270 
FOREST AND STREAM 
went to buy a little more paper money to last me 
until I reached Salt Lake City, the cashier seemed 
to resent the way I put it, in asking the price of 
greenbacks, and he told me tartly what he would 
pay for gold, which was about 145. 
We left Council Bluffs in a sleigh, crossed the 
Missouri River on the ice to the collection of 
wooden sheds and office buildings which at that 
time served the purposes of a terminal station 
for the Union Pacific Railway. A train of four 
or five of the ordinary day cars of the period 
was already made up, and about nine o’clock on 
the morning of March 27th, we pulled out for 
the west. There were no sleeping cars, but that 
was a trifling consideration to one who expected 
to pass nearly two weeks, day and night, in a 
stage coach. 
The cars were pretty well filled with a miscel¬ 
laneous lot of men, some with guns and all with 
pistols. The valley of the Platte was still cov¬ 
ered .with snow; and wil'd life such as coyotes, 
jack rabbits and crows, were much in evidence; 
.two or three times we saw deer and occasionally 
prairie chickens. 
There was a continual banging of guns and 
revolvers from the car windows, at every living 
thing within possible or even impossible range. 
The men who had never been west before were 
most industrious at this target practice, being- 
determined to acquire as much skill as possible 
before taking up their real business of killing 
Indians. 
So far as I recall, not a single shot was seen 
to take effect; a thing not to be wondered at con¬ 
sidering- that this gunning was of daily occur¬ 
rence, and the animals immediately scuttled to 
one side in one direction or another at the ap¬ 
proach of a train. 
Most of the passengers had provisions with 
them, but the train made stops for meals at about 
the usual eating hours. We were over thirty 
hours making the distance from Omaha to Chey¬ 
enne, about five hundred miles, partially owing 
to the fact that, in places on the prairie, the snow¬ 
drifts impeded our progress. Cheyenne was a 
typical border town of wooden buildings, mostly 
mere shanties, and of tents, or frames of build¬ 
ings with canvas tacked over, for temporary 
purposes. 
I went to the principal hotel, from which the 
stage coach made its final start, after taking- on 
such passengers as appeared at the coach and 
express office, and I was fortunate in being- 
able to procure a room for the night, all for my¬ 
self ; although only about eight feet by ten, and 
divided by the thinnest of partitions from the 
adjoining similar apartments, I rejoiced that I 
did not have to share with several of the men, as 
I have often had to do in new mining camps. 
After dinner I went around to the coach office 
to register for the next day’s coach. I had care¬ 
fully considered the question of breaking my trip 
to Salt Lake by a visit to Fort Laramie, situated 
some sixty to seventy miles from the stage coach 
route. A friend of mine, Major M., of the regu¬ 
lar army, whom I had known in California, was 
in command at that post, and had been very in¬ 
sistent that I should stop over for a few days 
and visit him, promising me the novel experi¬ 
ence of a buffalo hunt as an inducement. 
I ha'd only to let him know when I was coming 
through, and he said he would send a small 
escort of cavalry to meet me at the nearest stage 
station. I have never ceased to regret that I 
did not avail myself of this chance to participate 
for once in a sport which, in a very few years 
after this time, was ended forever by the practi¬ 
cal extinction of the buffalo. 
Letters from California, which seemed to make 
it needful for me to return, decided me, however, 
to forego my pleasure for the time; and the 
opportunity never occurred again. 
As is usually the case, I found after getting 
to Sacramento, that I might just as well have 
stayed a week or two longer. 
The remainder of the afternoon and the even¬ 
ing of my arrival at Cheyenne I spent in viewing 
the sights of the place, principally saloons and 
gambling houses; though I remember that the 
place where a few days before three men had 
been hung, was pointed out with evident pride. 
The terminus of the railway had managed to 
attract specimens of every type and class of 
mankind, cowboys, teamsters and railway labor¬ 
ers, merchants and gamblers; men from the 
mountains, and others only a few days from New 
York or other eastern cities, were all gathered 
here. 
The place was lively enough, but I was glad 
to go to bed at a reasonable hour, having had an 
uncomfortable night on the train. 
The next morning I made two or three needed 
purchases, and passed the time as best I might 
until the departure of the coach, which was not 
until one o’clock P. M. 
At that hour on Saturday, March 29th, I was 
ready and waiting with my valise, among the 
crowd which had gathered about the hotel, al¬ 
ways interested in the departure of the through 
Preparing for a Turkey Dinner. 
