had already run himself
nearly to death, and, when he tried to stop quickly, he lost his
balance, and fell forward to the ground. His lance stuck in the earth,
and broke in two.

Colter quickly pulled the pointed end of the spear out of the ground
and killed the fallen Indian. Then he turned and ran on toward the
river.

The other Indians were coming swiftly behind; but, as they passed the
place where the first one lay dead, each of them stopped a moment to
howl over him, after their custom. This gave Colter a little more time.
He reached a patch of woods near the river. He ran through this to the
river, and jumped in He swam toward a little island.

Logs and brush had floated down the river, and lodged across the
island. This driftwood had formed a great raft. Colter dived under this
raft. He swam to a place where he could push his head up to get air,
and still be hidden by the brush.

The Indians were already yelling on the bank of the river. A moment
later they were swimming toward the island. When they reached the drift
pile, they ran this way and that. They looked into all the cracks and
tried to find the white man. They ran right over his hiding place.
Colter thought they would surely find him.

But after a long time they went away. Colter thought they would set
fire to the raft of driftwood, but they did not think of that. Perhaps
they thought that Colter had been drowned.

He lay still under the raft till night came. Then he swam down the
stream a long distance, left the stream, and went far out on the
prairie. Here he felt himself safe from his enemies.

But he had no clothes and no food. He had no gun to shoot animals with.
It was several days' journey to the nearest place where there were
white men, at a trading house.

Colter had nothing to eat but roots. The sun burned his skin in the
daytime. He shivered without a covering at night. The thorns hurt his
feet when he walked, but he found his way to the trading house at last.

He used to tell of wonderful things that he saw while traveling to the
trading house after he got away from the Indians. He saw springs that
were boiling hot and steaming. He saw fountains that would sometimes
spout hot water into the air for hundreds of feet.

These and many other wonderful things that he saw at this time he used
to tell about. But nobody believed his stories. Nobody had ever seen
anything of the kind in this country. When Colter would tell of these
thing