Part 13 (1/2)

'It was getting dark, I had not touched food since starting, nor had I wetted my lips. My thirst was now intolerable. The travelling rule, about keeping on, was an ugly incubus. Samson would go his own ways-he had sense enough for that-but how, when, where, was I to quench my thirst? Oh! for the tip of Lazarus' finger-or for choice, a bottle of Ba.s.s-to cool my tongue! Then too, whither would the mustang stray in the night if I rested or fell asleep? Again and again I tried to stalk him by the starlight. Twice I got hold of his tail, but he broke away. If I drove him down to the river banks the chance of catching him would be no better, and I should lose the dry ground to rest on.

'It was about as unpleasant a night as I had yet pa.s.sed. Every now and then I sat down, and dropped off to sleep from sheer exhaustion. Every time this happened I dreamed of sparkling drinks; then woke with a start to a lively sense of the reality, and anxious searches for the mustang.

'Directly the day dawned I drove the animal, now very stiff, straight down for the Platte. He wanted water fully as much as his master; and when we sighted it he needed no more driving. Such a hurry was he in that, in his rush for the river, he got bogged in the muddy swamp at its edge. I seized my chance, and had him fast in a minute. We both plunged into the stream; I, clothes and all, and drank, and drank, and drank.'

That evening I caught up the cavalcade.

How curious it is to look back upon such experiences from a different stage of life's journey! How would it have fared with me had my rifle exploded with the fall? it was knocked out of my hands at full c.o.c.k. How if the stock had been broken? It had been thrown at least ten yards.

How if the horn had entered my thigh instead of the horse's? How if I had fractured a limb, or had been stunned, or the bull had charged again while I was creeping up to him? Any one, or more than one, of these contingencies were more likely to happen than not. But nothing did happen, save-the best.

Not a thought of the kind ever crossed my mind, either at the time or afterwards. Yet I was not a thoughtless man, only an average man. Nine Englishmen out of ten with a love of sport-as most Englishmen are-would have done, and have felt, just as I did. I was bruised and still; but so one is after a run with hounds. I had had many a nastier fall hunting in Derbys.h.i.+re. The worst that could happen did not happen; but the worst never-well, so rarely does. One might shoot oneself instead of the pigeon, or be caught picking forbidden fruit. Narrow escapes are as good as broad ones. The truth is, when we are young, and active, and healthy, whatever happens, of the pleasant or lucky kind, we accept as a matter of course.

Ah! youth! youth! If we only knew when we were well off, when we were happy, when we possessed all that this world has to give! If we but knew that love is only a matter of course so long as youth and its bounteous train is ours, we might perhaps make the most of it, and give up looking for-something better. But what then? Give up the 'something better'?

Give up pursuit,-the effort that makes us strong? 'Give up the sweets of hope'? No! 'tis better as it is, perhaps. The kitten plays with its tail, and the nightingale sings; but they think no more of happiness than the rose-bud of its beauty. May be happiness comes not of too much knowing, or too much thinking either.

CHAPTER XXIII

FORT LARAMIE was a military station and trading post combined. It was a stone building in what they called a 'compound' or open s.p.a.ce, enclosed by a palisade. When we arrived there, it was occupied by a troop of mounted riflemen under canvas, outside the compound. The officers lived in the fort; and as we had letters to the Colonel - Somner - and to the Captain - Rhete, they were very kind and very useful to us.

We pitched our camp by the Laramie river, four miles from the fort.

