CHAPTER VII.
Hides Bound for the Railroad.—I Go Into Partnership.—We Start North.—Grand Wild Animal Show.—The Wichita Mountains.—Wrong-wheel Jones.—I killed Eighty-eight Buffalo.—I was Verdigris-poisoned.—Traded Eagle Feathers for Pony.—Back South for a Winter's Hunt.
The freighters were instructed to look for these stakes after leaving Quinn's. Five days after Charlie's arrival, the freight teams arrived in camp. Each wagon had on a big rack, built like hay-racks. The hides were piled in this rack with a lap and boomed down tight like a load of hay. I have seen 200 bull-hides piled on one wagon. A dry bull-hide, as a rule, would weigh about fifty pounds. So the reader may have some idea of a train of six yokes of oxen to the team, lead and trail wagon to each team, the lead wagon hauling nearly 200 hides, and the trail hauling from 100 to 150. In bad places the trail was uncoupled while the lead wagon was drawn to good going. Then the driver would go back and bring up his trail wagon, couple on, and proceed.
It was quite a sight to see an outfit of twenty-five teams, as was frequently the case, weaving its way through the heart of the range. After loading at the camps, I piloted the freighters to our first camp, and my services were rendered to Hart and Hickey. By this time Quinn's was getting to be quite a headquarters for the hunters; so Charlie and I pulled for their place.
When we got there there were not less than twenty outfits, large and small, there. Some were going to the Canadian, up in the Panhandle, others were going west up the McKenzie trail to the Whitefish country and vicinity. Not one there knew or ever heard of the O Z brand. While here, Hart changed his mind about the Canadian hunt, and decided he would go to the Whitefish country. He believed from what he had heard that we were near the line of the second division of the great herds. He argued that the buffaloes were in three grand divisions: those from British America coming south in the summer, as far as the Platte river, and returning north in the fall; those in central western Texas going north to the Platte in summer, and returning south in the fall; and all from the Staked Plains region down to the Rio Grande were located, and they traveled east, west, north and south a certain distance, heading the wind. Part of all of which was fact.
But in six months more I knew more about the buffaloes than I did then. For all buffaloes had their nostrils for their protection. They were keen of scent, and would run quicker from scent than sight or sound.
I remember that in the Wolf creek country north of the Canadian, in July of this same year, the country was full of buffaloes; and there were some of them far north yet of the Arkansas river. The wind, what there was at a certain time, came from the southwest for seven consecutive days, and every buffalo was either traveling or headed that way; and on the eighth day the wind changed to the east about midnight, and blew pretty strong all the next day. And all day long the buffaloes moved eastward. That night there was heavy thunder and sharp lightning in the south; and just before daylight the wind whipped to the south and rain began to fall. As soon as it was light we noticed the buffaloes were headed south, and moving en masse.
Then again: In the following November, while hunting on a little tributary of Red river, when they were on their southward swing, there came up a "norther," a common term used in the southwest for a sudden cold spell, with the wind generally coming from the north. For three days they were headed north and northwest. So I, and all hunters of any observation, would be justifiable in saying that when unmolested, as a rule their heads were toward the wind.