April 23, 1910.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
649 
The End of Arnold the Horse Thief 
By 0. P. KIKER 
ing two miles, constantly going down this 
stream. Down 3,000 feet (aneroid) we found 
several old rotten birch bark stills. The work¬ 
ers of these stills had evidently used the stream 
as their road, but as they carried practically 
nothing but grub in and birch oil out, their 
loads were not heavy. 
The boy wanted to linger in this gorge, but 
time was passing. He got a promise to go 
back, however, and have a try at those trout 
later on, with a camp down the mountain. 
About five o’clock we struck a semblance of 
a trail and were soon down to Toe River, go¬ 
ing out by Micaville to the nearest railroad 
point, Boonford, on the new Clinchfield road, 
built at great expense with a one per cent, 
grade over the mountains. This road is build- 
1 N the early '60s Texas was yet a wilderness, 
and while there were many settlements, 
they were widely scattered, and this gave 
abundant opportunity for the operations of the 
outlaw and the cattle and horse thief. These 
men were well organized, and their resorts ex¬ 
tended through many portions of the State. 
No band was better known than the Jacob 
Arnold band. They were cold-blooded and 
wary, and many an officer of the law found it 
convenient to avoid them. 
or warning, is still visible. This seemed a very- 
popular rendezvous for this band. Here they 
would concentrate with the plunder of their 
raids before finally leaving this portion of the 
State. 
With the coming of the real settlers came in¬ 
creasing dangers to these lawless men, and they 
had so little regard for law that they usually 
perished without the law, for, when officer or 
citizen met and opposed this band it was the 
quickest man who lived to tell the story. The 
GREEN RIVER FALLS, BUCK FOREST. 
ing to the coast as a coal carrying road and is 
opening up some of the grandest scenery in the 
continent. There are nineteen tunnels in half 
as many miles. In one place, looking out of 
the car window one can see through three 
tunnels ahead. It is a standard gauge, rock- 
ballasted road, having the heaviest rails. The 
railroad ride from Boonford to Marion is 
worth seeing. 
We arrived at Marion in time to see our 
Asheville train pulling out. Every one took 
us for hobos, as our clothes were torn to 
tatters, and as we were not partial to hotels in 
our present condition, we went a mile out of 
town, cooked our dinner and waited for the 
evening train. 
We have traveled with pack train over Wyo¬ 
ming, Montana and Colorado, have portaged 
the Tobique section of New Brunswick, have 
been in the palmetto swamps of Georgia and 
Florida, but when you want a trip, go with a 
pack on your back down the north side of 
Mount Mitchell and come out by way of Toe 
River. 
This particular company of outlaws operated 
in a portion of the State where the roughness 
of the country made it possible for them easily 
to escape when pursued. In places where 
these outlaws conducted operations a sharp 
lookout was usually established, where a sys¬ 
tem of signals could be given, which would in¬ 
dicate to them the presence of the officer of the 
law or of prospective booty. Lying in the path 
of these roving thieves was a section of country 
lying on both sides of the Paluxy, a beautiful 
stream tributary to the Brazos River. The 
Arnold band, when making a raid upon the 
settlements in the lower lands on the Brazos in 
the counties of Hill and Bosque, would cross 
the river and retreat up the Paluxy and on 
finally into the Palo Pinto Mountains. 
Far up toward the head waters of the Paluxy 
was one of their signal mountains. This 
rounded hill set back some half a mile from 
the stream and to-day may be seen from the 
windows of the St. Louis and San Francisco 
trains. The rock-tower, from which signal 
fires gave forth their messages of information 
sittings of a jury or the decisions of a court 
were not thought of, and it was considered 
every man’s duty to exterminate these men 
against whom judgments had been given, and 
often large rewards had been offered. 
A man named Collins had established a claim 
on what is now Camp Creek, a small stream 
flowing into the Brazos River from the east, 
and he had gathered about him a nice herd of 
cattle and some good horses. One morning 
his wife heard a pistol 'shot out near the lots 
which were a few hundred yards from the house, 
and feeling that something out of the usual had 
happened, she cautiously ran down that way, 
and noted a band of men driving away not 
only the cattle from the pens, but the horses 
also. Before she could make any outcry they 
had gotten out of her sight, and she was ap¬ 
palled to find her husband lying in the cowpen 
in his own blood, dead. It seemed, as was 
afterward verified, that the robbers had de¬ 
liberately shot Mr. Collins and then driven his 
stock away. The heart-broken wife was com¬ 
pelled to walk four or five miles to the nearest 
