LIFE IN THE FAR WEST. 177 



You're good for beaver / know ; at deer or huffier, or 

 darned Red Injun either, you're 'some.' Now that's a 

 fact. ' Off-hand,' or * with a rest,' you make 'em ' come.' 

 You knows the ' sign ' of Injuns slick Blackfoot or Sioux, 

 Pawnee or Burnt wood, Zeton, Eapaho, Shian, or Sho- 

 shonee, Yutah, Piyutah, or Yamhareek their trail's as 

 plain as writin', old hos, to you." 



"Wagh!" grunted Killbuck, blushing bronze at all these 

 compliments. 



" Your sight ain't bad. Elks is elk ; black-tailed deer 

 ain't white-tails ; and b'ar is b'ar to you, and nothin' else, 

 a long mile off and more." 



"Wa-agh!" 



" Thar ain't a track as leaves its mark upon the plains 

 or mountains but you can read off-hand ; that I've see'd 

 myself. But tell me, old hos, can you make understand 

 the * sign ' as shows itself in a woman's breast ? " 



Killbuck removed the pipe from his mouth, raised his 

 head, and puffed a rolling cloud of smoke into the air, 

 knocked the ashes from the bowl, likewise made his medi- 

 cine and answered thus : 



" From Red River, away up north among the Britishers, 

 to Heely (Gila) in the Spanish country from old Mis- 

 soura to the Sea of Californy, I've trapped and hunted. 

 I knows the Injuns and thar ' sign,' and they knows me, 

 I'm thinkin'. Thirty winters has snowed on me in these 

 hyar mountains, and a niggur or a Spaniard * would lam 

 'some' in that time. This old tool" (tapping his rifle) 

 " shoots ' centre,' she does ; and if thar's game afoot, this 

 child knows 'bull' from 'cow,' and ought to could. That 

 deer is deer, and goats is goats, is plain as paint to any 

 but a greenhorn. Beaver's a cunning crittur, but I've 

 trapped a ' heap ; ' and at killing meat when meat's a-run- 

 ing, I'll ' shine ' in the biggest kind of crowd. For twenty 

 year I packed a squaw along. Not one, but a many. 

 First I had a Blackfoot the darndest slut as ever cried 

 for fofarraw. I lodge-poled her on Colter's Creek, and 



* Always alluding to Mexicans, who are invariably called Span- 

 iards by the Western Americans. 



M 



