15. Passed the Mormon station, saw a party of Californians and Mexicans
prospecting. There is gold this side of the mountains. Entered the
seven mile Kanyon, which begins the real pass of the Sierra Nevada. A
branch of the Carson River runs through it, which stream we follow to
its head. The Kanyon is a wild, picturesque place, with perpendicular
wall of gray granite hundreds of feet high, with lofty pines in the
bottoms, and a perfect chaos of granite blocks rent from the walls
above. We were compelled to camp in it with nothing for our horses to
eat, which somewhat destroyed the romance of the thing; as for eating
ourselves, it is so long since we have had anything to eat that we
don't trouble ourselves about it.