Theodore Winthrop

“ A frightened man becomes a barbarian and a brute. Fear is a miserable agent of civilization. We can hardly now connect ourselves with that period. No longer, when twigs crackle in the forest, do we shrink lest the parting leaves may reveal a new-comer, with whom we must race for life. Larceny is disgusting, burglary is unpleasant, arson is undesirable, murder is one of the foul arts; Indians were adepts in all of these trades at once. Any reminiscence of a condition from which we have happily escaped is agreeable. This palisade fort was a monument of a past age to me. ”

“ Clattering over the paved prairie we hied, the defaulter a little in advance and artfully dodging, — Loolowcan and I close upon him. Still more artfully at last he made show of finding the trail, and went pounding along, as if no traitorous stampede had happened. A total failure was this crafty sham, this too late repentance and acknowledgment of defeat. Vengeance will not thus be baffled. Men discover with bitterness that nature continues to use the scourge long after they have reformed, until relapse becomes impossible by the habit of virtue. ”

“ Better its insecure shelter for wife and child than the terror of a forest forever seeming aglare with cruel eyes, — where the forester could never banish the curdling consciousness of an unseen presence, watching until the assassin moment came; where the silence might hear other sounds than the hum of insects or the music of birds, — might hear the scoffing yell of Indians, contemptuous victors over the race that scorned them. ”

“ We breathe air as a matter of course, unobservant usually of how fair a draught it is. But to-night the chalice of nature was brimming with a golden haze, which touched the lips with luxurious winy flavor. ”

“ S’pose want fresh horses other side mountains, — you get ’em. Get everything. Look sharp. No fear bad Indian at Dalles; great chief not let ’em beat you. Be good boy! Good bye!” Owhhigh presented me, as a parting gift, his whip, which I had admired, a neat baton with a long hide lash and loop of otter fur for the wrist I could by its aid modify, without altering, the system of education already pursued with my horses. Homeric studies had taught me that the gifts of heroes should be reciprocal. I therefore, for lack of more significant token, prayed Owhhigh to accept a piece of silver. ”

“ Something always happens, in the go and the gallop of travel, demanding quick, instinctive action. Antipodes was in this case the agent to make me know my place. Antipodes, pointing his nose eastward toward his native valleys, had pounded along the trail for a couple of miles over the hillocks of a stony prairie, and on his back rattled my packs, for solace or annoyance, according to his own views. At a fork of the trail, Loolowcan urged Gubbins to the front, to indicate the route. ”

“ The Klickatats were encamped on a prairie near the house of a settler, five miles from the Fort. Just without the house was a group of them gambling. Presently Owhhigh followed Mr. H. and me into the farmer’s kitchen, bringing forward for introduction his son, my guide. He was one of the gambling group. I inspected him narrowly. My speed, my success, my safety, depended upon his good faith. Owhhigh bore no very high character, — why should son be honester than father? To an Indian the temptation to play foul by a possessor of horses, guns, blankets, and traps was enormous. ”

“ I was going homeward across the breadth of the land, and with the excitement of this large thought there came a slight reactionary sinking of heart, and a dread lest I had exhausted onward life, and now, turning back from its foremost verge, should find myself dwindling into dull conservatism, and want of prophetic faith. ”

“ It is chaos, and demands hours perhaps of patience to make order again.
Such experience in a minor degree might befall even my little party of three horses and two men. I therefore, for better speed, resolved to disentangle myself this evening, and have a clear field to-morrow. Recalcitrant Antipodes, therefore, suffered compulsion, and was packed with his complex burdens. Leaving him and Gubbins with Owhhigh to follow and be disciplined, Mr. H. and I galloped on under the oaks, over the trap-rock, toward the Klickatat camp. ”

“ Unconsidered trifles will stumble against the shins of Indians, stealing away at night.
As these representatives of Klalam civilization now make final exit from my narrative, I must give them a proper “teapot.” They may be taken as types of the worse character of the coast Indians, — jolly brutes, with the bad and the good traits of savages, and much harmed by the besettings of civilized temptations. ”

“ Would that there were more like him in this wordy world.
He promised also a guide, his son, now at the camp, and as to my horses, I might choose from the cavalcade. We went out to make selection, all the Klickatats, except Owhhigh, Adonis, and the interpreter, following in bow-legged silence. These three were vocal, and of better model than their fellows. No Indian wished to sell his best horse; each his second-best, at the price of the best. Their backs were in shocking condition. Pads and pack-saddles had galled them so that it was painful to a humane being to mount ”

“ Personal contact with a similar state of facts makes their forgotten perils real. In that recent antiquity, pioneers exposed to the indiscriminate revenge of the savage flew from cabin and clearing to stockades far less defensible than this. ”