One pretty morning John and myself started with the load, and left Dave and Charles in camp. We stopped at Bear Creek for the night; and directly after striking camp we had our attention attracted to a singular-looking object upon the side of the bluff away down the creek. We took out the glass, and it looked like a roll of buffalo-hides. After supper we picketed the horses, and taking our rifles, we strolled down the creek to investigate the curious object. Coming up to it we found it to be a buffalo-hide rolled up; and peeping in at one end we saw a man. The hide was taken from an old bull, and was almost an inch thick; and being frozen, it was as much as we could do to cut him from his narrow prison-walls. He was a middle-aged man, and was almost exhausted; but we took him to the fire and gave him to eat, and then heard his story. He said he was a cow-man from Texas, and had been to Granada and was returning when he was ingulfed in a furious blizzard a few miles north of Bear Creek. He said he had but two blankets, and having no matches, he knew he must perish; and happening to see a stray bull among the hills, he rode on to him and shot him, and concluded to take the hide to wrap himself in. His horse broke loose while he was skinning the bull, and he was left alone; so, spreading the hide upon the ground, fur side down, he spread the two blankets upon it, and then lay himself upon them and rolled up tightly. The green hide froze, and he was as securely incased as though he were within a steel boiler. He had been there five days; and being behind the bluff the sun had not reached and softened the hide. He said he had kept comfortable, with the exception of his feet, and with them he had suffered a great deal. Upon investigation, they were both found to be frozen; and we took him to Las Animas to the doctor, who amputated them both at the instep. He often said that a man without toes was better than no man, that he surely would have perished had he not captured the buffalo, and that, if we had not found him, a few days later the hide would have been his grave.
We found ready sale for our meat, and were soon steering again for the Cimaron. We came across several outfits, each of which had been more or less frozen in the late blizzard. Some had lost fingers, and others toes; and we heard of one whole outfit of three men, north of the Arkansas, freezing to death. We were not in the least injured, and we congratulated ourselves upon our being prepared with a good bed.
We came in sight of camp about sundown, and riding ahead and seeing no one about the camp, I concluded to try the boys; so, riding up over the hill, I came down upon the dug-out with a whoop, and fired several shots from my six-shooter as I circled to the east, and lying flat upon the pony I shot down a ravine just in front of the dug-out, my back being all that could be seen. Whiz! went a bullet just over my backbone; and I was satisfied that the boys were not asleep, and that they could shoot pretty well too. So I dismounted at a place in the gulch where my horse was hidden, and taking a white handkerchief I raised it to view to try the boys; but white flag or no white flag, the two old black gun-barrels lay up alongside of the cave door and there was no such thing as a flag of truce taking them down. I was a hundred yards off, and I swear I was afraid to put up my head to make myself known. At length they saw the team coming, and knowing my disposition, they then mistrusted that it was me in the ravine. When I was sure that the boys knew who I was, I mounted my poney and rode into camp. The boys acknowledged that I had completely deceived them, and that they took me for an Indian riding down there to draw them out, and then a whole band would fire upon them from every hill. Dave said he had done his finest to hit me on the wing, but he could see nothing but my back, and that went down the ravine as swift as a cork over the cataract of Niagara, and he supposed he shot wild. I told him that he did very well, and I would not like him to do better upon like occasions. Charley said he would like to have cut a suspender off anyhow, just to give me some caution.
We hunted for many miles around, including north-eastern New Mexico and the “pan-handle” of Texas. We had the hill-side covered with hides for some distance; and game becoming scarce, we concluded to pile up our hides and load up our outfit and start for other quarters. We followed the Cimaron down into Kansas; and just before we went into the territory we came on to a large herd of buffaloes, and killed enough to load our wagon with hides, leaving the rich, delicious meat to the wolves. We followed the river into the territory, and one evening a government officer with three men came out from Salt Springs to our camp; for we had been reported killing buffaloes in the territory. The officer rode up insultingly, and without any questions began to abuse us and call us trespassers and thieves, and said he had a great mind to upset the wagon and burn every hide we had. We told him we had not killed the buffaloes in the territory. But he continued his abuse; and thinking it about our time to talk, and being four against four, we told him we had enough talk now, and we wanted to see him burn the hides. We were well prepared; and seeing his position, he rode off with his men—I suppose partially convinced that a star upon the breast of an abusive scoundrel does not enable him to ride over honest men.
