On a chill, black morning the cabins of Los Ojos gave up their inmates
at an early hour. The ponies, mules, and _burros_ were herded up, and
stood shivering in an angle, while about them walked the men,
carefully coiling their hair lariats, and watching for an opportunity
to jerk them over the heads of the selected ones. The _patron’s_ black
pet walked up to him, but the mounts of my companion and self sneaked
about with an evident desire not to participate in the present
service. Old _Cokomorachie_ and Jim were finally led forth, protesting
after the manner of their kind. I carefully adjusted my Whitman’s
officer-tree over a wealth of saddle blanketing, and slung my
Winchester 45-70 and my field-glasses to it. The punchers, both white
and brown, and two or three women, regarded my new-fangled saddle with
amused glances; indeed, Mr. Bell’s Mexican wife laughed at it
outright, and Tom Bailey called it “a damn rim-fire.” Another humorist
thought that “it would give the chickens the pip if they got onto it”;
all of which I took good-humoredly, since this was not the first time
“your Uncle Samuel” had been away from home; and after some days, when
a lot of men were carefully leading sore-backed horses over the
mountains, I had cause to remark further on the subject. A Mexican
cow-saddle is a double-barrelled affair; it will eat a hole into a
horse’s spine and a pair of leather breeches at the same time. If one
could ask “Old Jim” about that saddle of mine, I think he would give
it an autograph recommend, for he finished the trip with the hide of
his back all there.
[Illustration: MY COMRADE]
Leaving the “burro men” to haul and pull at their patient beasts as
they bound on their loads, our outfit “pulled out” on what promised to
be plenty of travelling. We were to do the rounds of the ranch,
explore the mountains, penetrate to the old Apache strongholds, shoot
game, find cliff-dwellers’ villages, and I expect the dark minds of
the punchers hoped for a sight at the ever-burning fire which should
discover the lost mine of Tiopa. We were also promised a fight with
the “Kid” if we “cut his trail”; and if he “cut ours,” we may never
live to regret it. Some tame Indians, just in from a hunt in the Rio
Chico, had seen three fires, but they had “rolled their tails”[4] for
Bavicora so promptly that they had not ascertained whether they
were Apache or not. The same men we were in the company of had run the
“Kid’s” band in to the States only two months before, but on our trip
that very elusive and very “bad Injun” was not encountered. Much as I
should like to see him, I have no regrets, since it is extremely
likely that he would have seen me first.
[Footnote 4: Cowboy for travelling rapidly.]
[Illustration: ON THE MOUNTAINS]
Our little band was composed of the _patron_, Don Gilberto; my
travelling companion from New York city, who had never before been
west of the Elysian Fields of New Jersey; Bailey and Bell, ranch
foremen, and as dauntless spirits as ever the Texas border nurtured;
the ranch bookkeeper, a young man “short” on experiences and “long” on
hope; Epitacio, an Indian hunter, since outlawed; William, the colored
cook; four buckskin Mexican punchers; an old man who was useless for
practical purposes, but who was said to be “funny” in Spanish; and two
burro men. We were that day to go to the farthest outlying ranch,
called the Casa Camadra, and then to stop for a short hunt and to give
the punchers time to “gentle” some steers for work-cattle. The puncher
method of doing this is beautifully simple, for any animal undergoing
this is gentle or dead after it. After scouring the plain for antelope
until late, we followed up a creek towards the cabin where we expected
to find the punchers and the burro men with their loads of creature
comforts, and as we rode in it was raining a cold sleet. The little
log-cabin was low, small, and wonderfully picturesque. It was a
typical “shack,” such as one used to see in the Northwest when the
hunters were there. Out in the rain sat two punchers, enveloped in
their _serapes_, engaged in watching a half-dozen big steers eat
grass. Inside of the cabin was William by a good fire in a most
original fireplace, glowing with heat and pride over his corn-cakes
and “marrow-gut.” Between various cigarettes, the last drink of
_tequela_, and the drying of our clothes, we passed the time until
William had put the “grub” on a pack-saddle blanket and said, “Now,
gemmen, fly in.”
