Aug. 7 , 1909.] 
211 
Whenever you hear a man say that he waited 
►aim an’ cool for the bullets to begin flying, you 
ake it from me that he is a liar. How can one 
>e that way when he is dreading what may 
lappen to his own carcass? An’ again, no mat¬ 
er what the other fellow or outfit has done, 
>01’ hate, anyway, to be the one to send him 
'o the hot place. That’s the way you feel be- 
ore the fight; but once it begins, hooray for 
lood an’ hair! an’ the ground all tore up. 
“All of an hour passed an’ they didn’t show 
p again. Another hour an’ still no signs of 
hem. We got that nervous that a squirrel 
uddenly rustling the dead leaves made us jump, 
in’ then we looked at one another kind of 
shamed like. We had just about made up our 
finds that they had taken some other trail than 
•as unknown to us, when here they came, an’ 
foot. There were fourteen of them now, one 
aving been left with the horses, of course 
.n’ along back in the line of them—the seventh 
lr eighth man—was our cholo, Frijole, carry- 
ig a long gun an’ a couple of six-shooters 
uck in his belt. We had plenty of time to size 
lem up. I can’t say that they looked especially 
)Ugh; they were well armed; most of them 
oorted silver an’ gold braided clothes an’ hats, 
00 fine for them ever to have bought. The 
rader was just all ablaze with gold trimmings. 
;[e was a little bit of a slim man, good looking 
h’ a lot whiter than the rest of the gang. He 
as Antonio Aguilla, all right, fitting to a dot 
le way he had been described to Pedro. 
• “They came slow and.easy up the steep slope, 
opping often to get their breath, talking an’ 
ughing some an’ as unconcerned as though 
ley were going to a fiesta. As they came near 
e drew bead on them; when they were right 
ider the madrones, ‘Fire!’ Irish growled, 
lim! blim! blim! went our rifles. There was a 
ft of screeching an’ yelling; the powder smoke 
fifted into our eyes for a second; some of 
iem fired at us an’ one of the bullets cut a twig 
ust above my right ear. Then the smoke lifted, 
saw one man roll down the slope and off the 
Ige of the cliff. Two were lying still on the 
ail; another was on his hands an’ knees try- 
g to stand up, an’ he was Frijole. The rest were 
tting the back trail for all, they were worth, 
tiling, pushing, crowding, each one trying to be 
•st on the narrow trail. It was probably the 
: st time they had been ambushed—or for that 
atter, ever really been under fire. We didn’t 
rget what we were there for, you bet, an’ 
e way we made our Henrys crack was like 
icoffee mill, some continuous. They dropped 
st; two more rolled off into the canon, our 
iagazines went empty. There were still three 
' them streaking it down the trail, and before 
ay of us could slip in a fresh ca’tridge they 
nre out of sight. We looked over the lot of 
lose we had downed, an’ where one moved he 
'is given a finisher, then we slid down an' 
<amined them. Frijole wasn’t quite dead after 
H ‘Why did you do this?’ Pedro asked, lean- 
ig over him. The cholo raised up a little an’ 
r answer spit in his face with about the last 
leath he had. 
“I guess Irish’s man, the leader of the outfit, 
rver knew what struck him, for the old scout 
Id made his favorite shot, at the base of the 
>ck. ’Course we examined his clothes, ex¬ 
acting to find him loaded with gold an’ silver 
‘ diamonds, but there wasn’t a thing on him 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
worth having, nor on the rest of them. One an’ 
all we started the bodies rolling down the slope 
an’ off the wall they shot to the bed of the 
canon, maybe a thousand feet below. We 
pitched their weapons over too, for they were 
none of them as good as ours, an’ then we 
sat down to rest an’ talk it all over. 
“The story of that lost mine was that the 
Jesuits had owned it a hundred years or so 
back an’ taken out loads of silver. Then the 
Apaches had swooped down an’ killed every one 
—miners, packers, smelter men an’ all. After 
that those who knew the location of the mine 
were afraid to go to it on account of the 
Indians, an’ finally they all died. We allowed 
that we would either find the lead close to the 
old smelter, or a trail that would lead to it. 
Now that we could do so in peace, we went to 
prospecting for it. I tell you now, that the 
places we climbed an’ slid down, the walls we 
skinned along, holding our breath, for fear 
’twould overbalance us, were something to give 
a man nightmares. That was the very roughest 
country I ever got into. An’ for all of out¬ 
work we never found a sign of a mine in the 
three months we stayed there. We did find a- 
plenty of rich float, though, an’ maybe that was 
what those old-timers gathered up an’ smelted. 
