By the 5th of October, some simple prescriptions, together with an “Indian sweat,” had so far benefited Mr. Crooks, that he was enabled to move about; they therefore set forward slowly, dividing his pack and accoutrements among them, and made a creeping day’s progress of eight miles south.  Their route for the most part lay through swamps caused by the industrious labors of the beaver; for this little animal had dammed up numerous small streams, issuing from the Pilot Knob Mountains, so that the low grounds on their borders were completely inundated.  In the course of their march they killed a grizzly bear, with fat on its flanks upwards of three inches in thickness.  This was an acceptable addition to their stock of elk meat.  The next day Mr. Crooks was sufficiently recruited in strength to be able to carry his rifle and pistols, and they made a march of seventeen miles along the borders of the plain.

Their journey daily became more toilsome, and their sufferings more severe, as they advanced.  Keeping up the channel of a river, they traversed the rugged summit of the Pilot Knob Mountain, covered with snow nine inches deep.  For several days they continued, bending their course as much as possible to the east, over a succession of rocky heights, deep valleys, and rapid streams.  Sometimes their dizzy path lay along the margin of perpendicular precipices, several hundred feet in height, where a single false step might precipitate them into the rocky bed of a torrent which roared below.  Not the least part of their weary task was the fording of the numerous windings and branchings of the mountain rivers, all boisterous in their currents, and icy cold.

Hunger was added to their other sufferings, and soon became the keenest.  The small supply of bear and elk meat which they had been able to carry, in addition to their previous burdens, served but for a short time.  In their anxiety to struggle forward, they had but little time to hunt, and scarce any game in their path.  For three days they had nothing to eat but a small duck, and a few poor trout.  They occasionally saw numbers of the antelopes, and tried every art to get within shot; but the timid animals were more than commonly wild, and after tantalizing the hungry hunters for a time, bounded away beyond all chance of pursuit.  At length they were fortunate enough to kill one:  it was extremely meagre, and yielded but a scanty supply; but on this they subsisted for several days.

On the 11th, they encamped on a small stream, near the foot of the Spanish River Mountain.  Here they met with traces of that wayward and solitary being, M’Lellan, who was still keeping on ahead of them through these lonely mountains.  He had encamped the night before on this stream; they found the embers of the fire by which he had slept, and the remains of a miserable wolf on which he had supped.  It was evident he had suffered, like themselves, the pangs of hunger, though he had fared better at this encampment; for they had not a mouthful to eat.