George Frederick Augustus Ruxton

“ But now the snow on the ridge of the Sierra Madre, and the nightly frosts; the angular flights of geese and ducks constantly passing overhead; the sober tints of the foliage, and the dead leaves that strew the ground; the withering grass on the plain, and the cold gusts, sometimes laden with snow and sleet, that sweep from the distant snow-clad mountains;—all these signs warn us to linger no longer in the tempting valley of San Fernando, but at once to pack our mules to cross the dreary and desert plains and inhospitable sierras ”

“ But the free trappers were accountable to nobody. Each of them fought his own fight and won the full fruit of his endeavors. Going alone, or in small bands who acknowledged no captain and would split up whenever the humor moved them, everyone a law unto himself and relying upon his own strong arm, they were men picked by nature for great enterprises and great deeds.
It was not love of gain for its own sake that drew the free trappers into the wilderness. To them a pack of beaver skins was a mere gambler's stake, to be squandered riotously after the fashion of Jack ashore. ”

“ The horse was a strong square-built bay; and although the severities of a prolonged winter, with scanty pasture and long and trying travel, had robbed his bones of fat and flesh, tucked up his flank, and "ewed" his neck, still his clean and well-set legs, oblique shoulder, and withers fine as a deer's, in spite of his gaunt half-starved appearance, bore ample testimony as to what he had been; while his clear cheerful eye, and the hearty appetite with which he fell to work on the coarse grass of the bottom, proved that he had something in him still, and was game as ever. ”

“ Rough and savage though they were, they were the true pioneers of that extraordinary tide of civilization which has poured its resistless current through tracts large enough for kings to govern, over a country now teeming with cultivation, where, a few short years ago, countless herds of buffalo roamed unmolested, where the bear and deer abounded, and the savage Indian skulked through the woods and prairies, lord of the unappreciated soil that now yields its prolific treasures to the spade and plow of civilized man. ”

“ La Bonté and Killbuck stuck together:
they saw old Bill, bending over his saddle, dive right into the cloud of smoke, and apparently make for the creek bottom—their other companions scattering each on his own hook, and saw no more of them for many a month; and thus was one of the most daring and successful bands broken up that ever trapped in the mountains of the Far West.
It is painful to follow the steps of the poor fellows who, thus despoiled of the hardly-earned produce of their hunt, saw all their wealth torn from them at one swoop. ”

“ The trapper, whatever his faults, was still every inch a man. Bravest of the brave, yet cool and sagacious in the strategy of border war, capable in any emergency, faithful to his own code of honor, generous without limit to everyone but his foes, loyal to the death, frankly contemptuous of luxury and caste and affectation, imperial in his self-respect but granting equal rights to others, there was something heroic in this fierce and uncouth figure who dominated for a time the vast plains and mountains of the wild West. ”

“ Once more, in warm and well-remembered homespun, he sits on the snake-fence round the old clearing, and, munching his hoe-cake at set of sun, listens to the mournful note of the whip-poor-will, or the harsh cry of the noisy catbird, or watches the agile gambols of the squirrels as they chase each other, chattering the while, from branch to branch of the lofty tamarisks, wondering how long it will be before he will be able to lift his father's heavy rifle, and use it against the tempting game. ”

“ The face of the rock is covered with names familiar to the mountaineers as those of the most renowned of their hardy brotherhood; while others, again, occur, better known to the science and literature of the Old World than to the unlearned trappers of the Rocky Mountains. The huge mass is a well-known landmark to the Indians and mountaineers; and travelers and emigrants hail it as the halfway beacon between the frontiers of the United States and the still distant goal of their long and perilous journey. ”

“ A short distance from the lodges, the warriors halted to await the approach of the people. Old men, children, and squaws sitting astride their horses, sallied out to escort the victorious party in triumph to the village. With loud shouts and songs, and drums beating the monotonous Indian time, they advanced and encircled the returning braves, one of whom, his face covered with black paint, carried a pole on which dangled thirteen scalps, the trophies of the expedition. ”

