kill rx:iy horses for old Hardcoop." Some offered to
go back on foot and bring Hardcoop forw^ard. but the
others refused to wait for them.
Daily their cattle lessened in number, some drop- ping from exhaustion, some being shot or stolen by the natives. In such cases, wagons and property were buried at different points. One of the party, a Ger- man, having lost all his oxen, wished the company to stop while he concealed his effects. This the others refused to do ; so selecting two men, likewise Germans, he prevailed on them to help him, assuring them that they could easily overtake the train. Three days after the two men came up, and told a story of on- slaught by the savages, in which their employer was killed and the property burned. As the dead man had money, no one doubted that the others murdered him for it. Intense selfishness governed the actions of women as well as of men. Eddy, having lost all his property, picked up one of his children, and his wife another, and thus they marched along, until fainting, they begged first of one woman and then of another, a little meat to save their little ones from starvation. They were everywhere refused. Unable to get water, Eddy begged a pint of one who had ten gallons, and was likewise refused. " I will have it, or your life," cried the man, now desperate, and took it accordingly. The Donners had suffered severely with the rest, but up to this time their losses were less than some of the others.
On the 29th of October, they reached the eastern base of the Sierra, which loomed before them high into the heavens, a white wall glistening with frosted pines. Climbing upward as far as they could go, they found the top of Truckee pass five feet under snow. Returning to a cabin near their camp of the preceding night, they rested next day, and on the 31st the whole party again attempted to cross the mountains. They ascended to within three miles of the summit, where they now found ten feet of snow, each moment thick-
