It was really the most critical point in our experience.

After three or four days all hope of detecting the criminal had passed, and all danger was over out of any difficulty.
One night we had a fair camp, as we were close to the base of the snow butte, and found a hole of clear or what seemed to be living water.
There were a few minnows in it not much more than an inch long.

This was among a big pile of rocks, and around these the oxen found some grass.
There now appeared to be a pass away to the south as a sort of outlet to the great plain which lay to the north of us, but immediately west and across the desert waste, extending to the foot of a low black range of mountains, through which there seemed to be no pass, the distant snowy peak lay still farther on, with Martin's pass over it still a long way off though we had been steering toward it for a month.

Now as we were compelled to go west this impassable barrier was in our way and if no pass could be found in it we would be compelled to go south and make no progress in a westerly direction.
Our trail was now descending to the bottom of what seemed to be the narrowest part of the plain, the same one the Jayhawkers had started across, further north, ten days before.

When we reached the lowest part of this valley we came to a running stream, and, as dead grass could be seen in the bed where the water ran very slowly, I concluded it only had water in it after hard rains in the mountains, perhaps a hundred miles, to the north.