“ One young brave, more daring than the rest, rode out of the crowd, and dashed at the hunter, throwing himself, as he passed within a few yards, from the saddle, and hanging over the opposite side of his horse, thus presenting no other mark than his left foot. As he crossed La Bonté, he discharged his bow from under his horse's neck, and with such good aim, that the arrow, whizzing through the air, struck the stock of the hunter's rifle, which was at his shoulder, and, glancing off, pierced his arm, inflicting, luckily, but a slight wound. ”

“ Cowering under the shadow of a crumbling wall, the Indian drew his blanket over his head, and conjured to his mind's eye the former power and grandeur of his race—that warlike people who, forsaking their own country for causes of which no tradition, however dim, now exists, sought in the fruitful and teeming valleys of the south a soil and climate which their own lands did not afford, and, displacing the wild and barbarous hordes inhabiting the land, raised there a mighty empire, great in riches and civilization. ”

“ Round the room groups of New Mexicans lounge, wrapped in the eternal sarape, and smoking of course, scowling with jealous eyes at the more favored mountaineers. These, divested of their hunting-coats of buckskins, appear in their bran-new shirts of gaudy calico, and close-fitting buckskin pantaloons, with long fringes down the outside seam from the hip to the ankle; with moccasins, ornamented with bright beads and porcupine-quills. Each, round his waist, wears his mountain-belt and scalp-knife, ominous of the company he is in, and some have pistols sticking in their belts. ”

“ Where now intelligent and wealthy merchants walk erect, in conscious substantiality of purse and credit, and direct the commerce of a vast and well-peopled region, there stalked but the other day, in dress of buckskin, the Indian trader of the West; and all the evidences of life, mayhap, consisted of the eccentric vagaries of the different bands of trappers and hardy mountaineers who accompanied, some for pleasure and some as escort, the periodically arriving bateaux, laden with the beaver-skins and buffalo-robes collected during the season at the different trading-posts in the Far West. ”

“ At this news the whole village was speedily in commotion: the war-shout was taken up from lodge to lodge; the squaws began to lament and tear their hair; the warriors to paint and arm themselves. The elder chiefs immediately met in council, and, over the medicine-pipe, debated as to the best course to pursue—whether to wait the attack, or sally out and meet the enemy. In the meantime, the braves were collected together by the chiefs of their respective bands; and scouts, mounted on the fastest horses, despatched in every direction to procure intelligence of the enemy. ”

“ Before reaching the forks, however, he finally bade them adieu; and, turning the head of his old grizzled mule westward, he heartily wrung the hand of his comrade La Bonté; and, crying Yep! to his well-tried animal, disappeared behind a roll of the prairie, and was seen no more—a thousand good wishes for the welfare of the sturdy trapper speeding him on his solitary way. ”

“ At one end of the oblong building, a rough irregular arch of sun-burned bricks is surmounted by a rude cross, under which hangs a small but deep-toned bell—the wonder of the Indian peones, and highly venerated by the frayles themselves, who received it as a present from a certain venerable archbishop of Old Spain, and who, whilst guarding it with reverential awe, tell wondrous tales of its adventures on the road to its present abiding-place. ”

“ Against the walls, groups of Indians too proud to enter without an invitation, lean, wrapped in their buffalo-robes, sulky and evidently ill at ease to be so near the whites without a chance of fingering their scalp-locks; their white lodges shining in the sun, at a little distance from the riverbanks—their horses feeding in the plain beyond.
The appearance of the fort is very striking, standing as it does hundreds of miles from any settlement, on the vast and lifeless prairie, surrounded by hordes of hostile Indians, and far out of reach of intercourse with civilized man ”

“ At the camp-fire at night, Antoine, the Canadian guide, amused them with tales of the wild life and perilous adventures of the hunters and trappers who make the mountains their home; often extorting a scream from the women by the description of some scene of Indian fight and slaughter, or beguiling them of a commiserating tear by the narrative of the sufferings and privations endured by those hardy hunters in their arduous life. ”

