Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 24.djvu/57

 Recollections of B. F. Bonney got the oxen inside. The buffalo charged by, not far off. The Greenwood boys killed a two-year-old and a heifer calf. We had to camp there for a few hours, for our guides told us that if our oxen crossed the trail of the buffalo they would become unmanageable. It is an odd thing that when oxen smell the fresh trail of the buffalo they stop and paw and bellow as if they smelled fresh blood. If you have ever tried to stop a runaway ox team you know what hard work it is. I remember see- ing on the plains a stampede of oxen which were hitched to the wagons. They tried to stop them but they had to let them run till they were tired out. Two of the oxen were killed by being dragged by the others. The men cut the throats of the two oxen, bled them and we ate them, though the meat was tough and stringy. "While we were crossing the sage brush desert, one of the men in our party named Jim Kinney, who hailed from Texas, came upon an Indian. Kinney had a big wagon and four yoke of oxen for his provisions and bedding. He also had a spring hack pulled by a span of fine mules. His wife drove the mules while Kinney him- self always rode a mule. He had a man to drive his wagon with the four yoke of Oxen. Kinney was a typi- cal southerner. He had long black hair, long black mus- tache, heavy black eyebrows, and was tall and heavy, weighing about 225 pounds. He had a violent temper and was a good deal of a desperado. "When he saw this Indian in the sage brush he called to his driver to stop. Kinney's wagon was in the lead, so the whole train was stopped. Going to the wagon he got a pair of handcuffs and started back to where the Indian was. The Indian had no idea Kinney meant any harm to him. My father said, 'Kinney, what are you going to do with that Indian?' Kinney said, 'Where I came from we have slaves. I am going to capture that Indian and take him with me as a slave/ My father said to him, 'The first thing you know, that Indian will