Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/567

Rh have got off of her and let her feed at the end of a picket rope while I would lie down and sleep, and the moment she would see or scent anything strange she would come to where I was lying and paw until I would raise up and look in the direction of whatever object she had seen or heard, and in less than three months she was the pet of the entire command. She would follow me like a dog anywhere I would go.

We pulled out for the mountains, and went some- thing like one hundred and fifty miles from Fort Yuma before making a halt for a permanent camp this being in the fore part of February, 1866 and as soon as we were fairly settled we began active work.

We had only been there a few days when George Jones came in and reported having seen the trail of a band of Indians coming from the direction of Black canyon. George, myself and four other scouts started out immediately to take the trail, which was ten miles south of our quarters. We camped on their trail that night on account of the country being too rough to travel after night, but the next morning we were off early and followed the trail all day. Just before sundown we halted on a high ridge, when I took a look through my glasses over the country. About twelve miles away I saw an Apache camp. The course they had traveled that day brought them about as near our quarters as where we had struck their trail, and from this I came to the conclusion that they were either looking for the command or were expecting an attack.

Now the country between us and the Indians was