MAJOE NORTH. 143 



coming; and it was then found that an arrow had passed 

 through the hinder boy, and had stuck into the one in front, 

 pinning them together. I saw the marks of the wound on one 

 of them, the arrow having passed through on the left side of 

 the spine and low down. 



When I asked Mrs. Martin if she had not been very much 

 frightened, she answered that she had lived too long in the 

 West for that, and her husband added that once when some 

 Indians, supposed to be friendly, had come into the house and 

 had been very insolent, finding only a woman at hom, and 

 taking whatever they fancied, she had, as he said, gone for 

 them with an axe-handle, and had driven them out of the 

 house in no time. Martin had, he told me, come out with 

 only enough to keep himself and his wife for a few weeks, and 

 he owned to being worth thirty thousand pounds, all of it 

 being made without speculation or mining. 



I left the rauche on the third day for Fort Kearney, a ride 

 of thirty miles, to get letters and a few supplies, and arrived 

 the same evening. The Commandant kindly put me up, and 

 made me remain the next day, as he wanted me to meet a 

 Major North, who was in command of about six hundred 

 Pawnee Indian scouts, and who was away at a ranche on the 

 Platte River. Major North was an Englishman who had come 

 out to America when very young, going eventually into the 

 army during the war, and was appointed to the command of 

 the scouts about two years before my visit to Kearney. These 

 were picked men from the tribe, and, now that they were well 

 disciplined, did good service against any hostile Indians, being 

 mounted and armed as soldiers. 



Major North came in the following morning, and told me 



