Sometimes we would see a small party of Indians at a short distance from us.  I would step to my instrument, and turn the glass towards them.  They would at once commence to scamper, throw sand, turn into all manner of shapes, lie down, roll over, thinking no doubt it was a gun or something that would destroy them.  At one time, I attempted to cross from the sink of the Mohave river to Providence, some sixty miles, expecting to find water at Washburn’s well.  This was a hole which I afterwards found dug down about ten feet in the white sand that covers this desert.  On this sand not any thing grows, but musquit bush, which bears a bean that the Indians eat.

After travelling to within twelve miles of the mountain, my animals and my men all gave out.  We did not have a drop of water, and my chart said that there was none short of the mountain.  I told the boys that evening was coming on, and I would take some leather bottles we had and go and get some water as quickly as I could.  So just before dark, I started with bottles enough to hold twenty quarts.  I had a trail to follow in the dark, not over a foot in width.  After what seemed to me the longest twelve miles I ever travelled, I arrived at the mountain.  After following the ravine through the top, I found the spring, drank heartily, filled my bottles, and started on my return trip.  I arrived at the place where I had left my men, just as the day was breaking.  After giving them a good drink, I gave some to each of the animals, any one of which would drink from a canteen or bottle.

We then all immediately started on towards the mountain, at which place we finally arrived.  When within about fifty yards of the spring, I saw a small party of Indians camped just above it.  One of them, the chief, stepped forward, and in Spanish ordered me to stop.  And here let me say, that almost all of the Indians, especially their chiefs, can talk Spanish.  When he ordered me to stop, I burst out into a laugh, and asked him “what for.”  My boys in the meantime were preparing for a fight.  I told them to put up their weapons, as I did not wish to commence fighting the Indians here, as there were lots of them, and we had a good deal of work to do in that vicinity.  Though we might kill or capture all of this party, a larger band might attack us in the future.  So I told the boys that if they would keep still, I would bother the Indians a little, and then let them go.  This was agreed to.  Upon my asking the chief what for, he said,

“This water belongs to the Indians.”

I replied, “Do you call yourselves Indians?  You are nothing but squaws and papooses.  I was here last night, and got water under your very noses, and you did not know it.”

“The white captain,” the chief replied, “talks with two tongues.  He lies.”

“You are the one that lies,” I rejoined.  “Has the chief lost his eyesight?  Is he so old that he cannot see the white man’s trail?  Let him come forward and meet his white brother alone, and he will show him his trail.”