They kept on up the stream for quite a little way, and then leaving it, went around to their horses again. Hugh looked at the sun as they mounted, and said, "We have lots of time to get back to camp, and I think it might be worth while for us, on our way back, to go down to the two traps we set below. We might easily have something in one of them, seeing how tame these beaver are, and how they seem to be out all day long."
On the way back, they stopped as suggested, but only went near enough to the bank of the stream to see that neither trap had been disturbed, and then returned to camp. Half an hour was spent in stretching the lion's skin that Jack had killed the day before, and while they were at work at this Hugh said, "There seem to be quite a lot of lions in this country, son, and it's worth while to kill one every chance we get. We might run across a camp of Utes down here, and the Utes, like all other Indians that I know anything about, think a great deal of lion's skins. The chances are that you could trade this skin for three or four good beaver, and of course those would be worth a great deal more than a lion's skin, which is good for nothing except to look at. The Indians, you know, like lions' skins to make bow cases and quivers. I have often thought that maybe they have the same idea about the lion's skin that they do about the feathers of hawks or owls."
"How do you mean, Hugh?" asked Jack.
"Why," said Hugh, "you know that the Indians think a great deal of all the birds that catch their prey; that is, the eagles, hawks, and owls; they value them and their feathers in war, and they think that wearing those things helps them to be successful in war. I suppose the idea is that as the hawk or the eagle is fierce and strong and successful in attacking his enemies, so they, if they wear his feathers, will be fierce and strong and successful. In other words, they think that the qualities of the bird will be given to them if they have about them something that belongs to the bird.
"Well, now, here's a mountain lion; he is cunning and cautious, creeping about and scarcely ever being seen, able to catch his prey and hold and kill it with his sharp claws and his strong teeth, and maybe the Indians think that if they have about them something that belongs to him they will also have some of his qualities."
"Jerusalem, Hugh," said Jack, "I like to hear you tell about what the Indians believe, and why they believe it. I wonder if most men who have seen much of Indians understand as well as you do how they think about things. Of course, it's fun to hear you tell about their habits and what they do, but it's better fun yet to hear you tell about how they think about the different matters of their living."
"Well, son," said Hugh, "I've talked a heap with Indians about all these matters, and I do like to hear how they feel about them. I guess maybe there are lots of other people feel the way you and I do; but most of the old-time hunters and mountain men didn't think about much of anything except gathering a lot of fur and then going in and selling it, and getting their money and spending it as quick as they could, and then starting out to get more fur.
"I mind that once your uncle, when I was telling him some story about Indians, said to me, 'The proper study of mankind is man,' and when I told him I thought so, too, he said that that was something that some poet said a couple of hundred years ago."
"Well, I guess it's so, Hugh," said Jack, "no matter who it was said it."