through sheer exhaustion. I also noticed that nearly all the three year
old mules that went to Utah, in 1857, froze to death that winter, while
those whose ages varied from four, and up to ten, stood the winter and
came out in the spring in good working condition. In August, 1855, I
drove a six-mule team to Fort Riley, in Kansas Territory, from Fort
Leavenworth, on the Missouri River, loaded with twelve sacks of grain.
It took us thirteen days to make the trip. When we reached Fort Riley
there were not fifty mules, in the train of one hundred and fifty, that
would have sold at public sale for thirty dollars, and a great many gave
out on account of being too young and the want of proper treatment. In
the fall of 1860, I drove a six-mule team, loaded with thirty hundred
weight, twenty-five days' rations for myself and another man, and twelve
days' storage for the team, being allowed twelve pounds to each mule per
day. I drove this team to Fort Laramie, in Nebraska Territory, and from
there to Fort Leavenworth, on the Missouri River. I made the drive there
and back in thirty-eight days, and laid over two and a half days out of
that. The distance travelled was twelve hundred and thirty-six miles.
After a rest of two days, I started with the same team, and drove to
Fort Scott, in Kansas Territory, in five days, a distance of one hundred
and twenty miles. I went with Harney's command, and, for the most part
of the time, had no hay, and was forced to subsist our animals on dry
prairie grass, and had a poor supply of even that. Notwithstanding this,
I do not believe that any mule in the team lost as much as ten pounds of
flesh. Each of these mules, let me say, was upward of five years old.

In 1858, I took a train of mules to Camp Floyd, in Utah, forty-eight
miles south of Salt Lake City; During the march there were days and
nights that I could not get a drop of water for the animals. The young
mules, three and four years old, gave out from sheer exhaustion; while
the older ones kept up, and had to draw the wagons along. Now, there are