USA > Oregon > The Oregon trail : sketches of prairie and Rocky Mountain life > Part 25
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ran wildly round and round in a circle. Shaw and I then galloped forward, and passing him as he ran, foaming with rage and pain, we discharged our pistols into his side. Once or twice he rushed furiously upon us, but his strength was rapidly exhausted. Down he fell on his knees. For 5 one instant he glared up at his enemies with burning eyes through his black tangled mane, and then rolled over on his side. Though gaunt and thin, he was larger and heavier than the largest ox. Foam and blood flew together from his nostrils as he lay bellowing and pawing the ground, Io tearing up grass and earth with his hoofs. His sides rose and fell like a vast pair of bellows, the blood spouting up in jets from the bullet-holes. Suddenly his glaring eyes be- came like a lifeless jelly. He lay motionless on the ground. Henry stooped over him, and making an incision with his 15 knife, pronounced the meat too rank and tough for use; so, disappointed in our hopes of an addition to our stock of provisions, we rode away and left the carcass to the wolves.
In the afternoon we saw the mountains rising like a gigantic wall at no great distance on our right. “Des 20 sauvages ! des sauvages !" exclaimed Deslauriers, looking round with a frightened face, and pointing with his whip toward the foot of the mountains. In fact, we could see at a distance a number of little black specks, like horse- men in rapid motion. Henry Chatillon, with Shaw and 25 myself, galloped toward them to reconnoiter, when to our amusement we saw the supposed Arapahoes resolved into the black tops of some pine trees which grew along a ravine. The summits of these pines, just visible above the verge of the prairie, and seeming to move as we our- 30 selves were advancing, looked exactly like a line of horse- men.
We encamped among ravines and hollows, through which a little brook was foaming angrily. Before sun- rise in the morning the snow-covered mountains were beauti- 35 fully tinged with a delicate rose color. A noble spectacle awaited us as we moved forward. Six or eight miles on our right, Pike's peak and his giant brethren rose out of the level prairie, as if springing from the bed of the ocean. From their summits down to the plain below they were 40 involved in a mantle of clouds, in restless motion, as if
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urged by strong winds. For one instant some snowy peak, towering in awful solitude, would be disclosed to view. As the clouds broke along the mountain, we could see the dreary forests, the tremendous precipices, the white patches 5 of snow, the gulfs and chasns as black as night, all revealed for an instant, and then disappearing from the view. One could not but recall the stanza of Childe Harold º:
Morn dawns, and with it stern Albania's hills, Dark Suli's rocks, and Pindus' inland peak, Robed lialf in mist, bedewed with snowy rills, Array'd in many a dun and purple streak, Arise; and, as the clouds along them break, Disclose the dwelling of the mountaineer: Here roams the wolf, the eagle whets his beak,
Birds, beasts of prey, and wilder men appear,
And gathering storms around convulse the closing year.
Every line save one of this description was more than verified here. There were no "dwellings of the moun- taineer" among these heights. Fierce savages, restlessly 20 wandering through summer and winter, alone invade them. Their hand is against every man, and every man's hand against them.
On the day after we had left the mountains at some distance. A black cloud descended upon them, and a 25 tremendous explosion of thunder followed, reverberating among the precipices. In a few moments everything grew black and the rain poured down like a cataract. We got under an old cotton-wood tree which stood by the tide of a stream, and waited there till the rage of the torrent 30 had passed.
The clouds opened at the point where they first had gathered, and the whole sublime congregation of moun- tains was bathed at once in warm sunshine. They seemed more like some luxurious vision of Eastern romance than 35 like a reality of that wilderness; all were melted together into a soft delicious blue, as voluptuous as the sky of Naples° or the transparent sea that washes the sunny cliffs of Capri. On the left the whole sky was still of an inky blackness; but two concentric rainbows stood in brilliant 4º relief against it, while far in front the ragged cloud still
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streamed before the wind, and the retreating thunder muttered angrily.
Through that afternoon and the next morning we were passing down the banks of the stream called La Fontaine qui Bouille, from the boiling spring whose waters flow 5 into it. When we stopped at noon, we were within six or eight miles of the Pueblo. Setting out again, we found by the fresh tracks that a horseman had just been out to reconnoiter us; he had circled half round the camp, and then galloped back full speed for the Pueblo. What made Io him so shy of us we could not conceive. After an hour's ride we reached the edge of a hill, from which a welcome sight greeted us. The Arkansas ran along the valley be- low, among woods and groves, and closely nestled in the midst of wide cornfields and green meadows where cattle 15 were grazing rose the low mud walls of the Pueblo.
