He then progressed southward through what are now Washoe, Humboldt, Churchill and Lyon counties, and over the California line into Mono County, back again into Douglas, and thence over the mountains south of Lake Tahoe, but did not find Mary’s Lake, nor the places upon which he relied to recruit his animals and give rest to his party.  He did, however, find Pyramid Lake.  This being the body of water into which the Truckee River flows, and the Truckee being the only outlet to Lake Tahoe, it is well that this portion of the account be given in full.  Fremont and Carson were on ahead.  The day was January 10, 1843.  Fremont writes: 

Leaving a signal for the party to encamp, we continued our way up the hollow, intending to see what lay beyond the mountain.  The hollow was several miles long, forming a good pass (some maps designate this pass as Fremont Pass, others as San Emidio Canyon), the snow deepened to about a foot as we neared the summit.  Beyond, a defile between the mountains descended rapidly about two thousand feet; and, filling up all the lower space, was a sheet of green water, some twenty miles broad (Pyramid Lake).  It broke upon our eyes like the ocean.  The neighboring peaks rose high above us.  One peak, on the eastern side of the lake, rises nearly forty-four hundred feet above the lake, and on the side (toward which Fremont was looking) one peak rises 4925 feet above the lake; and we ascended one of them to obtain a better view.

The waves were curling in the breeze, and their dark-green color showed it to be a body of deep water.  For a long time we sat enjoying the view, for we had become fatigued with mountains, and the free expanse of moving waves was very grateful.  It was set like a gem in the mountains, which, from our position, seemed to inclose it almost entirely.  At the western end it communicated with the line of basins we had left a few days since; and on the opposite side it swept a ridge of snowy mountains, the foot of the great Sierra.  Its position at first inclined us to believe it Mary’s Lake, but the rugged mountains were so entirely discordant with descriptions of its low rushy shores and open country, that we concluded it some unknown body of water, which it afterwards proved to be.

On January 13th we followed again a broad Indian trail along the shore of the lake to the southward.  For a short space we had room enough in the bottom; but, after traveling a short distance, the water swept the foot of the precipitous mountains, the peaks of which are about 3000 feet above the lake.  The trail wound around the base of these precipices, against which the water dashed below, by a way nearly impracticable for the howitzer.  During a greater part of the morning the lake was nearly hid by a snowstorm, and the waves broke on the narrow beach in a long line of foaming surf, five or six feet high.  The day was unpleasantly cold, the wind driving