Stove-pipe's urbanity delighted me; "he was the mildest-mannered man that ever raised a scalp, or cut a throat." In his domestic concerns, however, he was, to say the least of it, peremptory. Returning to the reservation one day, after some Apache war, he learnt that his squaw had presented him with triplets. Being a modest man, in respect of family his requirements might have been more easily gratified. The news disturbed him, and he took action at once, thereupon cracking the three little skulls of his offspring upon the nearest available stone. Then he warned his wife that "he had not intended to marry a dog, and if she did it again, he would treat her pericranium in the same fashion." It was an unusual course to have pursued in such a case, perhaps; but, as the Secretary of one of the foremost of Liberal Associations in London (an extremely pleasant man, and an advanced thinker, enthusiastic, moreover, in the cause of civilisation) once remarked to me, concerning the infantine victims of some Holy-Russian atrocities in Central Asia, "What does it matter?—they would only have been savages after all." One of the beauties of civilisation—of being humane and wise, that is—lies in the fact that it absolves us of all duty towards our neighbour, if he be a savage, and permits us the privilege of "wiping him out" with a clear conscience, in the name of God.
The muffled sound of a wild chant reached us from a point hidden by a bend in the stream, and on walking to the overhanging bank, we found that it issued from a small beehive-shaped tent of blankets on the further side of the water. It was a sweat bath. Some large stones are heated in a fire, and placed on the floor in the centre of the tent, into which ten or a dozen men then crowd. A little water thrown on the stones generates steam, and this from time to time is renewed, whilst the bathers amuse themselves by chanting a chorus. Having perspired sufficiently, they plunge into cold water, and some of those who had completed the process, were lying stark naked in the sun to dry, or being dry, were sleeping.
We continued our cruise round the camp. Here one or two men were seated in a tent full of tanned deer-skins, which they were working up and softening with the hands; there, an industrious warrior was embroidering a mocassin or shirt; elsewhere were men occupied in hammering ornaments out of silver dollar or half-dollar pieces, or in burning patterns on the beautifully coloured beans, gathered in the Sierra Madre, with which they make bracelets and necklaces. For a little while, we watched a knot of men playing Nazouch, a monotonous and uninteresting game, to which the Apaches are passionately addicted. Finally we joined a ring of spectators that were gathered round some card-players.
It is refreshing, in these times of jaded appetites and blasé indifference, to see real interest displayed in anything. These men were in earnest. Their flashing glances, short, sharp utterances and cries, their vivid gestures, the élan with which, having secured the call, one or other of them would dash down lead after lead, and the lightning pounce with which an opponent would produce a trump or winning card to check such a one's career, were positively exciting.
The Apaches are inveterate gamblers, and hold cheating to be legitimate in their games, thus eliminating from it the stigma which attaches to it in civilised communities. Cards with them involves a trial of skill indeed, and I am told that they display a degree of subtilty in such trials that the blackleg fraternity in black cloth would have some difficulty in checkmating. Occasionally they club together and lay siege to a monte or faro bank. Only one of the subscribers to the pool plays at a time, but they succeed one another rapidly at the table until one or other of them has revealed a vein of luck. He is then allowed to play on until his good fortune appears to be wavering, when he is promptly superseded. They contrive thus always to play "the man in luck," and are said to achieve considerable success by this means.
The afternoon was wearing away when we quitted the charmed circle; we had a rough ride before us; and bidding adieu to our good-natured cicerone, therefore, once more turned our faces towards the Lang ranch.