In the first disappointment we felt from the dissipation of our dream of the fertile islands, I called this Disappointment Island.

"Out of the drift wood, we made ourselves pleasant little lodges, open to the water, and, after having kindled large fires to excite the wonder of any straggling savage on the lake shores, lay down, for the first time in a long journey, in perfect security; no one thinking about his arms. The evening was extremely bright and pleasant; but the wind rose during the night, and the waves began to break heavily on the shore, making our island tremble. I had not expected in our inland journey to hear the roar of an ocean surf; and the strangeness of our situation, and the excitement we felt in the associated interests of the place, made this one of the most interesting nights I remember during our long expedition.

"In the morning the surf was breaking heavily on the shore, and we were up early. The lake was dark and agitated, and we hurried through our scanty breakfast, and embarked-having first filled one of the buckets with water from the lake, of which it was intended to make salt. The sun had risen by the time we were ready to start; and it was blowing a strong gale of wind, almost directly off the shore, and raising a considerable sea, in which our boat strained very much. It roughened as we got away from the island, and it required all the efforts of the men to make any head against the wind and sea, the gale rising with the sun; and there was danger of being blown into one of the open reaches beyond the island. At the distance of half a mile from the beach, the depth of water was sixteen feet, with a clay bottom; but, as the working of the boat was very severe labor, and during the operation of rounding it was necessary to cease paddling, during which the boat lost considerable way, I was unwilling to discourage the men, and reluctantly gave up my intention of ascertaining the depth, and the character of the bed. There was a general shout in the boat when we found ourselves in one fathom, and we soon after landed on a low point of mud, immediately under the butte of the peninsula, where we unloaded

the boat and carried the baggage about a quarter of a mile to firmer ground. We arrived just in time for meridian observation, and carried the barometer to the summit of the butte, which is 500 feet above the lake. Mr. Preuss set off on foot for the camp, which was about nine miles distant; Basil accompanying him to bring back horses for the boat and baggage.

"The rude-looking shelter we raised on the shore, our scattered baggage and boat lying on the beach, made quite a picture; and we called this the Fisherman's Camp. Lynosiris graveolens, and another new species of OBIONE (O confertifolia--Torr. & Frem.), were growing on the low grounds, with interspersed spots of an unwholesome salt grass, on a saline clay soil, with a few other plants.

"The horses arrived late in the afternoon, by which time the gale had increased to such a height that a man could scarcely stand before it; and we were obliged to pack our baggage hastily, as the rising water of the lake had already reached the point where we were halted. Looking back as we rode off, we found the place of recent encampment entirely covered. The low plain through which we rode to the camp was covered with a compact growth of shrubs of extraordinary size and luxuriance. The soil was sandy and saline; flat places, resembling the beds of ponds, that were bare of vegetation, and covered with a powdery white salt, being interspersed among the shrubs. Artemisia tridentata was very abundant, but the plants were principally saline; a large and vigorous thenopodiaceous shrub, five to eight feet high, being characteristic, with Fremontia vermicularis, and a shrubby plant which seems to be a new salicornia. We reached the camp in time to escape a thunder storm which blackened the sky, and were received with a discharge of the howitzer by the people, who, having been unable to see anything of us on the lake, had begun to feel some uneasiness."

On the 4th of November, Col. Fremont and his party reached Fort Vancouver, on the Columbia River,

the appointed terminus of his journey. He remarks in his journal that it would have been very gratifying to have gone down to the Pacific, and solely in the interest and in the love of geography, to have seen the ocean on the western as well as on the eastern side of the continent, so as to give a satisfactory completeness to the geographical picture which had been formed in his mind; but the rainy season had now regularly set in, and the air was filled with fogs and rain, which left no beauty in any scenery, and obstructed observations. The object of his instructions had been entirely fulfilled in having connected his reconnoissance with the surveys of Captain Wilkes; and although it would have been agreeable and satisfactory to have completed there his astronomical observations, he did not feel that for such a reason he would be justified in waiting for favorable weather. He therefore signified his intention to his companions to set out for the east without an hour's unnecessary delay.

CHAPTER V.

SECOND EXPLORING EXPEDITION CONTINUED SETS OUT FROM FORT VANCOUVER-INTERESTING INDIAN COUNCIL-SPEECH OF COL. FREMONT JOURNEY THROUGH THE MOUNTAINSINSANITY OF HIS MEN FROM PRIVATION AND COLD-PREUSS LOSES HIS WAY-ARRIVAL AT THE RANCHE OF CAPTAIN SUTTER.

IN two days, preparations for their return were completed, and on the 10th of November, his little party embarked on their homeward journey, in which he contemplated a circuit to the south and southeast, and the exploration of the Great Basin between the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevada. Three principal objects were indicated, by report or by maps, as being on this route, the character or existence of which he wished to ascertain, and which he assumed as land. marks, or leading points, on the projected line of return. The first of these points was the Tlamath Lake, on the table-land between the head of Fall River, which comes to the Columbia, and the Sacramento, which goes to the bay of San Francisco; and from which lake a river of the same name makes its way westwardly direct to the ocean. The position of this lake, on the line of inland communication between

Oregon and California; its proximity to the demarkation boundary of latitude 42°; its imputed double character of lake, or meadow, according to the season of the year; and the hostile and warlike character attributed to the Indians about it-all made it a desirable object to visit and examine. From this lake he intended to go about southeast, to a reported lake called Mary's, distant some days' journey in the Great Basin; and thence, still on southeast, to the reputed Buenaventura River, which has had a place in many maps, countenancing a belief in the existence of a great river flowing from the Rocky Mountains to the bay of San Francisco. From the Buenaventura his destination was that section of the Rocky Mountains which includes the heads of Arkansas River, and of the opposite waters of the California gulf; and thence down the Arkansas to Bent's fort, and home. This was his projected line of return-a great part of it absolutely new to geographical, botanical, and geological science and the subject of endless rumors of lakes, rivers, deserts, and savages hardly above the condition of wild animals, all tending to inflame his curiosity and love of adventure to its highest pitch.

It was a serious enterprise, at the commencement of winter, to undertake the passage of such a region, and with a party consisting only of twenty-five persons, and they of many nations-American, French, German, Canadian, Indian, and colored-and most of them young, several of them being under twenty-one years of age. All knew that a strange country was to be explored, and dangers and hardships to be encountered; but no one blenched at the prospect. On the contrary, courage and confidence animated the whole party.