“We stayed there as long as we could; when 
our ammunition got down to less than a hun¬ 
dred rounds, it was safest to pull out. On our 
way back across the border we stopped for a 
few days with No Talk. He had already got 
the mafiana habit an’ spent most of his time 
lying in the remada smoking cigarettes. We 
talked some of hog-tying him, an’ taking him 
north with us whether or no, but he was so 
all-fired lazy an’ contented that we concluded 
’twould be a shame to disturb him. 
“Well, that was the end of that trip, an’ as 
usual, it was another fizzle. But you just wait; 
as soon as I can do what I want to down in 
that Yaqui country, I’ll show you a gold mine 
that will make old Rockefeller himself turn 
green with envy.” 
THE TOP RAIL. 
It is amusing to note the tendency of some 
of us to do a thing the wrong way the first time 
we try, then persist in the error through habit. 
Take the osier trout creel, for example. In 
France it is made with two strap-holes on its 
concave side. It is furnished with an adjustable 
strap and webbing to go over the left shoulder. 
Another adjustable strap is attached at the back, 
and this is passed around the body well below 
the right arm pit, and made fast to the shoulder 
strap with a snap-hook. The theory is that the 
shoulder strap is nearly above the center of the 
weight of a full creel when the latter rests 
against the left hip or side, according to the 
fancy of the owner. His arm movement in fish¬ 
ing tends to work the webbing down over the 
left shoulder, hence the body strap, which merely 
controls this tendency and in a measure prevents 
the creel from swinging about as one walks. 
Fly-fishers move slowly, as a rule, and with 
them arm freedom is preferred to body com¬ 
fort, so the creel is dropped nearly as low as 
the position of the old-time cowboy’s six-shooter, 
and rests against the hip, where it is handy to 
reach with the left hand. If it becomes neces¬ 
sary to walk far with a full creel, the straps are 
tightened until the weight is raised above the 
flopping point. 
I know a man who, like the voyagers that 
“fight with their packs,” is constantly struggling 
with his creel. You would think, to watch him, 
that he had had small practice with it, for it 
seems never to be properly adjusted, and he is 
always letting out or tightening straps, be the 
creel empty or filled with trout. Other men 
seem to be oblivious to the fact that they are 
carrying a creel. Perhaps it is a matter of fit; 
certainly a full creel grows heavy at the end of 
the day. 
Another fly-fisher - passes one strap over the 
right shoulder and the other under the right arm 
until both are so tight that the strangulation 
point is near and the freedom of both arms sadly 
hampered. This forces the creel’s weight above 
the waist line, and when he begins to struggle 
with it in order to creel a trout, if you are at 
a distance his motions remind you of your own 
attempts to remove a turtle-neck sweater while 
in deep water alongside an overturned canoe. 
But you cannot help the thought that he makes 
more work of placing his trout in the basket 
than was necessary in freeing yourself of the 
heavy wet garment and climbing into the canoe. 
* * * 
It was during a big tournament that several 
anglers were seated around a hotel table, at 
dinner. A salesman for a reelmaker had just 
received by express from his employer a new 
model reel, and he was eager to exhibit it, add¬ 
ing to his explanation that the new reel was 
made to sell for fifty dollars. It was passed 
around the table, each man examining it in 
silence, until it reached the joker of the party, 
who said, in a matter-of-fact way: 
“That is a fine reel and I would like to have 
one like it. How much did you say it will cost?” 
“Fifty dollars,” replied the salesman with ill- 
concealed pride. 
“Fifty dollars! Um! And what would the 
handle cost?” 
The salesman figured with his pencil on the 
box, then announced the result. 
“Well,” drawled the other, as he returned the 
reel, “you order a handle for me and some day 
I may have enough money to have a reel made 
to fit it.” Grizzly King. 
“My Life as an Indian.” 
Warroad, Minn.July 20 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: A year and a half ago I bought from 
you the book entitled “My Life as an Indian,” 
after having read it in serial form in your pub¬ 
lication. 
I have read and re-read it, and many times 
I have thought to tell you how deep in the heart 
it strikes the chord of human happiness and 
pathos, and how it shows that gentleness and 
faithfulness are not monopolized by, and pecu¬ 
liar to, what we term the enlightened peoples. 
I will not try to express my thoughts; I cannot. 
I shall just say the book is great. D. O. S. 
