. It so happened that this
gentleman was well informed in the theory of vaccination, and it
struck him that by impressing on the savages his skill, he might
extricate himself. By the aid of signs, a lancet and some virus, he
set himself to work, and soon saw that he had gained a reputation
which saved him his scalp. He first vaccinated his own arm, after
which all of the Indians present solicited his magic touch, to save
them from the loathsome disease. The result was, that he found he had
enlisted himself in an active practice. After a few days, the Indians
were delighted with the results, and began to look upon their prisoner
as possessed of superhuman knowledge. They feared to do him injury,
and finally resolved to let him go; of which privilege, it is almost
unnecessary to say, he was delighted to avail himself, and was not
long in finding his friends.]

The incidents which enliven and add interest to the historic page,
have proved of spontaneous and vigorous growth in the new settlements
of America. Nearly every book which deals with the early planting and
progress of the American colonists and pioneers, contains full, and
frequently glowing, descriptions of exploits in the forest; strifes of
the hunter; fights with the savages; fearful and terrible surprises of
lurking warriors, as they arouse the brave settler and his family
from their midnight dreams by the wild, death-announcing war-whoop;
hair-breadth escapes from the larger kinds of game, boldly bearded in
their lair; the manly courage which never yields, but surmounts every
obstacle presented by the unbroken and boundless forest; all these
are subjects and facts which have already so many counterparts in
book-thought, accessible to the general reader, that their details
may be safely omitted during the boyhood days of young Carson. It is
better, therefore, to pass over the youthful period of his eventful
life, until he began to ripen into manhood.

Kit Carson, at fifteen years of age, was no ordinary person. He had at
this early age earned, and well earned, a reputation, on the basis
of which the prediction was ventured in his behalf, that he would not
fail to make and leave a mark upon the hearts of his countrymen. Those
who knew him at the age of fifteen, hesitated not to say, "Kit Carson
is the boy who will grow into a man of influence and renown."

The chief points of his character which elicited this prediction were
thus early clearly marked. Some of