286 IN THE OLD WEST 



hanging from his slouching beaver over the shoul- 

 ders of his buckskin hunting-shirt. He, as he was 

 wont to say, was " no dam Spaniard, but moun- 

 tainee man, wagh ! " Chabonard, a half-breed, 

 was not lost in the crowd ; and, the last in 

 height, but the first in every quality which consti- 

 tutes excellence in a mountaineer, whether of in- 

 domitable courage or perfect indifference to death 

 or danger with an iron frame capable of with- 

 standing hunger, thirst, heat, cold, fatigue, and 

 hardships of every kind of wonderful presence 

 of mind and endless resources in times of peril 

 with the instinct of an animal and the moral cour- 

 age of a man, who was " taller " for his inches 

 than Kit Carson, paragon of mountaineers ? * 

 Small in stature, and slenderly limbed, but with 

 muscles of wire, with a fair complexion and quiet 

 intelligent features, to look at Kit none would sup- 

 pose that the mild-looking being before him was an 

 incarnate devil in Indian fight, and had raised 

 more hair from head of Redskins than any two 

 men in the western country; and yet, thirty win- 

 ters had scarcely planted a line or furrow on his 



* Since the time of which we speak, Kit Carson has dis- 

 tinguished himself in guiding the several U. S. exploring ex- 

 peditions under Fremont across the Rocky Mountains, and 

 to all parts of Oregon and California; and for his services, 

 the President of the United States presented the gallant 

 mountaineer with the commission of lieutenant in a newly- 

 raised regiment of mounted riflemen, of which his old leader 

 Fr&nont is appointed colonel. (Author's note.) 



