Where McPhail was last seen
The trapper's keen eyes
A nap in the open air
The Author woke up
Camp-fires
A surprise attempted
Horses left in charge
The tactics of the advance and the retreat
A shot from a rifle, and a man wounded
A salute
The rifle shot explained
Horses driven off
A volley fired
Poor Horry scalped
The trapper promises vengeance
The wounded man
Grief at the loss of a friend
A mystery explained
Horry's grave
His funeral and monument.
It must have been about one o'clock when we started, and, after
half-an-hour's hard riding, we came upon the spot where McPhail had
last been seen. We shouted for some time as loudly as our lungs would
let us, but heard nothing, save the howl of some hungry wolf, in reply.
We then followed the trail at a brisk pace for eight or nine miles, but
could discover nothing of our missing friend. There seemed no
possibility of ascertaining whether he had proceeded in the direction
in question or not, as the marks made by the horses of the party in the
morning, on their way out, somewhat confused the old trapper. His keen
eye, however, soon detected marks of a horse's hoof in a contrary
direction, over the marks which the horses of the hunting party had
made on their return. These signs were not apparent beyond the spot we
had reached. In which direction they were continued, the night was too
dark to discover.
Feeling that further search before daybreak would be useless, we
resolved to get a few hours' sleep in the meantime; and, dismounting
from our horses, secured them as well as we could, and placing our
saddles on the ground, to serve as pillows, we wrapped our
saddle-cloths round us, and were soon fast asleep. Story and the lad
Horry did first duty as sentinels. While they were on guard I was
wakened by a sharp tug at my leg, and while I was seizing hold of my
rifle, I recognised Story's voice calling me by name. He told me that,
after keeping a sharp look-out for about half-an-hour, he observed
several fires on the hill-sides, apparently about half-a-mile off; he
had been watching them for some time, and at last determined to wake
one of the party.
I went with him outside the little willow copse where we had fixed
ourselves, and true enough there were the fires, belonging, as we
thought, to a camp of Indians--very likely the same who had stolen our
horses and attacked us in the morning. We returned and woke the whole
party; and, a consultation being held, it was decided, as we were well
armed, and as the Indians had shown so much anxiety this morning to get
beyond reach of our weapons, after tasting a few shots, to effect a
surprise, and recover, if possible, our stolen horses. We saddled and
mounted as quickly as possible, and, after riding about a mile in the
direction of the fires, found that we were getting tolerably close to
our enemies. On we went, taking every bush which crackled beneath our
horses' tread for a token of the movements of some Indian scout who had
scented our approach. When within a short distance of the camp-fires we
dismounted, and tied our horses to some trees, leaving them in charge
of the lad Horry, with directions for him to keep his ears well open,
and, in the event of his hearing us retreat from the Indians, to give a
few lusty shouts, so as to let us know where the means of flight were
to be found.
We advanced cautiously, Malcolm and Bradshaw preceding the main body,
about twenty paces apart. The arrangement was for the five (namely,
Lacosse, Story, the Trapper, José, and myself) who composed the main
body, to form a semicircle, of which the two scouts would compose the
extreme points, and so to approach the Indians' camp, on nearing which
we were to fire a volley on them from our rifles, and, wheeling round,
drive our horses off and retreat. We were within two hundred paces of
the camp-fires when we were startled by the report of a rifle. A shrill
whistle followed; but we still advanced, and in a few moments came up
with Malcolm and Bradshaw, the sailor being supported in the arms of
his companion, who called out that the man was shot, and begged me to
look to him. The remainder of the party, hearing this, moved a few
paces forward, levelled their rifles, and were on the eve of firing,
when we were suddenly saluted, in true British vernacular, with an
exclamation of "D---- your eyes, who goes there?" This so startled our
party that it saved the lives, very probably, of the whole camp. They
halted for a moment, and consulted together as to the course to be
adopted. A shot had been fired from the camp, and one of our men
injured. They, therefore, concluded that we had stumbled on the camp of
one of those gangs of ruffians which were known to infest the hills at
the foot of the Sierra Nevada.
