Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 2.djvu/157

Rh I got into my clothes as quickly as possible, passing Wash Shaw, the captain's second son, outside the tent, trying to load his gun, but having not fully completed his dressing, his pants being drawn over only one leg. He was not acting a part either. Captain Shaw was "the officer of the day," and could not act well. He remarked to me as I went past his tent, "The boys are getting very careless, John; somebody has fired a gun outside the cattle.' I was ignorant, but not deceived then. It makes my flesh creep even now to think of the undrilled condition we were in. This Captain Shaw, whose wife was a sister of General Gilliam, was by nature much more capable of generalship than her brave, impulsive brother, who from the day we voted him his title had never got his head down to the importance of drill, or even a plan of defense in case of a sudden attack; and we were now just entering the great game range, and liable to such an attack any day or night. I saw the funny side of the false alarm then, but now I do not wonder at the unrest Mr. Parrish's journal betrays.

On July 2 the first antelope was brought into camp. We are now following up the Little Blue, the drainage of the west branch of the main stream. We followed out thence to the divide between that and the Platte, and struck that remarkable stream about twelve miles east of where Fort Kearney was subsequently built.

On July 4 the general's orders were: "A rest for the cattle, wash day for the women, and a day to hunt for the men."

This writer, under a news tip, left camp alone early, his burning desire being to kill an antelope. The extraor-