in, with which he pounded
the mules along; for we felt ourselves in a ticklish predicament should
we come across any of the brigands of the plains, on that lonely route,
with the animals to look out for, and only two of us to do the fighting.

Suddenly we saw sitting on the bank of the Arkansas River, about a dozen
rods from the Trail, an antiquated-looking savage with his war-bonnet
on, and armed with a long lance and his bow and arrows. We did not care
a cent for him, but I thought he might be one of the tribe's runners,
lying in wait to discover the condition of the coach--whether it had an
escort, and how many were riding in it, and that then he would go and
tell how ridiculously small the outfit was, and swoop down on us with
a band of his colleagues, that were hidden somewhere in the sand hills
south of the river. He rose as we came near, and made the sign, after
he had given vent to a series of "How's!" that he wanted to talk; but
we were not anxious for any general conversation with his savage majesty
just then, so my clerk applied the trace-chain more vigorously to the
tired mules, in order to get as many miles between him and the coach as
we could before he could get over into the sand hills and back.

It was, fortunately, a false alarm; the old warrior perhaps had no
intentions of disturbing us. We arrived at Fort Lyon in good season,
with our valorous driver absolutely sobered, requesting me to say
nothing about his accident, which, of course, I did not.

As has been stated, the caravans bound for Santa Fe and the various
forts along the line of the Old Trail did not leave the eastern end of
the route until the grass on the plains, on which the animals depended
solely for subsistence the whole way, grew sufficiently to sustain them,
which was usually about the middle of May. But a great many years
ago, one of the high officials of the quartermaster's department at
Washington, who had never been for a moment on duty on the frontier
in his life, found a good deal of fault with what he thought the
dilatoriness of the officer in charge at Fort Leavenworth, who
controlled the question of transportation for the several forts
scattered all over the West, for not getting the freight caravans
started earlier, which the functionary at the capital said must and
should be done. He insisted that they must leave the Missouri River by
the middle of April, a month earlier than usual, and came out himself
to superintend th