When a man recals some sensation with more than ordinary pleasure, it is very usual for him, particularly if he is a writer of travels, to ask you if you have experienced the same. Says one “reader, did you ever witness a sun-set from Chimborazo?� Says the other “reader, did you ever eat a mangostein?� Unfortunately the reader is unable to reply until the description of these wonders has been perpetrated. I have alluded to this custom in excuse for asking the reader if he ever groomed his own horse and derived pleasure from it? If not, I recommend him after he has managed Chimborazo and the mangostein to try it. Mainspring’s coat was daily rubbed by me, when my own coat hung neglected on a peg; but the fact is, he was a very handsome horse, and in the mines such a rarity is a passport. With the natural vanity of man, I found that Mainspring attracted more attention than I did, so I allowed my beard to run to seed, and bestowed all my pains in beautifying the dumb animal.
You, madam, who have viewed with pleasure the envious glances that have been cast on the lovely bonnet you wore at Chiswick, will understand the emotions I felt when miners left their pits and claims to pronounce with less spleen upon the beauties of my steed.
The Old Soldier and Choctaw were seldom groomed; the mud in which, of course, they wallowed, was generally removed from their coats with a spade, and on grand occasions they were finished off with a broom. Rowe had a cream-coloured mare that was considered by the miners “some pumpkins,� an expression which indicates great merit, and is equally applied to a chew of tobacco, or the President of the United States.
We generally rode into Sonora of an evening, for we were always in want of something, and our drills and pickaxes, in particular, soon became blunted by the hard quartz, and had to be tempered again by the Sonora blacksmith. We would return by moonlight, and had always to pass through a camp of Mexicans of the worst character; these fellows not only cast their covetous glances on our horses in open daylight, but on more than one occasion they attempted at night to entrap us into a position that would have left us unable to defend either our lives or our beasts. They had a quantity of curs in their camp, and these, as we rode through in the moonlight, would rush out, being set upon us, and worry us on all sides with their yelping; they would follow us, howling, for some distance, and our natural impulse was to shoot them with our revolvers, for they were like wolves, but we were soon wise enough to refrain from discharging our fire-arms, for we should thus have left ourselves defenceless, against the half-dozen mounted ruffians we would encounter higher up the road, waiting, undoubtedly, for this result.
Two armed white men need fear little interruption from Mexicans provided a proper amount of caution is exercised, and no sign of trepidation is evinced. But their first principle is to attempt to throw you off your guard, therefore the best rule in meeting such men is to insist at once that they do not approach within the distance at which they can throw their deadly lasso, a weapon more formidable in the dark than fire-arms. Whenever, singly or with Rowe, I met a party of mounted Mexicans in the mines, I drew up on one side of the road until they passed, and after dusk I took the precaution of warning them to a respectful distance, nor was this unnecessary, for the Mexicans encamped round Tuttle Town committed many murders, and my horse alone was sufficient inducement for them, independent of the sums of money that the necessities of my party often required me to carry of a night.
One morning on entering the canvas stable that adjoined my hut, I discovered that Mainspring was gone; his halter had been cut, and there was no doubt that he had been stolen. Fortunately a drizzly rain was falling sufficient to moisten the ground, and this had probably set in about an hour after the thieves had removed the horse at the risk of their lives. Without some knowledge of Mexican cunning, it would have been useless to have attempted to track a stolen horse of Mainspring’s fleetness. We presumed at starting that he had been taken over the table mountain in our rear, as his foot prints could leave no trace behind for some miles in that direction.
Rowe and I then started on the search, and after crossing the mountain we halted at a gulch. With some trouble we discovered at last that the horse had crossed here, for he had one cutting shoe, the heel of which left a slight imprint; from the gulch we traced him to a tree, and here the ground being covered with dead leaves and brushwood, all sign was lost. Accident favoured us, for a few miles further on we again hit his trail at another gulch, but here he appeared to be returning. A close inspection, however, proved that his shoes had been turned, for the heel of the cutting shoe was on the wrong side, still we lost him again among the trees, and as evening advanced we began to despair. But soon we arrived at a Mexican encampment, and here by some stupid oversight on the part of the thieves, Mainspring’s rug was left lying exposed on the ground. All had protested their ignorance of the matter on our arrival, but now with the blanket staring them in the face, they soon produced the horse from a distant tent in the bushes, and assured us that a man had left it there that morning, and had gone on his way.
But a Mexican who was sleeping in a tent in mud-splashed clothes was the thief, I knew: he started when I roused him up suddenly and held the blanket before his eyes: but he swaggered out in apparent unconcern, and lighting a cigarito with admirable sang-froid, he began to play at cards with one of the others. I was too glad to recover Mainspring, to care about troubling myself by taking the Mexican back to Tuttle Town on suspicion, and I dare say he was not sorry when Rowe and I departed, for a horse thief in the mines has not much chance of his life when detected, and of this he is fully aware. It has ever puzzled me on reflection, that where so much pains had been taken to remove all trace of the horse, the glaring evidence of the theft should be left forgotten in open daylight, and I am inclined to think that the horse thieves considered themselves safe from pursuit, and were rather surprised at our appearance. From that day our horses were chained and padlocked every night.
The American residents of our mining village were very sociable and kind, and the good feeling they evinced towards us added materially to our comfort.