not heard, but
while you were gone you were nominated and elected to represent the
twenty-sixth district of Nebraska in the Legislature." I said:

"That is highly complimentary, and I appreciate it, but I am no
politician and I shall have to tender my resignation," and tender it I
did.

My refusal to serve as a lawmaker was unqualified. I knew nothing about
politics. I believe that I made a fairly good justice of the peace, but
that was because of no familiarity with the written law. I merely
applied the principles of fair-dealing to my cases and did as I would
have been done by. The Golden Rule was the only statute I applied.

I inquired how to free myself formally from the new honors that had
been thrust upon me, and soon another man was serving in my stead--and
quite welcome he was to the pay and credit that might have been mine.

I returned back to the Plains for employment, but there was nothing to
do. The Indians, for a wonder, were quiet. There was little stirring in
the military posts. I could have continued to serve in one of them if I
had chosen, and the way was still open to study for a commission as an
officer. But army life without excitement was not interesting for me,
and when Ned Buntline offered me a chance to come East and try my
fortunes as an actor I accepted.

I accepted with misgivings, naturally. Hunting Indians across a stage
differed from following them across the Plains. I knew the wild western
Indian and his ways. I was totally unacquainted with the tame stage
Indian, and the thought of a great gaping audience looking at me across
the footlights made me shudder.

But when my old "pards," Wild Bill and Texas Jack, consented to try
their luck with me in the new enterprise I felt better. Together we
made the trip to New York, and played for a time in the hodgepodge
drama written for us by Ned Buntline himself.

Before any of us would consent to be roped and tied by Thespis we
insisted on a proviso that we be freed whenever duty called us to the
Plains.

The first season was fairly prosperous, and so was the second. The
third year I organized a "show" of my own, with real Indians in it--the
first, I believe, who ever performed on a stage. I made money and began
to get accustomed to the new life, but in 1876 the call for which I had
been listening came.

The Sioux War was just breaking out. I closed the show earlier than
usual and returned to the West. Colonel Mills had written me severa