CHAPTER XXI
THE PUEBLO AND BENT'S FORT
WE approached the gate of the Pueblo. It was a wretched species of fort of most primitive construction, being noth- ing more than a large square inclosure, surrounded by a wall of mud, miserably cracked and dilapidated. The 5 slender pickets that surmounted it were half broken down. and the gate dangled on its wooden hinges so loosely, that to open or shut it seemed likely to fling it down altogether. Two or three squalid Mexicans, with their broad hats, and their vile faces overgrown with hair, were lounging about to the bank of the river in front of it. They disappeared as they saw us approach; and as we rode up to the gate a light active little figure came out to meet us. It was our old friend Richard. He had come from Fort Laramie on a trading expedition to Taos; but finding, when he reached the 15 Pueblo, that the war would prevent his going farther, he was quietly waiting till the conquest of the country should allow him to proceed. He seemed to consider himself bound to do the honors of the place. Shaking us warmly by the hand, he led the way into the area.
20 Here we saw his large Santa Fé wagons standing together. A few squaws and Spanish women, and a few Mexicans, as mean and miserable as the place itself, were lazily sauntering about. Richard conducted us to the state apartment of the Pueblo, a small mud room, very neatly finished, consider- 25 ing the material, and garnished with a crucifix, a looking- glass, a picture of the Virgin, and a rusty horse pistol. There were no chairs, but instead of them a number of chests and boxes ranged about the room. There was another room beyond, less sumptuously decorated, and here three 30 or four Spanish girls, one of them very pretty, were baking cakes at a mud fireplace in the corner. They brought out a poncho, which they spread upon the floor by way of table- cloth. A supper, which seemed to us luxurious, was soon)
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laid out upon it, and folded buffalo robes were placed around it to receive the guests. Two or three Americans, besides ourselves, were present. We sat down Turkish fashion, º and began to inquire the news. Richard told us that, about three weeks before, General Kearny's army had 5 left Bent's fort to march against Santa Féº; that when last heard from they were approaching the mountainous defiles that led to the city. One of the Americans produced a dingy newspaper, containing an account of the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma.º While we were dis- 10 cussing these matters, the doorway was darkened by a tall, shambling fellow, who stood with his hands in his pockets taking a leisurely survey of the premises before he entered. He wore brown homespun pantaloons, much too short for his legs, and a pistol and bowie knife stuck 15 in his belt. His head and one eye were enveloped in a huge bandage of white linen. Having completed his observa- tions, he came slouching in and sat down on a chest. Eight or ten more of the same stamp followed, and very coolly arranging themselves about the room, began to stare at the 20 company. Shaw and I looked at each other. We were forcibly reminded of the Oregon emigrants, though these unwelcome visitors had a certain glitter of the eye, and a compression of the lips, which distinguished them from our old acquaintances of the prairie. They began to catechise 25 us at once, inquiring whence we had come, what we meant to do next, and what were our future prospects in life.
The man with the bandaged head had met with an un- toward accident a few days before. He was going down to the river to bring water, and was pushing through the 30 young willows which covered the low ground, when he came unawares upon a grizzly bear, which, having just eaten a buffalo bull, had lain down to sleep off the meal. The bear rose .on his hind legs, and gave the intruder such a blow with his paw that he laid his forehead entirely bare, clawed 35 off the front of his scalp, and narrowly missed one of his eyes. Fortunately he was not in a very pugnacious mood, being surfeited with his late meal. The man's companions, who were close behind, raised a shout and the bear walked away, crushing down the willows in his leisurely retreat. 40
These men belonged to a party of Mormons, who, out
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of a well-grounded fear of the other emigrants, had post- poned leaving the settlements until all the rest were gone. On account of this delay they did not reach Fort Laramie until it was too late to continue their journey to California. 5 Hearing that there was good land at the head of the Ar- kansas, they crossed over under the guidance of Richard, and were now preparing to spend the winter at a spot about half a mile from the Pueblo.
