Part 12 (2/2)

We rolled him up in a blanket, laid him in the grave and covered him with dirt. The funeral being over, our party started for Bent's Fort.

The third day's travel brought us to Sweet.w.a.ter, where we came to the top of a hill, from which we could overlook the entire valley, which was covered with wagons and tents. This was a large train of emigrants from various portions of the East who had started the year before and had wintered on Platte river, the edge of settlement, and when spring opened they had resumed their journey.

After supper that evening, Uncle Kit suggested that we visit the emigrant camp and see the ladies, which did not altogether meet with my approval, but rather than be called bashful, I went along with the crowd. I was now twenty-one years of age, and this was the first time I had got sight of a white woman since I was fifteen, this now being the year of 1853.

I had been out in the mountains a long time, and had not had my hair cut during that time, but took excellent care of it. I always kept it rolled up in a piece of buckskin, and when unrolled it would hang down to my waist.

There was a number of young ladies in the train, and they were not long in learning that I was the most bashful person in the crowd, and they commenced trying to interest me in conversation. At that time I only owned two horses, and would have given them both, as free as the water that runs in the brook, if I could only have been away from there at that moment. Seeing that I had long hair, each of them wanted a lock. By this time I had managed to muster courage enough to begin to talk to them.

I told them that if they would sing a song, they might have a lock of my hair.

A little, fat Missouri girl, spoke up and said: ”Will you let any one that sings have a lock of your hair?”

I a.s.sured her that I would.

”And each of us that sing?” interrupted another young lady.

I said each one that would sing could have a lock, provided there was enough to go around.

I now had the ice broken, and could begin to talk to the ladies and crack a few jokes with them.

The little, fat, chubby young lady, that first started the conversation, sang a song ent.i.tled ”The Californian's Lament,”

which was as follows:

Now pay attention unto me, All you that remain at home, And think upon your friends Who have to California gone; And while in meditation It fills our hearts with pain, That many so near and dear to us We ne'er shall see again.

While in this bad condition, With sore and troubled minds, Thinking of our many friends And those we left behind, With our hearts sunk low in trouble Our feelings we cannot tell, Although so far away from you, Again we say, farewell.

With patience we submitted Our trials to endure, And on our weary journey The mountains to explore.

But the fame of California Has begun to lose its hue-- When the soul and body is parting What good can money do?

The fame of California Has pa.s.sed away and gone; And many a poor miner Will never see his home.

They are falling in the mountains high, And in the valleys, too; They are sinking in the briny deep, No more to rise to view.

This I thought the prettiest song I had ever heard in my life.

Environment so colors things. In other words, ”circ.u.mstances alter cases.”

The lady at once demanded a lock of my hair as compensation for services rendered, and I removed the buckskin wrap and told her to take a lock, but cautioned her not to take too large a bunch, for fear there might not be enough to go around. The young lady, seeing that I was very bashful, had considerable trouble in finding a lock that suited her. A number of the young ladies sang together, after which several of them took the scissors and cut a lock of hair from the head of the young trapper.

I wondered at the time why it was that all the young ladies had a pick at me, for there was Johnnie West, a fine looking young man, who was continually trying to engage some of them in conversation, but they did not want to talk to any one but me, and it amused Uncle Kit not a little to see the sport the young ladies were having at my expense.

Before leaving, I told the young lady who sang the first song that I thought it was the prettiest song I had ever heard, and requested her to sing it again. She replied that she would if I wished, and she did.

The next day about ten o'clock as we rode along, feeling drowsy from the warm sun, Jake Harrington turned around in his saddle, yawned and said: ”Well, Will, can't you sing the song for us that you learned from those little Missouri gals last night?”

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