e held in our hands and kept ready for
instant service. The most dangerous point was that at which the two
trails would inevitably intersect. To gain this place in advance of
our savage enemies, all our hopes now centered. For twelve miles we
dashed along, laboring under a state of suspense not to be easily
forgotten. When, at last, we arrived at the desired point, we were
only about two hundred yards in the advance of our savage pursuers;
still, we felt that our lives, for the time being, were saved, and
accordingly breathed a prayer to the Almighty in thanks for our
deliverance thus far. The pace now became tremendous; and here our
grain-fed horses proved to be too much (and their powers of endurance
were fully put to the test), for the grass-fed ponies of the Indians.
After a short run, the savages saw that the advantage belonged to us,
consequently soon after they halted. We, however, kept steadily, but
with slackened speed, on our course, fearing that some accident might
change the happy turn of affairs in their favor. On finding themselves
thwarted in their designs, the Indians fired two or three shots at us,
but even these final compliments did not, to use nautical phraseology,
make us "heave to." We reached the settlement of the Red River in good
season, and concluded that we had traveled the distance in about as
brief a space of time as it ever had been accomplished either before
or since our adventure. Our horses were so used up by this race that
we were obliged to exchange them for fresh ones, on which we finished
our journey without further annoyance. The Indians, in this incursion
stole five thousand sheep, besides other property from the Costillo,
and killed two men who were traveling behind us and on the same
road. When the bodies of these men were discovered, one of them had a
mouthful of bullets, which he had evidently put there in order that he
might drop them into his rifle as he should require them, and not be
obliged to be delayed in taking them from his ammunition pouch; but,
evidently, before he could have used more than one from this supply,
he was shot dead.

It cannot be denied but that this outbreak on the part of the Indians,
and its subsequent outrages, was the result of mismanagement; and, it
is but justice to the reputation of Kit Carson to assert, that it was
no fault of his that affairs had terminated so disastrously. He had
used every means which human skill could devise to allay the an