When we took leave of Richard, it was near sunset. Io Passing out of the gate, we could look down the little valley of the Arkansas; a beautiful scene, and doubly so to our eyes, so long accustomed to deserts and mountains. Tall woods lined the river, with green meadows on either hand; and high bluffs, quietly basking in the sunlight, flanked 15 the narrow valley. A Mexican on horseback was driving a herd of cattle toward the gate, and our little white tent, which the men had pitched under a large tree in the meadow, made a very pleasing feature in the scene. When we reached it, we found that Richard had sent a Mexican to 20 bring us an abundant supply of green corn and vegetables, and invite us to help ourselves to whatever we wished from the fields around the Pueblo.
The inhabitants were in daily apprehensions of an inroad from more formidable consumers than ourselves. Every 25 year at the time when the corn begins to ripen, the Ara- pahoes, to the number of several thousands, come and encamp around the Pueblo. The handful of white men, who are entirely at the mercy of this swarm of barbarians, choose to make a merit of necessity; they come forward 3º very cordially, shake them by the hand, and intimate that the harvest is entirely at their disposal. The Arapahoes take them at their word, help themselves most liberally, and usually turn their horses into the cornfields afterward. They have the foresight, however, to leave enough of the 35 crops untouched to serve as an inducement for planting the fields again for their benefit in the next spring.
The human race in this part of the world is separated into three divisions, arranged in the order of their merits; white men, Indians, and Mexicans; to the latter of whom 40 the honorable title of "whites" is by no means conceded.
In spite of the warm sunset of that evening the next morn-
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ing was a dreary and cheerless one. It rained steadily, clouds resting upon the very treetops. We crossed the river to visit the Mormon settlement. As we passed through the water, several trappers on horseback entered it from the other side. Their buckskin frocks were soaked through 5 by the rain, and clung fast to their limbs with a most clammy and uncomfortable look. The water was trickling down their faces, and dropping from the ends of their rifles, and from the traps which each carried at the pommel of his saddle. Horses and all, they had a most disconsolate and 10 woebegone appearance, which we could not help laughing at, forgetting how often we ourselves had been in a similar plight.
After half an hour's riding we saw the white wagons of the Mormons drawn up among the trees. Axes were sound- 15 ing, trees were falling, and log-huts going up along the edge of the woods and upon the adjoining meadow. As we came up the Mormons left their work and seated themselves on the timber around us, when they began earnestly to discuss points of theology, complain of the ill-usage they had re- 20 ceived from the "gentiles," and sound a lamentation over the loss of their great temple at Nauvoo.º After remaining with them an hour we rode back to our camp, happy that the settlements had been delivered from the presence of such blind and desperate fanatics.
25
On the morning after this we left the Pueblo for Bent's fort. The conduct of Raymond had lately been less satis- factory than before, and we had discharged him as soon as we arrived at the former place; so that the party, our- selves included, was now reduced to four. There was some 30 uncertainty as to our future course. The trail between Bent's fort and the settlements, a distance computed at six hundred miles, was at this time in a dangerous state; for since the passage of General Kearny's army, great numbers of hostile Indians, chiefly Pawnees and Coman- 35 ches, had gathered about some parts of it. A little after this time they became so numerous and audacious, that scarcely a single party, however large, passed between the fort and the frontier without some token of their hos- tility. The newspapers of the time sufficiently display 4c this state of things. Many men were killed, and great
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numbers of horses and mules carried off. Not long since I met with the gentleman, who, during the autumnn, came from Santa Fé to Bent's fort, when he found a party of seventy men, who thought themselves too weak to go 5 down to the settlements alone, and were waiting there for a reinforcement. Though this excessive timidity fully proves the ignorance and credulity of the men, it may also evince the state of alarm which prevailed in the country. When we were there in the month of August, the danger Io had not become so great. There was nothing very attrac-
tive in the neighborhood. We supposed, moreover, that we might wait there half the winter without finding any party to go down with us; for Mr. Sublette and the others whom we had relied upon had, as Richard told us, already 15 left Bent's fort. Thus far on our journey Fortune had kindly befriended us. We resolved therefore to take ad- vantage of her gracious mood and trusting for a continu- ance of her favors, to set out with Henry and Deslauriers, and run the gauntlet of the Indians in the best way we 20 could.
