came to me, the man whom I had found unconscious in the
mountains said:

"Father and mother, this is the man who sought and found me and saved my
life."

The father took my hand, and, in a voice that trembled with emotion,
said, "I can never thank you enough for what you have done for my boy
and his mother and me, for he is our only son, and I think our hearts
would have broken if he had shared the sad fate of his two comrades."

The mother gave me her hand without speaking, but her tear-stained face
and smiling lips thanked me more than words could have done. The young
girl, whom the elder man presented as his daughter, thanked me in a
sweet voice for bringing her brother back to them, and when all got
through, I felt almost overpowered with their gratitude.

They insisted on my going home with them to stay all night, which I did,
and the next morning I had the pleasure of meeting the father and mother
and two brothers of the other man.

After I had talked with them all a while, one of the young men asked me
what they should pay me for all the trouble I had taken upon myself in
their cause.

I told them that I would take the twenty dollars that Col. Bent had
given him for me, and as the morning was wearing away, I bid them good
bye and left them and started on my journey to Taos, New Mexico, and my
much-looked-forward-to visit to Uncle Kit, and that was the last time
I ever saw any of these people. But a year ago I was at Denver and had
occasion to call at the office of _The Rocky Mountain News_, which, by
the way, is the oldest newspaper published in the state of Colorado, and
while I was talking with the editor, he alluded to the incident I have
just spoken about and said that the man whom I had found unconscious at
the camp fire in the mountains lived and died at Denver, and that he was
always called "Moccasin Bill," from the fact that he ate his moccasins
while trying to find his way out of the mountains, and that for several
months before he died he seemed to dwell upon that event and always
mentioned how I'd rescued him from certain death on that to him
never-to-be-forgotten occasion.

When I arrived at Taos, I found Uncle Kit and his family all in good
health, and I found Jim Bridger there having what he called a grand good
rest.

As soon as I had been greeted by Uncle Kit and the others of the family,
he asked me how I had succeeded in my quest of the lost, and when I told
him all the particulars, he