"Bring Me His Ears"

by Clarence Edward Mulford

Under their eyes lay the Arkansas River, dotted with green islands, its channel four or five hundred yards wide, and so shallow that at normal stage it was formidable at many points. While its low, barren banks, only occasionally tinted with the green of cottonwoods, were desolate in appearance, they had a beauty peculiar and striking. As far as the eye could see spread the sand-hills and hillocks, like waves of some pale sea, here white and there yellow, accordingly as to how the light was reflected from them. Its appearance had been abrupt, the prairie floor rising slightly to the crumbling edge, below which and at some distance flowed the river, here forming the international boundary between Texas and the United States. While territorially Texas lay across the river, according to Texan claims, actually, so far as supervision was concerned, it was Mexico, for the Texan arm was yet too short to dominate it and the ordinary traveler let it keep its original name.

While its northern bank was almost destitute of timber, the southern one showed scattered clumps of cottonwood, protected from the devastating prairie fires from the North not only by the river itself, but also by the barren stretch of sand, over which the fires died from starvation. To the right of the caravan lay the grassy, green rolls of the prairie, to an imaginative eye resembling the long swells of some great sea; on the left a ribbon of pale tints, from gleaming whites to light golds which varied with the depths of the water and the height and position of the sun. Massive sand dunes, glittering in the sunlight made a rampart which stretched for miles up and down the river and struck the eye with the actinic power of pure, drifted snow. Here the nature of the prairie changed, losing its rich, luxuriant verdure, for here the short buffalo grass began to dominate to a noticeable extent.

The excitement spread. Eager couriers raced back to the plodding caravan to tell the news. Some of the more impressionable forthwith rode toward the river, only a few yards away, hot to be the first to splash in its waters; but they found that prairie air was deceptive and that the journey over the rolling hillocks was a great deal longer than they had thought. But a few miles meant nothing to them and they pushed on, careless of Comanche, Kiowa, or Pawnee Picts, some with their guns empty from the salute they had fired at sight of the stream. The caravan kept stolidly on, following a course roughly paralleling the river and not stopping until evening found it on the far side of Walnut Creek after they had crossed a belt of such poor grass that they had grave doubts about the pasturage at the encampment; and the flinty, uncompromising nature of the ground down the slope of the little divide, in which seemingly for eternity was graven the strands of the mighty trail, seemed to justify their fears. But then, while they were worrying the most, the grass improved and when they had crossed the creek not far from its mouth they found themselves in a little, timber-fringed valley thick with tall grass. And they now had entered one of the great danger spots of the long trail.

Hank Marshall got his fire started in a hurry while his partner looked after the pack mules; and when Tom came back to attend to the fire and prepare the supper, Hank dug into his "possible" sack and produced some line and a fish hook. Making a paste of flour, he mixed it with some dried moss he had put away and saved for this use. Rolling the little doughballs and hardening them over the fire he soon strode off up the creek, looking wise but saying nothing; and a quarter of an hour later he returned with three big catfish, one of which he ate after he had consumed a generous portion of buffalo hump-ribs; and he followed the fish by a large tongue raked out of the ashes of the fire. To judge from his expression he had enjoyed a successful and highly gratifying day, and since he was heavy and drowsy with his gorging and had to go on watch that night, he rolled up in his blanket under a wagon and despite the noise on all sides of him, fell instantly asleep. He had "set hisself" to awaken at eleven o'clock, which he would do almost on the minute and be thoroughly wide awake.

Fearing for the alertness of the sentries that night, a number of plainsmen and older traders agreed upon doing duty out of their turns and followed Hank's example, "settin'" themselves to awaken at different hours; and despite these precautions had a band of Pawnees discovered the camp that night they most certainly would have been blessed with success; and no one understood why the camp had not been discovered, for the crawling train made a mark on the prairie that could not be missed by savage eyes miles away.

Because of the height and the luxuriance of the grass within the corral the morning feeding, beyond the time needed for getting ready to leave, was dispensed with and the train got off to an early start, fairly embarked on the eastern part of the great buffalo range and a section of the trail where Indians could be looked for in formidable numbers.

This great plain fairly was crowded with bison and was dark with them as far as the eye could see. They could be numbered by the tens of thousands and actually impeded the progress of the caravan and threatened constant danger from their blind, unreasoning stampedes which the draft animals seemed anxious to join. Because of the matted hair in front of their eyes their vision was impaired; and the keenness of their scent often hurled them into dangers which a clearer eyesight would have avoided. So great did this danger become shortly after the train had left the valley of the Walnut that the rear guard, which had grown slightly as the days passed, now was sent out to protect the flanks and to strengthen the vanguard, which had fallen back within a few hundred feet of the leading wagons. Time after time the stupid beasts barely were kept from crashing blindly into the train, and the wagoners had the most trying and tiring day of the whole journey.

Several bands of Indians at times were seen in the distance pursuing their fleeing game, but all were apparently too busy to bother with the caravan, which they knew would stop somewhere for the night. No longer was there any need to freight buffalo meat to the wagons; for so many of the animals were killed directly ahead that the wagoners only had to check their teams and help each other butcher and load. This constant stopping, now one wagon and now another, threw the train out of all semblance of order and it wandered along the trail with its divisions mixed, which caused the sweat to stand out on the worried captain's forehead. His lieutenants threatened and swore and pleaded and at last, after the wagons had all they could carry of the meat, managed to get four passable divisions in somewhat presentable order.

While the caravan shuffled itself, chased buffalo out of the way, turned aside thundering ranks of the formidable-looking beasts, and had a time hectic enough to suit the most irrational, Pawnee Rock loomed steadily higher, steadily nearer, and the great sand-hills of the Arkansas stretched interminably into the West, each fantastic top a glare of dazzling light.

Well to the North, rising by degrees out of the prairie floor, and gradually growing higher and bolder as they neared the trail and the river, were a series of hills which terminated abruptly in a rocky cliff frowning down upon the rutted wagon road. From the distance the mirage magnified the ascending hills until they looked like some detached mountain range, which instead of growing higher as it was approached, shrunk instead. It was a famous landmark, silent witness of many bloody struggles, as famous on this trail as was Chimney Rock and Courthouse Rock along the great emigrant trail going up the Platte; but compared to them in height it was a dwarf. Here was a lofty perch from which the eagle eyes of Indian sentries could descry crawling caravans and pack trains, in either direction, hours before they reached the shadow of the rocky pile; and from where their calling smoke signals could be seen for miles around.