“I heard him refuse a pull at the Indian agent’s flask, between Devil’s Landing and Fort Jones.”
“No doubt. That is George’s gnat. He makes it a point never to drink while driving. But he had swallowed his camel before he took the ribbons at Devil’s Landing, and he will swallow another when he reaches Artesian Wells, where his route ends. Aye! and keep swallowing camels every time he wakes up during the night, and until he mounts the box for his return trip to-morrow.”
“What a fearful life for a man to lead!” I said.
“Yes, indeed,” said the lieutenant, “and the ending is still more fearful. George’s team will bring him in some fine morning stone-dead on the box, with the ribbons still in his stiffened fingers.”
“I can imagine,” I answered, “how a man who is excited by strong drink may find pleasure in it, though it may tempt him to break things and get him into many a fight. But I cannot for the life of me imagine why those dead-alive drinkers continue the habit.”
“I suppose they can’t stop it,” said the lieutenant. “They have gone too far to turn back. Death is behind them as well as before.”
Our conversation was interrupted by a series of prolonged howls from George:
“Hi-hi-hi-hi,” etc., ad libitum.
I was very much startled by these vocal efforts. I thought “it was Indians.” Next it struck me that George’s last fit of delirium tremens had commenced, and he was about to become dangerous. My military companion, noticing my astonishment, kindly explained that this was the usual signal to the station-keeper. The drivers commence their howls of warning when they arrive within a mile or so of the station. Their peculiar cry can be heard quite a long way off.
When we were quite near the station, we overtook an ox-wagon with its solitary driver walking by the side of his animals, and giving the talismanic “whoa haws!” and “gees” by which the movements of these clumsy beasts of draught are directed.