It was now getting late in the season, and we concluded to haul our hides to market and travel over the south during the summer. We left the outfit at the dug-out, and two stayed with it and the other two hauled hides. We took up two fall loads, and had as many more as we could haul with the outfit the third trip. We shipped them to Kansas City and sold them well, and struck a rich dividend. We camped up and down the Arkansas, fishing and occasionally shooting a deer among the brush along the river, and spending some time moving in the refined society of the valley, and now and then staying a little late conversing with the cultured daughters of the ranchmen. We spent many pleasant days and evenings thus; and after trimming up the outfit carefully, and laying in a good supply of ammunition and such eatables as we supposed would be needed on our trip, we were ready to start again for southern sights.
CHAPTER IV.
Summer Trip Through the South—Indian Agencies—Canadian River—Lion Fight—Red River—Double Mountain—Staked Plains—Pecos River—Indian Skirmish—Santa Fe, New Mexico—Return to the Arkansas Valley—Description of the Plains—Mirage—Dangers of the Prairie—Wild Horses and How Captured—Creasing Animals.
When the April sun of 1878 was high in the heavens, we bid farewell to our valley friends and wound merrily down the river. The green grass had begun to show itself, and the valley was lovely; and the little birds sported and sung in the bushes and little trees along the river-banks. As the houses became more and more numerous, we began to realize that we were going east to where somebody lived. Following the river on down, we passed through the Creek and Cherokee agencies, and also the Chocktaw country, and were very much interested in our Indian observations. The Cherokees are far advanced in civilization, and are by far the most intelligent tribe.
They have school-houses, and churches, and pretty villages; and some have carpet upon their floors. They appear to enjoy their new mode of living, and take pride in their pretty homes. I may also state that there are some very pretty girls among them. All the agency lands that we passed through were the best that the sun ever warmed. Though Uncle Sam reaches forth his bountiful hand whenever the weakest red man asks, most of the tribes appear restless; and though there is much game in the territory, and notwithstanding that they are let out of the agency once a year to hunt over the wide wild country, their eyes are restless, their faces itch for the war-paint, and they long to sally forth beneath the white-eagle plume, to ring the valleys with their wild war-whoop, and wash the hatchet in the white man’s blood. The farming implements furnished them are left to rust, and they indolently exist upon the nation’s bounty.
Every Indian nation in the United States to-day, who will receive them, have beautiful reservations, which are the very gardens of the Union; and their every want is most bounteously supplied. The only tribes that are to-day suffering are those who will not receive from the hand of plenty. But in spite of all this, there are some of the tribes breaking from their agencies every few months and committing their bloody outrages, which boil a human’s blood; and the clemency of the Government is exhibited by its capturing the murderers and placing them back upon their homes, giving them new blankets and rifles, and telling them not to do so again,—sometimes giving them a trial, but rarely giving them the deserved penalty. Persons seated in their comfortable mansions in the land from whence savagedom has long since been driven, and where the protecting arm of civilization is thrown around them, are prone to speak of the poor Indian eking out a miserable livelihood from the western deserts and barren mountains, and continually persecuted and provoked by the cruel white man, only waiting for an opportunity to kill them off. Oh, fie! Go see what I have seen, and learn the truth, and your sympathies will be banished by bitter scorn. Go see the poor emigrant, who has taken his little family to a new home in the sundown land, shot down at his labor and scalped in the furrow, his dear wife and innocent babes crushed with the hatchet, their blood spilled upon the cabin floor, and their brains spattered against the wall. Go