ty."

So we put the horses into as much of a trot as the deep snow would allow,
and before long it was evident that we were gaining on our predecessors,
for the tracks grew more distinct. We hurried along, and at the end of
an hour the tracks looked still newer and fresher--but what surprised us
was, that the number of travelers in advance of us seemed to steadily
increase. We wondered how so large a party came to be traveling at such
a time and in such a solitude. Somebody suggested that it must be a
company of soldiers from the fort, and so we accepted that solution and
jogged along a little faster still, for they could not be far off now.
But the tracks still multiplied, and we began to think the platoon of
soldiers was miraculously expanding into a regiment--Ballou said they had
already increased to five hundred! Presently he stopped his horse and
said:

"Boys, these are our own tracks, and we've actually been circussing round
and round in a circle for more than two hours, out here in this blind
desert! By George this is perfectly hydraulic!"

Then the old man waxed wroth and abusive. He called Ollendorff all
manner of hard names--said he never saw such a lurid fool as he was, and
ended with the peculiarly venomous opinion that he "did not know as much
as a logarythm!"

We certainly had been following our own tracks. Ollendorff and his
"mental compass" were in disgrace from that moment.

After all our hard travel, here we were on the bank of the stream again,
with the inn beyond dimly outlined through the driving snow-fall. While
we were considering what to do, the young Swede landed from the canoe and
took his pedestrian way Carson-wards, singing his same tiresome song
about his "sister and his brother" and "the child in the grave with its
mother," and in a short minute faded and disappeared in the white
oblivion. He was never heard of again. He no doubt got bewildered and
lost, and Fatigue delivered him over to Sleep and Sleep betrayed him to
Death. Possibly he followed our treacherous tracks till he became
exhausted and dropped.

Presently the Overland stage forded the now fast receding stream and
started toward Carson on its first trip since the flood came. We
hesitated no longer, now, but took up our march in its wake, and trotted
merrily along, for we had good confidence in the driver's bump of
locality. But our horses were no match for the fresh stage team. We
were soon left out of sight;