This was said by one of the most silent men, and best shots, who had enlisted with Captain Crim.
"That's so, for sartain!" cried one of my boys, with an oath.
"I jist tell yer, Cap!" said the man who had replied to Brighton Bill, as he kicked over one of the dead bodies in which a ball had perforated the skull—probably it was that of the Indian he had drawn a bead on, "this was a darned square bit of Injin cunning. Yer've shown 'em, two can play their game. I'm proud to sarve under yer."
Brighton Bill said no more.
He was evidently thinking profoundly upon the different style in which matters were managed in crossing the Plains, to that in which they might have been, in case of necessity, in his own country.
On rejoining the train at the head of the cañon, and reporting the affair to our Captain, he was pleased to say, I had proved the justice of what he had said, when he appointed me to the command of the party. The congratulations on my success, however, which I received from my companions, were considerably warmer and more gratifying. For some twenty-four hours, I actually found myself promoted by general acclamation to the position of a hero. A little pluck and caution count heavily on the Plains.
Bill, however, did not change his opinions. Although still as warmly as ever attached to me, he said on the same evening, while sitting round our camp-fire:
"I don't care, Mose! It would 'ave been more square to give 'em the lead, face to face."
Late on the following day we reached Thousand Spring Valley, where the head-waters of the Humboldt River take their rise. Here water and game were good and abundant, and the train remained two days to rest the stock, while I and some others scoured the adjacent country in quest of fresh meat.
A lovelier spot than this valley, it would, perhaps, be impossible to find in the whole continent, and I could, while I wandered through it, scarcely avoid reflecting on the change which a hundred, or in all probability no more than fifty, years might produce here. Then, it will be thoroughly peopled. Possibly, a great inland city may have been reared by the bustling and intelligent life of my country. The red man will have been effaced by the onward march of civilization, or compelled by sheer necessity to accept a settled life. A Sharp's rifle or a colt will no longer be possessions of paramount necessity to him who travels thitherward. The buffalo will have been cleared out from this section of the States, and an antelope steak will be a rarity. At that period a man of my, at this time, nomadic instincts will be compelled to search for fresh ground in which to develop and enjoy them. The interior of Africa or South America will be the only parts of the world in which he can follow the life of a wanderer, unchecked and unhindered.