Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/61

Rh "Yes, sir; and if you will watch you will see him come up out of the ravine, directly."

Uncle Kit, laughing, said: "It was not a man you saw, my boy, but a mirage," and he explained to me the phenomena, which I became familiar with in the years that followed.

Sometimes the mirages present to the vision what appear to be men, at other times bodies of water surrounded by trees, and often houses and whole towns. They appear before you on the dryest plains and then disappear as if the earth opened and swallowed them.

Early in June we reached Bent's Fort and met there Col. Bent and his son, Mr. Roubidoux and his son, and a man named James Bridger, of whom you will see a great deal, later on in this narrative. These men were all traders, buying furs and buffalo robes from Indians, white hunters and trappers.

We remained at Bent's Fort six weeks, and often during that time some one of the many hunters, trappers and traders, that made this place their headquarters, would ask Uncle Kit what he was going to do with that boy—meaning me. To all of which Carson would reply "I'm goin' to make a hunter and trapper of him."

During the six weeks at the fort I was out nearly every day with some of the men, and to me they gave the name of "Young Kit."

By the time we were ready to leave Bent's Fort, Young Kit became quite a rider, and Uncle Kit had been training me in the dexterous use of the rifle, shooting from my knee, lying on my back, resting the gun on my