“In traveling, he was nearly always to be seen on the top of the car, for he had an appreciative eye for scenery,—so much so, indeed, as sometimes to interfere with his duties. His great fault was procrastination.
“When we reached Durango he became very greatly depressed, and on my inquiring the reason for his melancholy, he attributes it to the dullness of the place; ‘for, ma’am, there is no excitement,—no one has been killed for two weeks. Not at all what I was led to expect.’ On reaching Leadville, he became much more cheerful, as he had only been in the city six hours before seeing two fights and half of another.
“His gait was something peculiar. It can best be described by the ditty we used to sing, my dear, which commemorates so touchingly the character and adventures of Susanna in her excursions abroad,—
‘When she walks she lifts her foot,
And then she puts it down again.’
“Long, lank, dark-skinned, dressed in flapping coat and immensely broad and excessively slouched sombrero (until my husband bought him a cap), with his loping walk and swinging elbows, he was easily recognized at a long distance; and as he would come sailing down upon us from afar, with arms full of bundles, he reminded one a little of some huge bird of prey.
“He had a wholesome fear of rattlesnakes and grizzly bears, which the wicked men of the fort maliciously represented to him, abounded in terrible numbers, and of the most ferocious kind wherever we went. ‘No, ma’am,’ he said, in his slow, stately way, when I cautioned him one day about trying to shoot a bear if he happened to meet one, as they were hard to kill and especially dangerous if wounded, ‘No, ma’am; if I meet a bear you just bet I don’t stay to take his portrait, but shin up the first tree I come to.’
“He was continually developing new accomplishments. We learned, after a few weeks, that we had not ‘prospected’ him thoroughly at the beginning. He proved to have had more experience than his youthful looks and aimlessness of motive lead us to expect. We had little occasion to call into use whatever knowledge he had acquired as a bar-keeper, because the education of the gentlemen of the party had not been neglected in that direction,—wholly in an amateur way, and they were accustomed, while ‘concocting elaborately commingled potations,’ (as they grandiloquently termed mixed drinks) to say to one another: ‘If you would have anything well done do it yourself.’
“One day, however, great delight was caused by the discovery that Burt was a barber. His services were at once required, and when, at the end of long labors, he was munificently offered two nickels, he declined them. This noble independence aroused ‘Chum’s’ admiration. He said that he was glad to see that the boy was free from the mercenary spirit so painful to witness in the young.
“Our porter seemed to consider the whole expedition a huge joke, and ourselves a show arranged for his especial benefit. If—as it frequently happened, for a more thoroughly heedless and forgetful youth never existed—we were obliged to expostulate with him on some neglect of duty, a seriousness of countenance would remain with him for some time, but the first joke that came to his ears dispelled it. Sullen, he never was, or ill natured; and if any real emergency occurred, more willing and unselfish help could not have been tendered by a firm friend than was tendered by this servant. I repent me, indeed, Mrs. McAngle, of having made fun of him, even in the privacy of a letter to you. The odor of the steaks that he cooked still lingers in my grateful nostrils; I remember that without him, material for many jokes would have been wanting, and I look on his fast vanishing, but always picturesque figure, with regret.”