IN THE OLD WEST 295 



trusty weapons they felt, indeed, unarmed ; and 

 not knowing how the affair just over would be fol- 

 lowed up, lost no time in making preparations for 

 defense. However, after great blustering on the 

 part of the prefecto, who, accompanied by a 

 -posse cojnitatus of " Greasers," proceeded to the 

 house, and demanded the surrender of all concerned 

 in the affair — which proposition was received with 

 a yell of derision — the business was compounded 

 by the mountaineers promising to give sundry dol- 

 lars to the fiiends of two of the Mexicans who died 

 during the night of their wounds, and to pay for a 

 certain amount of masses to be sung for the repose 

 of their souls in purgatory. Thus the affair blew 

 over; but for several days the mountaineers never 

 showed themselves in the streets of Fernandez with- 

 out their rifles on their shoulders, and refrained 

 from attending fandangos for the present, and un- 

 til the excitement had cooled down. 



A bitter feeling, however, existed on the part of 

 the men ; and one or two offers of a matrimonial 

 nature were rejected by the papas of certain ladies 

 who had been wooed by some of the white hunters, 

 and their hands formally demanded from their re- 

 spective padres. 



La Bonte had been rather smitten with the 

 channs of one Dolores Salazar — a buxom lass, 

 more than three parts Indian in her blood, but con- 

 fessedly the beauty of the Vale of Taos. She, by 