Bent's fort stands on the river, about seventy-five miles below the Pueblo. At noon of the third day we arrived within three or four miles of it, pitched our tent under a tree, hung our looking-glasses against its trunk, and having 25 made our primitive toilet, rode toward the fort. We soon came in sight of it, for it is visible from a considerable dis- tance, standing with its high clay walls in the midst of the scorching plains. It seemed as if a swarm of locusts had invaded the country. The grass for miles around was 3º cropped close by the horses of General Kearny's soldiery. When we came to the fort, we found that not only had the horses caten up the grass, but their owners had made away with the stores of the little trading post; so that we had great difficulty in procuring the few articles which we 35 required for our homeward journey. The army was gone, the life and bustle passed away, and the fort was a scene of dull and lazy tranquillity. A few invalid officers and soldiers sauntered about the area, which was oppressively hot; for the glaring sun was reflected down upon it from the 40 high white walls around. The proprietorsº were absent, and we were received by Mr. Holt, who had been left in charge
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of the fort. He invited us to dinner, where, to our ad- miration, we found a table laid with a white cloth, with castors in the center and chairs placed around it. This unwonted repast concluded, we rode back to our camp.
Here, as we lay smoking round the fire after supper, we 5 saw through the dusk three men approaching from the di- rection of the fort. They rode up and seated themselves near us on the ground. The foremost was a tall, well- formed man, with a face and manner such as inspire con- fidence at once. He wore a broad hat of felt, slouching Io and tattered, and the rest of his attire consisted of a frock and leggings of buckskin, rubbed with the yellow clay found among the mountains. At the heel of one of his moccasins was buckled a huge iron spur, with a rowelº five or six inches in diameter. His horse, who stood quietly looking 15 over his head, had a rude Mexican saddle, covered with a shaggy bearskin, and furnished with a pair of wooden stir- rups of most preposterous size. The next man was a sprightly, active little fellow, about five feet and a quarter high, but very strong and compact. His face was swarthy 20 as a Mexican's and covered with a close, curly black beard. An old greasy calico handkerchief was tied round his head, and his close buckskin dress was blackened and polished by grease and hard service. The last who came up was a large strong man, dressed in the coarse homespun of the 25 frontiers, who dragged his long limbs over the ground as if he were too lazy for the effort. He had a sleepy gray eye, a retreating chin, an open mouth, and a protruding upper lip, which gave him an air of exquisite indolence and helpless- ness. He was armed with an old United States yager,º 30 which redoubtable weapon, though he could never hit his mark with it, he was accustomed to cherish as the very sovereign of firearms.
The first two men belonged to a party who had just come from California with a large band of horses, which 35 they had disposed of at Bent's fort. Munroe, the taller of the two, was from Iowa. He was an excellent fellow, open, warm-hearted, and intelligent. Jim Gurney, the short man, was a Boston sailor, who had come in a trad- ing vessel to California, and taken the fancy to return across 40 the continent. The journey had already made him an
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expert "mountain-man," and he presented the extraor- dinary phenomenon of a sailor who understood how to manage a horse. The third of our visitors, named Ellis, was a Missourian, who had come out with a party of Oregon 5 emigrants, but having got as far as Bridge'sº fort, he had fallen home-sick, or as Jim averred, love-sick - and Ellis was just the man to be balked in a love adventure. He thought proper to join the California men and return home- ward in their company.
IO They now requested that they might unite with our party, and make the journey to the settlements in company with us. We readily assented, for we liked the appearance of the first two men, and were very glad to gain so efficient a reinforcement. We told them to meet us on the next 15 evening at a spot on the river side, about six miles below the fort. Having smoked a pipe together, our new allies left us, and we lay down to sleep.
