It went on, even though nearly half his force of nine thousand were needed to keep the line clear of snow, and his reports showed so little progress that the partners in California were newly alarmed. In December, Stanford and Hopkins, up from balmy Sacramento to view the battle for themselves, stood shivering on a snowbank above Cisco while five locomotives strained futilely to drive a snowplow through thirty-foot drifts. They returned to the lowlands convinced that Crocker’s reports of his troubles were not all imagined.
