38 The Winning of the West 



ing the horses; the whites pursued them in bands, 

 and occasionally pitched battles were fought, with 

 loss on both sides, and apparently as often resulting 

 in the favor of one party as of the other. The most 

 expert Indian fighters naturally became the leaders, 

 being made colonels and captains of the local militia. 

 The position and influence of the officers depended 

 largely on their individual prowess; they were the 

 actual, not titular, leaders of their men. Old Kasper 

 Mansker, one of the most successful, may be taken as 

 a type of the rest. He was ultimately made a colonel, 

 and shared in many expeditions ; but he always acted 

 as his own scout, and never would let any of his 

 men ride ahead or abreast of him, preferring to trust 

 to his own eyes and ears and knowledge of forest 

 warfare. The hunters, who were especially exposed 

 to danger, were also the men who inflicted most loss 

 on the Indians, and though many more of the set 

 tlers than of their foes were slain, yet the tables were 

 often turned on the latter, even by those who seemed 

 their helpless victims. Thus, once, two lads were 

 watching at a deer lick, when some Indians came to 

 it; each of the boys chose his man, fired, and then 

 fled homeward; coming back with some men they 

 found they had killed two Indians, whose scalps they 

 took. 



The eagerness of the Indians to get scalps caused 

 them frequently to scalp their victims before life was 

 extinct; and, as a result, there were numerous in 

 stances in which the scalped unfortunate, whether 

 man, woman, or child, was rescued and recovered, 