At this juncture I ran up to the group with the intelligence that
Bradshaw had been injured by a shot from his own rifle, which had
accidentally gone off, and which circumstance Malcolm had not, in the
first instance, explained. I told my companions that the man was
seriously wounded in the leg; that I had merely bandaged it up with a
handkerchief, and, leaving him in Malcolm's charge, had hastened
forward to let them know the fact, that no more blood might be shed. No
sooner was this explanation given than we heard a loud shout from the
lad Horry, followed, as I thought, by some faint groans; but none of
the others heard them, and I thought I might have been mistaken. It
was concluded that he was merely shouting in accordance with our
instructions, and no further notice was taken of the affair. At that
instant several horses came galloping by at full speed, passing within
a few yards of us, and, following them, we could discern half-a-dozen
mounted Indians. We guessed the truth at once. They had cut the bridles
of our horses, and were driving them away to rejoin their fellows,
which had been stolen from us in the morning. We levelled our rifles
and fired--reloaded, and fired again; and then, in the midst of a
chorus of hallooing and screaming from the camp just before us, and the
loud bellowing of the retreating Indians, started off in pursuit, and
soon succeeded in turning our animals round, the Indians vanishing as
rapidly as they had appeared.
Securing our steeds, we walked them back in the direction of the spot
where we had left Horry, and, after some trouble, succeeded in finding
the exact place, when, to our horror, we found the poor fellow quite
dead, his body covered with blood, and his head and face dreadfully
disfigured. A closer examination showed us that the poor lad, after
being murdered, had been scalped by the savages. "Yes, yes," said the
old trapper, "sure enough his scalp is dangling in the belt of one of
them devils. G----d! I'll send an ounce of lead through the first
red-skin I meet outside them clearings. We'll have vengeance--we will."
As soon as I was a little recovered from the horror which this scene
naturally caused, I returned with the old trapper to the spot where I
had left Malcolm and Bradshaw, hardly expecting, after what I had just
witnessed, to find either of them alive. I was, however, happy in my
fears not being realized. They were both as I had left them. We carried
the wounded man as well as we could between us back to the place where
the remainder of the party were waiting for us. Here we stayed till
daybreak, silent and dejected. For my own part I could have wept. That
rough sailor lad, though under other circumstances I might have looked
down on him with contempt, and not have cared one straw whether he was
dead or alive, had been one of a little society, every member of which
had grown upon me in the rude life we had lived together in this
wilderness, and I felt that I had lost a friend.
The day broke at last, and, after repairing our bridles as well as we
could, we prepared to depart. We wrapped the body of the dead lad in a
blanket, and laid it over the back of his horse to convey it to our
camp, where we might bury it according to the rites of the English
church. I examined the carpenter's leg, and found his hurt was,
fortunately, only a flesh wound. It gave him, nevertheless, great pain
to travel on horseback, but there was no other means of conveying him
to the camp. As we rode slowly along, in the grey light of the morning,
we caught sight of the valley, the scene of our last night's
misfortunes, and saw on the hill-sides two white-tented emigrant
wagons, with the horses quietly grazing down in the bottom. Several of
us rode towards the spot, but found not a soul there. One of last
night's mysteries was explained. The camp we had at first taken to be
an Indian one, and then one of mountain robbers, was merely that of a
few emigrants, who, having crossed the pass in the Sierra Nevada, were,
doubtless, on their way to the Sacramento Valley. In all probability,
alarmed by the extraordinary affair of last night, they had abandoned
their wagons, and sought concealment from the dangers which they
imagined surrounded them. We shouted out the words "Friends,"
"Americans," and other expressions, to give them confidence, if they
were within hearing, but we obtained no reply. We, therefore, hastened
to rejoin the remainder of our party, and in about three hours time we
reached the camp, cheering ourselves with the thought, as we moved
along, that we should find McPhail had returned. But we were doomed to
disappointment; there were no tidings of him, and sorrowfully did we
set to work to dig poor Horry's grave. After Malcolm had read the
service from the English Prayer-book over him, we sawed off a pine-log,
which was inserted a couple of feet deep in the ground, and on the
upper part, which had been smoothed for that purpose, we carved, in
rude letters, his name, and the date of his death.