Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/696

556 Now the fun was over and we were not afraid to speak out, so we called out for the man that we left in charge of our horses to bring them over, and we gathered some wood and built a fire.

It had been several days since we had had fresh meat, but the Pimas had been kind enough to kill an antelope that day, and as they had only eaten of it once, we had a feast that morning, which we enjoyed very much.

We gathered up the guns and ammunition that belonged to the Indians, which, by the way, was the best armed lot of Indians I had ever seen. Each one of them had a good rifle and a Colt revolver, and one of them had the handsomest knife I ever saw. Had we not run on to them no doubt they would have done some devilment in the white settlement the following day. We reached headquarters in three days.

It was now time for the emigrants to begin to travel over the Butterfield route, and Lieut. Jackson started one company of cavalry across to the opposite side of the mountain some sixty miles away to protect the emigrants, and George Jones and I both accompanied them. We established our quarters about a half mile from the road at the foot of the mountains on the south side.

The next day after we struck this place George and I started out to scout over the country to see whether or not there were any Indians in the country and also ride out on the road and look for emigrants.

The second day out we climbed to the top of a high ridge, and by looking through the glass we could see a large emigrant train coming, which we thought to be