I felt I was in constant danger, but could do nothing else but go on and keep eyes open trusting to circumstances to get out of any sudden emergency that might arise.
As I recollect this was Christmas day and about dusk I came upon the camp of one man with his wife and family, the Rev.J.W.Brier, Mrs.
Brier and two sons.

I inquired for others of his party and he told me they were somewhere ahead.

When I arrived at his camp I found the reverend gentleman very cooly delivering a lecture to his boys on education.

It seemed very strange to me to hear a solemn discourse on the benefits of early education when, it seemed to me, starvation was staring us all in the face, and the barren desolation all around gave small promise of the need of any education higher than the natural impulses of nature.

None of us knew exactly where we were, nor when the journey would be ended, nor when substantial relief would come.
Provisions were wasting away, and some had been reduced to the last alternative of subsisting on the oxen alone.