280 WILD aCENES AND WILD HUNTERS. 



We carried our lives in our hands — or, wtat is in other worda 

 the same thing — our weapons. 



It added very much to my relish of the sense of being, the 

 consciousness that I could get myself shot at any time by 

 crooking my finger. It was a novel sensation — ^the having 

 one's life so entirely at our command — at least the holding it in 

 such complete dependence upon one's prompt right arm. And 

 then the occasional divertisement of quelling some red-handed 

 bully — as cowardly as he was ferocious. It was a refreshing 

 exultation to unmask such villains, and see their white livers 

 paling through their cheeks. 



But the life in the cities and settlements was a mere fore- 

 taste. I must go to the frontier to meet the dusky chivalry 

 of the mountains on the " Debatable Ground" of the plains^. 

 What, with the open struggle with these wild warriors,-^ 

 gaunt, half naked, subtle — and guarding against the secret 

 and murderous treachery of the Mexican, — I expected to find 

 employment enough, and glut my passions with the tumult 

 of strange perils ! 



Perhaps then my blood would grow cooler, the fever might 

 go off, and leave me thinking and feeling more as I onoe did ! 

 for I longed at times to get back to the ground I had left, but 

 could not now! The disease must have its course. I. was 

 plunging into all this madness to get away from my own con- 

 sciousness, to hide from the frightful realization of my own 

 doctrines ! 



I would say, parenthetically, that this recital is not in- 

 tended for the sleepy, lymphatic denizens of the "namby 

 pamby inane." Your "perfect people," who never had a 

 sinful thought, a passion above beef-steak, or a higher adven- 

 ture than overturning a poor woman's apple-stall, — their very 

 blood would be congealed at the idea of reading a line from 

 the pen of so wicked a wretch as I have described myself to 

 have been. But men and women who have thought, felt, 

 analyzed, seen, acted and remembered, will recognize the 



