among the willows.  They were Joseph Miller, Jacob Rezner, and Robinson, the scalped Kentuckian, the veteran of the Bloody Ground.

The reader will perhaps recollect the abrupt and willful manner in which Mr. Miller threw up his interest as a partner of the company, and departed from Fort Henry, in company with these three trappers, and a fourth, named Cass.  He may likewise recognize in Robinson, Rezner, and Hoback, the trio of Kentucky hunters who had originally been in the service of Mr. Henry, and whom Mr. Hunt found floating down the Missouri, on their way homeward; and prevailed upon, once more, to cross the mountains.  The haggard looks and naked condition of these men proved how much they had suffered.  After leaving Mr. Hunt’s party, they had made their way about two hundred miles to the southward, where they trapped beaver on a river which, according to their account, discharged itself into the ocean to the south of the Columbia, but which we apprehend to be Bear River, a stream emptying itself into Lake Bonneville, an immense body of salt water, west of the Rocky Mountains.

Having collected a considerable quantity of beaver skins, they made them into packs, loaded their horses, and steered two hundred miles due east.  Here they came upon an encampment of sixty lodges of Arapahays, an outlawed band of the Arrapahoes, and notorious robbers.  These fell upon the poor trappers; robbed them of their peltries, most of their clothing, and several of their horses.  They were glad to escape with their lives, and without being entirely stripped, and after proceeding about fifty miles further, made their halt for the winter.

Early in the spring they resumed their wayfaring, but were unluckily overtaken by the same ruffian horde, who levied still further contributions, and carried off the remainder of their horses, excepting two.  With these they continued on, suffering the greatest hardships.  They still retained rifles and ammunition, but were in a desert country, where neither bird nor beast was to be found.  Their only chance was to keep along the rivers, and subsist by fishing; but at times no fish were to be taken, and then their sufferings were horrible.  One of their horses was stolen among the mountains by the Snake Indians; the other, they said, was carried off by Cass, who, according to their account, “villainously left them in their extremities.”  Certain dark doubts and surmises were afterwards circulated concerning the fate of that poor fellow, which, if true, showed to what a desperate state of famine his comrades had been reduced.