We moved that day down the river about ten miles. We camped in a hackberry and elm grove, at the mouth of a big coulée. This term is used more in the Dakotas than in Texas, meaning ravine, draw, cañon, arroyo,—all these terms being nearly synonymous. It was an ideal camping-ground. Plenty of wood, water, grass, and protection from storms. I commenced at once to make myself useful. Buck and his father's family camped separately. Each outfit had a good tent; Buck's tent was ten by twelve feet, his father's, twelve by fourteen feet. Simpson lived with Mr. Wood, senior. Buck and his wife lived alone. Buck invited me to make my home with him, which invitation I gladly accepted.
The first thing in order was unhitching the team; the harness was hung over each front wheel, collars hung on the front hounds of the wagon. Then the grass scalped off where the camp-fire was to be, when not using the cook-stove. Wood was to be gathered, the camp-fire built, water brought, the cooking utensils and mess box placed near the fire, Mrs. Wood getting the meals and Buck and I putting up the tent, carrying in the bedding, leveling the rough places, and making down the beds.
This was the universal custom when camping. And the sun had not yet gone down when supper was eaten. I walked up onto a little hill, just back of our camp, where I had a good view back up the coulée, to the north. I was not more than one hundred yards from camp, and after looking a little bit to make sure, I said in a strong voice that "I believed I saw five thousand buffalo." Buck, his father, and George, all came up with their guns; and as they looked and ejaculated I thought my estimate very considerate. The old gent said there were ten thousand in sight, this minute, not counting those in the gulches and ravines that we could not see.
After looking at them a short time we all went down to camp and held a council. Buck said if I would stay with him he would make a killing as long as it would pay to stay; said he would give me 30 cents apiece for all the buffaloes I would skin and peg out. That is to say: after the hides were brought into camp and little holes cut through them around the outer edge and pegs about six inches long, sharpened at one end and driven into the ground through the holes, commencing the work by first driving three pegs at the neck end of the hide, then going to the tail end, and pulling on the hide to a proper degree and driving two pegs, one on each side of the tail, then so on all around it, stretching the hide in a proper and uniform shape. I told him I would stay with him indefinitely if I could get to where I could get some clothes, a gun, and plenty of tobacco.
I omitted, previously, to state that I was an inveterate chewer and smoker at the time; and what made the last day of my pilgrimage to the Adobe Walls worse was, that I ran out of both chewing and smoking tobacco. I told Mr. Wood so the morning that I came to them; told him "how I had missed my tobacco the day before." He gave me a piece, and said they nearly all used it, and had plenty of it. But it did not taste natural to me until this evening.
I now briefly gave the party my antecedents, and when I came to that part, and had related it, of the last few days' experience, they acted toward me more like father, mother, brothers and sisters than mere chance acquaintances.
George Simpson said: "I'll tell you what we will do: let's hunt here a few days until the bulk of these buffalo pass, then you and I will take two of the horses, some coffee, salt, and a little flour, and go back and get your gun and outfit." All of which was agreed to.
That night I slept soundly, and was awakened next morning by the crowing of the roosters. Each family had a coop of chickens. I got up feeling well refreshed.
After building the camp-fire, Buck and his wife came out of the tent. We all helped to get the breakfast, and soon after eating it was light enough to see the horses, which we soon had the harness on. We unloaded the wagon and hitched the team to it. Then, with a steel, a ripping-knife and a skinning-knife, together with an old Enfield rifle, I drove up the coulée behind Buck, who was on horseback, carrying a 50-caliber Sharp's rifle, a belt buckled around his waist containing thirty-two cartridges, besides a dozen loose ones in his coat pocket.