ed to
say, 'Never borrow trouble, or cross a river before you reach it.' So
when the cattle are through grazing, let them hit the trail north.
It's entirely too late for us to veer away from any Indians."

We were following the regular trail, which had been slightly used for
a year or two, though none of our outfit had ever been over it, when
late on the third afternoon, about forty miles out from Doan's, about
a hundred mounted bucks and squaws sighted our herd and crossed the
North Fork from their encampment. They did not ride direct to the
herd, but came into the trail nearly a mile above the cattle, so it
was some little time from our first sighting them before we met. We
did not check the herd or turn out of the trail, but when the lead
came within a few hundred yards of the Indians, one buck, evidently
the chief of the band, rode forward a few rods and held up one hand,
as if commanding a halt. At the sight of this gaudily bedecked
apparition, the cattle turned out of the trail, and Flood and I rode
up to the chief, extending our hands in friendly greeting. The chief
could not speak a word of English, but made signs with his hands; when
I turned loose on him in Spanish, however, he instantly turned his
horse and signed back to his band. Two young bucks rode forward and
greeted Flood and myself in good Spanish.

On thus opening up an intelligible conversation, I called Fox
Quarternight, who spoke Spanish, and he rode up from his position of
third man in the swing and joined in the council. The two young
Indians through whom we carried on the conversation were Apaches, no
doubt renegades of that tribe, and while we understood each other in
Spanish, they spoke in a heavy guttural peculiar to the Indian. Flood
opened the powwow by demanding to know the meaning of this visit. When
the question had been properly interpreted to the chief, the latter
dropped his blanket from his shoulders and dismounted from his horse.
He was a fine specimen of the Plains Indian, fully six feet in height,
perfectly proportioned, and in years well past middle life. He looked
every inch a chief, and was a natural born orator. There was a certain
easy grace to his gestures, only to be seen in people who use the sign
language, and often when he was speaking to the Apache interpreters, I
could anticipate his requests before they were translated to us,
although I did not know a word of Comanche.

Before the powwow had progressed far it was e