CHAPTER XXII TÊTE ROUGE, THE VOLUNTEER
THE next morning, having directed Deslauriers to repair with his cart to the place of meeting, we came again to the fort to make some arrangements for the journey. After completing these we sat down under a sort of porch, to smoke with some Cheyenne Indians whom we found there. In a 5 few minutes we saw an extraordinary little figure approach us in a military dress. He had a small, round countenance, garnished about the eyes with the kind of wrinkles commonly known as crow's feet and surrounded by an abundant crop of red curls, with a little cap resting on the top of them. 10 Altogether, he had the look of a man more conversant with mint juleps° and oyster suppers than with the hardships of prairie service. He came up to us and entreated that we would take him home to the settlements, saying that unless he went with us he should have to stay all winter at 15 the fort. We liked our petitioner's appearance so little that we excused ourselves from complying with his request. At this he begged us so hard to take pity on him, looked so disconsolate, and told so lamentable a story that at last we consented, though not without many misgivings. 20
The rugged Anglo-Saxon of our new recruit's real name proved utterly unmanageable on the lips of our French attendants, and Henry Chatillon, after various abortive attempts to pronounce it, one day coolly christened him Tête Rouge, ° in honor of his red curls. He had at different 25 times been clerk of a. Mississippi steamboat, and agent in a trading establishment at Nauvoo, besides filling various other capacities, in all of which he had seen much more of life than was good for him. In the spring, thinking that a summer's campaign would be an agreeable recreation, he 30 had joined a company of St. Louis volunteers.
"There were three of us," said Tête Rouge, "me and Bill
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Stevens and John Hopkins. We thought we would just go out with the army, and when we had conquered the country, we would get discharged and take our pay, you know, and go down to Mexico. They say there is plenty of 5 fun going on there. Then we could go back to New Orleans by way of Vera Cruz." º
But Tête Rouge, like many a stouter volunteer, had reckoned without his host. Fighting Mexicans was a less amusing occupation than he had supposed, and his pleasure Io trip was disagreeably interrupted by brain fever, which attacked him when about halfway to Bent's fort. He jolted along through the rest of the journey in a baggage
wagon. When they came to the fort he was taken out and left there, together with the rest of the sick. Bent's fort 15 does not supply the best accommodations for an invalid. Tête Rouge's sick chamber was a little mud room, where he and a companion attacked by the same disease were laid together, with nothing but a buffalo robe between them and the ground. The assistant surgeon's deputy visited 20 them once a day and brought them cach a huge dose of calomel,° the only medicine, according to his surviving victim, which he was acquainted with.
Tête Rouge woke one morning, and turning to his com- panion, saw his eyes fixed upon the beams above with the 25 glassy stare of a dead man. At this the unfortunate vol-
unteer lost his senses outright. In spite of the doctor, how- ever, he eventually recovered; though between the brain fever and the calomel, his mind, originally none of the strongest, was so much shaken that it had not quite re- 30 covered its balance when we came to the fort. In spite of the poor fellow's tragic story, there was something so ludicrous in his appearance, and the whimsical contrast between his military dress and his most unmilitary de- incanor, that we could not help smiling at them. We 35 asked him if he had a gun. He said they had taken it from him during his illness, and he had not seen it since; "but perhaps," he observed, looking at me with a bescech- ing air, "you will lend me one of your big pistols if we should meet with any Indians." I next inquired if 40 he had a horse; he declared he had a magnificent one, and at Shaw's request a Mexican led him in for inspec-
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tion. He exhibited the outline of a good horse, but his eyes were sunk in the sockets, and every one of his ribs could be counted. There were certain marks too about his shoulders, which could be accounted for by the circumstance, that during Tête Rouge's illness, his com- 5 panions had seized upon the insulted charger, and har- nessed him to a cannon along with the draft horses. To Tête Rouge's astonishment we recommended him by all means to exchange the horse, if he could, for a mule. For- tunately the people at the fort were so anxious to get rid 10 of him that they were willing to make some sacrifice to effect the object and he succeeded in getting a tolerable mule in exchange for the broken-down steed.
A man soon appeared at the gate, leading in the mule by a cord which he placed in the hands of Tête Rouge, 15 who, being somewhat afraid of his new acquisition, tried various flatteries and blandishments to induce her to come forward. The mule, knowing that she was expected to advance, stopped short in consequence, and stood fast as a rock, looking straight forward with immovable composure. 20 Being stimulated by a blow from behind she consented to move, and walked nearly to the other side of the fort before she stopped again. Hearing the by-standers laugh, Tête Rouge plucked up spirit and tugged hard at the rope. · The mule jerked backward, spun herself round, and made a 25 dash for the gate. Tête Rouge, who clung manfully to the rope, went whisking through the air for a few rods, when he let go and stood with his mouth open, staring after the mule, who galloped away over the prairie. She was soon caught and brought back by a Mexican, who mounted a horse and 30 went in pursuit of her with his lasso.
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