s scouts, to see if they can discover any
signs of Indians, such as footprints or trail, or smoke, or anything of
that kind. Men that are used to it, can distinguish between the footprints
of an Indian and a white man. They can also, at a long distance off, tell
an Indian fire from a white man's.

Any mountaineer can tell by the trail, how long since persons have passed,
the number of the party, as well as the number of animals. An Indian, when
he makes a fire, uses half a dozen little sticks as big as your thumb, and
very dry, and all the smoke the fire makes, will ascend straight up in one
steady column. The white man will use, if he is a novice, the dry to
kindle with, and then he will chuck on the wet wood, which will cause a
great smoke.

But to return to my _cache_. I keep out my scouts all the time we are to
work. "Boys, get your shovels, and dig a hole about four or five feet
deep, by ten feet in length. Put a lot of wood or branches in the bottom.
In with the provisions, canvas over the top, or more bushes. Cover over
all with earth. Then take ashes from previous fires, and scatter over the
top; then build fires over them, so as to dry the sand."

It was here in this camp that I first met Christopher Carson, or Kit
Carson, as he was called. From his wide acquaintance with the Indians on
both sides of the Rocky mountains; from his personal knowledge of the many
tribes of the red men; from his bravery under all circumstances in which
he has been placed, Kit Carson stands at the head of all the hardy
pioneers of the Great West. It is now more than twenty years, since I
first met him on the Mohave river, about eighty miles from San Bernardino.

He was accompanied by an American and half a dozen Mexicans or half
breeds, who were assisting him to drive some sheep. As he rode up, he
saluted me with Buenos dias Senor, which means 'good day sir.' I answered
the salutation in the same language, at the same time clasping his hand as
he dismounted, and introduced himself as Kit Carson. He is about five feet
eight or nine inches high, and weighs about one hundred and sixty pounds.
He had a round, jolly looking face, a dark piercing eye, that looked right
through you, and seemed to read your every thought. His long brown hair
hung around his shoulders. His dress consisted of buckskin coat and pants,
with leggins coming up to his knees, and in which he carried, in true
Mexican style, his Machete or long two-edged knife.