Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/156

 had the slightest acquaintance with him. He will follow through grass, over sand or rock, or through the chapparal of scrub oak, up and down the flanks of the steepest ridges, traces so faint that to the keenest-eyed American they do not appear at all.

Conversely, he is fiendishly dexterous in the skill with which he conceals his own line of march when a pursuing enemy is to be thrown off the track. No serpent can surpass him in cunning; he will dodge and twist and bend in all directions, boxing the compass, doubling like a fox, scattering his party the moment a piece of rocky ground is reached over which it would, under the best circumstances, be difficult to follow. Instead of moving in file, his party will here break into skirmishing order, covering a broad space and diverging at the most unexpected moment from the primitive direction, and not perhaps reuniting for miles. Pursuit is retarded and very frequently baffled. The pursuers must hold on to the trail, or all is lost. There must be no guesswork. Following a trail is like being on a ship: so long as one is on shipboard, he is all right; but if he once go overboard, he is all wrong. So with a trail: to be a mile away from it is fully as bad as being fifty, if it be not found again. In the meantime the Apache raiders, who know full well that the pursuit must slacken for a while, have reunited at some designated hill, or near some spring or water "tank," and are pushing across the high mountains as fast as legs harder than leather can carry them. If there be squaws with the party, they carry all plunder on their backs in long, conical baskets of their own make, unless they have made a haul of ponies, in which case they sometimes ride, and at all times use the animals to pack.

At the summit of each ridge, concealed behind rocks or trees, a few picked men, generally not more than two or three, will remain waiting for the approach of pursuit; when the tired cavalry draw near, and begin, dismounted, the ascent of the mountain, there are always good chances for the Apaches to let them have half a dozen well-aimed shots—just enough to check the onward movement, and compel them to halt and close up, and, while all this is going on, the Apache rear-guard, whether in the saddle or on foot, is up and away, as hard to catch as the timid quail huddling in the mesquite.

Or it may so happen the Apache prefers, for reasons best known to himself, to await the coming of night, when he will