WILDERNESS LIFE. 269 





WILDERNESS LIFE. 



CIRCUMSTANCES had caused me to attach myself to 

 a trader, who, with about twenty teamsters, was en 

 route for northern Mexico. My duties were to hunt and 

 supply the party with game, a pleasant enough occupa- 

 tion but not without danger, for the greater portion of 

 the country we traversed belonged to the much-dread- 

 ed Comanche, the most reckless race of freebooters and 

 horsemen probably on the face of the earth, who are 

 at war with every one, and prize nothing more than 

 a white man's scalp. Knowing such to be the case 

 it behooved me to keep my weather eye open when 

 separated from my newly-formed acquaintances, but 

 for all my watchfulness I several times had narrow 

 escapes. Still time fled pleasantly onward, and as 

 I write this I look back with delight to the happy, 

 free, thoughtless hours passed either in the saddle or 

 watching the movements of the wild animals that 

 knew no bounds to their demesne. The Indians sel- 

 dom troubled my thoughts, for I had a mare, that 



