IN THE OLD WEST 45 



picketed animals, cautioning the guard round the 

 camp to keep their " eyes skinned, for there would 

 be powder burned before morning." Then return- 

 ing to the fire, and kicking with his moccasined 

 foot the slumbering ashes, he squatted down be- 

 fore it, and thus soliloquized: 



" Thirty year have I been knocking about these 

 mountains from Missoura's head as far sothe as 

 the starving Gila. I've trapped a heap,* and 

 many a hundred pack of beaver I've traded in my 

 time, wagh! What has come of it, and whar's 

 the dollars as ought to be in my possibles? 

 Whar's the ind of this, I say? Is a man to be 

 hunted by Injuns all his days? Many's the time 

 I've said I'd strike for Taos, and trap a squaw, 

 for this child's getting old, and feels like wanting 

 a woman's face about his lodge for the balance of 

 his days; but when it comes to caching of the 

 old traps, I've the smallest kind of heart, I have. 

 Certain, the old State comes across my mind now 

 and again, but who's thar to remember my old 

 body? But them diggings gets too overcrowded 

 nowadays, and it's hard to fetch breath amongst 

 them big bands of corncrackers to Missoura. Be- 

 side, it goes against natur' to leave bufler-meat 

 and feed on hog; and them white gals are too 

 much like picturs, and a deal too ' fofarraw ' 



* An Indian is always " a heap " hungry or thirsty 

 loves "a heap" is "a heap" brave; in fact, "a heap" 

 is tantamount to very much. 