Nearer than that there was not a blade of gra.s.s. The cavalry horses and military mules needed all there was at hand. Some of the mules we were allowed to buy, or exchange for our own. We accordingly added six fresh ones to our cavalcade, and parted with two horses; which gave us a total of fifteen mules and six horses. Government provisions were not to be had, so that we could not replenish our now impoverished stock. This was a serious matter, as will be seen before long. Nor was the evil lessened by my being laid up with a touch of fever-the effect, no doubt, of those drenches of stagnant water. The regimental doctor was absent. I could not be taken into the fort. And, as we had no tent, and had thrown away almost everything but the clothes we wore, I had to rough it and take my chance. Some relics of our medicine chest, together with a tough const.i.tution, pulled me through. But I was much weakened, and by no means fit for the work before us. Fred did his best to persuade me from going further. He confessed that he was utterly sick of the expedition; that his injured knee prevented him from hunting, or from being of any use in packing and camp work; that the men were a set of ruffians who did just as they chose-they grumbled at the hards.h.i.+ps, yet helped themselves to the stores without restraint; that we had the Rocky Mountains yet to cross; after that, the country was unknown. Colonel Somner had strongly advised us to turn back. Forty of his men had tried two months ago to carry despatches to the regiment's headquarters in Oregon. Only five had got through; the rest had been killed and scalped. Finally, that we had something like 1,200 miles to go, and were already in the middle of August. It would be folly, obstinacy, madness, to attempt it. He would stop and hunt where we were, as long as I liked; or he would go back with me. He would hire fresh good men, and buy new horses; and, now that we knew the country, we could get to St. Louis before the end of September, and-. There was no reasonable answer to be made. I simply told him I had thought it over, and had decided to go on. Like the plucky fellow and staunch friend that he was, he merely shrugged his shoulders, and quietly said, 'Very well. So be it.'

Before leaving Fort Laramie a singular incident occurred, which must seem so improbable, that its narration may be taken for fiction. It was, however, a fact. There was plenty of game near our camping ground; and though the weather was very hot, one of the party usually took the trouble to bring in something to keep the pot supplied. The sage hens, the buffalo or elk meat were handed over to Jacob, who made a stew with bacon and rice, enough for the evening meal and the morrow's breakfast.

After supper, when everyone had filled his stomach, the large kettle, covered with its lid, was taken off the fire, and this allowed to burn itself out.

For four or five mornings running the kettle was found nearly empty, and all hands had to put up with a cup of coffee and mouldy biscuit dust.

There was a good deal of unparliamentary language. Everyone accused everyone else of filthy greediness. It was disgusting that after eating all he could, a man hadn't the decency to wait till the morning. The pot had been full for supper, and, as every man could see, it was never half emptied-enough was always left for breakfast. A resolution was accordingly pa.s.sed that each should take his turn of an hour's watch at night, till the glutton was caught in the act.

My hour happened to be from 11 to 12 P.M. I strongly suspected the thief to be an Indian, and loaded my big pistol with slugs on the chance. It was a clear moonlight night. I propped myself comfortably with a bag of hams; and concealed myself as well as I could in a bush of artemisia, which was very thick all round. I had not long been on the look-out when a large grey wolf prowled slowly out of the bushes. The night was bright as day; but every one of the men was sound asleep in a circle round the remains of the camp fire. The wolf pa.s.sed between them, hesitating as it almost touched a covering blanket. Step by step it crept up to the kettle, took the handle of the lid between its jaws, lifted it off, placed it noiselessly on the ground, and devoured the savoury stew.

I could not fire, because of the men. I dared not move, lest I should disturb the robber. I was even afraid the click of c.o.c.king the pistol would startle him and prevent my getting a quiet shot. But patience was rewarded. When satiated, the brute retired as stealthily as he had advanced; and as he pa.s.sed within seven or eight yards of me I let him have it. Great was my disappointment to see him scamper off. How was it possible I could have missed him? I must have fired over his back. The men jumped to their feet and clutched their rifles; but, though astonished at my story, were soon at rest again. After this the kettle was never robbed. Four days later we were annoyed with such a stench that it was a question of s.h.i.+fting our quarters. In hunting for the nuisance amongst the thicket of wormwood, the dead wolf was discovered not twenty yards from our centre.

The reader would not thank me for an account of the monotonous drudgery, the hards.h.i.+ps, the quarrellings, which grew worse from day to day after we left Fort Laramie. Fred and I were about the only two who were on speaking terms; we clung to each other, as a sort of forlorn security against coming disasters. Gradually it was dawning on me that, under the existing circ.u.mstances, the fulfilment of my hopes would be (as Fred had predicted) an impossibility; and that to persist in the attempt to realise them was to court destruction. As yet, I said nothing of this to him. Perhaps I was ashamed to. Perhaps I secretly acknowledged to myself that he had been wiser than I, and that my stubbornness was responsible for the life itself of every one of the party.