“ Thus alone is the memory of these hardy men perpetuated, at least of those whose fate is ascertained; for many, in every season, never return from their hunting expeditions, but meet a sudden death from Indians, or a more lingering fate from accident or disease in some lonely gorge of the mountains, where no footfall save their own, or the heavy tread of the grizzly bear, disturbs the unbroken silence of the awful solitude. ”

“ With a plentiful supply of dry pine-logs on the fire, and its cheerful blaze streaming far up into the sky, illuminating the valley far and near, and exhibiting the animals, with well-filled bellies, standing contentedly at rest over their picket-fire, I would sit cross-legged, enjoying the genial warmth, and, pipe in mouth, watch the blue smoke as it curled upwards, building castles in its vapory wreaths, and, in the fantastic shapes it assumed, peopling the solitude with figures of those far away. ”

“ From the center lodge, two or three medicinemen, fantastically attired in the skins of wolves and bears, and bearing long peeled wands of cherry in their hands, occasionally emerged to tend a very small fire which they had kindled in the center of the open space; and when a thin column of smoke arose, one of them planted the scalp-pole obliquely across the fire. Squaws in robes of white dressed buckskin, garnished with beads and porcupines' quills, and their faces painted bright red and black, then appeared. ”

“ Why does the medicine-wolf follow the buffalo and deer? For blood—and for blood the Indian follows the treacherous white from camp to camp, to strike blow for blow, until the deaths of those so basely killed are fully avenged. ”

“ Before the trappers had time to turn their horses and fly, a cloud of smoke burst from the thicket almost in their faces. Batiste, pierced with several balls, fell dead, and Mark-head felt himself severely wounded. However, he struck the spurs into his horse; and as some halfscore Blackfeet jumped with loud cries from their cover, he discharged his rifle amongst them, and galloped off, a volley of balls and arrows whistling after him. He drew no bit until he reined up at the camp-fire, where he found Bill quietly dressing a deer-skin. ”

“ General Chittenden, our first authority on the history of the fur trade, says of the mountain men: "It was the roving trader and the solitary trapper who first sought out these inhospitable wilds, traced the streams to their sources, scaled the mountain passes, and explored a boundless expanse of territory where the foot of the white man had never trodden before. The Far West became a field of romantic adventure, and developed a class of men who loved the wandering career of the native inhabitant rather than the toilsome lot of the industrious colonist. ”

“ Still, as he ate he wondered, and wondering admired, that nature, in giving him such profound gastronomic powers, and such transcendent capabilities of digestion, had yet bountifully provided an edible so peculiarly adapted to his ostrich-like appetite, that after consuming nearly his own weight in rich and fat buffalo-meat, he felt as easy and as little incommoded as if he had lightly supped on strawberries and cream. ”

“ The rich buffalo or grama grass was exchanged for a coarser species, on which the hard-worked animals soon grew poor and weak. The thickets of plum and cherry, of box-elder and quaking-ash, which had hitherto fringed the creeks, and where the deer and bear loved to resort—the former to browse on the leaves and tender shoots, the latter to devour the fruit—now entirely disappeared, and the only shrub seen was the eternal sage-bush, which flourishes everywhere in the western regions in uncongenial soils where other vegetation refuses to grow. ”

“ Not a few of the present band are bound thither with matrimonial intentions; the belles of Nuevo Mejico being to them the ne plus ultra of female perfection, uniting most conspicuous personal charms (although coated with cosmetic alegria—an herb, with the juice of which the women of Mexico hideously bedaub their faces) with all the hard-working industry of Indian squaws. The ladies, on their part, do not hesitate to leave the paternal abodes, and eternal tortilla-making, to share the perils and privations of the American mountaineers in the distant wilderness. ”

“ Before them a thousand miles of dreary desert or wilderness, overrun by hostile savages, thirsting for the white man's blood; famine and drought, the arrows of wily hordes of Indians—and, these dangers past, the invasion of the civilized settlements of whites, the least numerous of which contained ten times their number of armed and bitter enemies—the sudden swoop upon their countless herds of mules and horses, the fierce attack and bloody slaughter;—such were the consequences of the expedition these bold mountaineers were now engaged in. ”