Doubtless thoughts akin to these must often have haunted the mind of my companion; but he never murmured; only uttered a hasty objurgation when troubles reached a climax, and invariably ended with a burst of cheery laughter which only the sulkiest could resist. It was after a day of severe trials he proposed that we should go off by ourselves for a couple of nights in search of game, of which we were much in need. The men were easily persuaded to halt and rest. Samson had become a sort of nonent.i.ty. Dysentery had terribly reduced his strength, and with it such intelligence as he could boast of. We started at daybreak, right glad to be alone together and away from the penal servitude to which we were condemned. We made for the Sweet.w.a.ter, not very far from the foot of the South Pa.s.s, where antelope and black-tailed deer abounded. We failed, however, to get near them-stalk after stalk miscarried.

Disappointed and tired, we were looking out for some snug little hollow where we could light a fire without its being seen by the Indians, when, just as we found what we wanted, an antelope trotted up to a brow to inspect us. I had a fairly good shot at him and missed. This disheartened us both. Meat was the one thing we now sorely needed to save the rapidly diminis.h.i.+ng supply of hams. Fred said nothing, but I saw by his look how this trifling accident helped to depress him. I was ready to cry with vexation. My rifle was my pride, the stag of my life-my _alter ego_. It was never out of my hands; every day I practised at prairie dogs, at sage hens, at a mark even if there was no game. A few days before we got to Laramie I had killed, right and left, two wild ducks, the second on the wing; and now, when so much depended on it, I could not hit a thing as big as a donkey. The fact is, I was the worse for illness. I had constant returns of fever, with bad s.h.i.+vering fits, which did not improve the steadiness of one's hand. However, we managed to get a supper. While we were examining the spot where the antelope had stood, a leveret jumped up, and I knocked him over with my remaining barrel. We fried him in the one tin plate we had brought with us, and thought it the most delicious dish we had had for weeks.

As we lay side by side, smoke curling peacefully from our pipes, we chatted far into the night, of other days-of Cambridge, of our college friends, of London, of the opera, of b.a.l.l.s, of women-the last a fruitful subject-and of the future. I was vastly amused at his sudden outburst as some start of one of the horses picketed close to us reminded us of the actual present. 'If ever I get out of this d-d mess,' he exclaimed, 'I'll never go anywhere without my own French cook.' He kept his word, to the end of his life, I believe.

It was a delightful repose, a complete forgetting, for a night at any rate, of all impending care. Each was cheered and strengthened for the work to come. The spirit of enterprise, the love of adventure restored for the moment, believed itself a match for come what would. The very animals seemed invigorated by the rest and the abundance of rich gra.s.s spreading as far as we could see. The morning was bright and cool. A delicious bath in the Sweet.w.a.ter, a breakfast on fried ham and coffee, and once more in our saddles on the way back to camp, we felt (or fancied that we felt) prepared for anything.

That is just what we were not. Samson and the men, meeting with no game where we had left them, had moved on that afternoon in search of better hunting grounds. The result was that when we overtook them, we found five mules up to their necks in a muddy creek. The packs were sunk to the bottom, and the animals nearly drowned or strangled. Fred and I rushed to the rescue. At once we cut the ropes which tied them together; and, setting the men to pull at tails or heads, succeeded at last in extricating them.

Our new-born vigour was nipped in the bud. We were all drenched to the skin. Two packs containing the miserable remains of our wardrobe, Fred's and mine, were lost. The catastrophe produced a good deal of bad language and bad blood. Translated into English it came to this: 'They had trusted to us, taking it for granted we knew what we were about.

What business had we to ”boss” the party if we were as ignorant as the mules? We had guaranteed to lead them through to California [!] and had brought them into this ”almighty fix” to slave like n.i.g.g.e.rs and to starve.' There was just truth enough in the Jeremiad to make it sting.