“Fly in” is vulgar, but it is also literal, for we did that: we did
not dine--we flew in. The expression and the food were both good.
Outside, the cold rain had turned into a wet snow, and we all crowded
into the little place and squatted or lay about on the floor. With
fingers and hunting-knives we carved and tore at the mountain of beef.
The punchers consume enormous quantities of meat, and when satiated
they bring forth their corn-husks and tobacco-pouches, and roll their
long, thin cigarettes, which burn until they draw their _serapes_
about their heads and sink back in dreamless sleep. It is all
beautifully primitive, and as I rise on my elbow to look across the
blanketed forms packed like mackerel in a cask, to hear their heavy
breathing, and see the fire glow, and hear the wind howl outside, I
think how little it takes to make men happy. Tom Bailey and Johnnie
Bell, the ranch foremen, had faces which would have been in character
under a steel head-piece at Cressy, while the wildest blood of Spain,
Morocco, and the American Indian ran in the veins of the punchers; and
all these men were untainted by the enfeebling influences of luxury
and modern life. A chunk of beef, a cigarette, an enveloping _serape_,
with the Sierras for a bedroom, were the utmost of their needs.
The sunlight streamed down the big chimney, and William’s
“Good-mo’nin’, sah,” brought back my senses. Beyond his silhouette, as
he crouched before the fireplace, I could hear the sputtering of the
broiling steak. I repaired to the brook and smashed the ice for a
rub-down. It was still drizzling, and the landscape lay under a heavy
fog. Outside the cabin lay the dead body of a skinned wolf, and
about a small fire crouched the punchers.
[Illustration: THE CASA CAMADRA]
Breakfast over, the men rode off by twos into the fog, and as Tom
Bailey and I jogged along together we reasoned that if we were to
strike the point of the mountains and then keep well in the timber we
might catch a bunch of antelope which we had “jumped” the day before
on the plain below. So all day long we rode over the wet rocks, under
the drip and drizzle of the mountain pines, up hill and down dale, and
never “cut a sign.” It was our luck; for on riding up to the “shack”
we saw the bodies of deer, antelope, a big gray wolf, and the skin of
a mountain-lion. We were requested to view the game, and encouraged to
comment on it; but Tom and I sought a dark corner of the cabin to
consume our coffee and cigarettes in silence.
At the Casa Camadra are two other log-houses, and in them live some
squalid, yellow-hided humans who are to farm a little stretch of
bottom-land this year. They require work-steers to do their ploughing,
and Mr. Bell has brought up half a dozen vicious old “stags,” which
are both truculent and swift of foot. The Mexicans insist that they
are not able to handle them; and Mr. Bell orders his punchers into
action. I strolled out to the corrals to see the bulls “gentled.”
After a lot of riding and yelling they were herded and dragged into
the enclosure, where they huddled while seven punchers sat on their
ponies at the gate. I was standing at one corner of the corral, near
the men, when out from the midst of the steers walked a big black
bull, which raised its head and gazed directly at me. The bull had
never before in his stupid life observed a man on foot, and I
comprehended immediately what he would do next, so I “led out” for the
casa at a rate of speed which the boys afterwards never grew weary of
commending. No spangled _torero_ of the bull-ring ever put more heart
and soul into his running than did I in my great-coat and long
hunting-spurs. The bull made a “fo’lorn hope” for the gate, and the
gallant punchers melted away before the charge.
The diversion of the punchers made the retreat of the infantry
possible, and from an intrenched position I saw the bulls tear over
the hill, with the punchers “rolling their tails” behind. After an
hour of swearing and hauling and bellowing, the six cattle were lugged
back to the pen, and the bars put up. The punchers came around to
congratulate me on my rapid recovery from a sprained ankle, when they
happened to observe the cattle again scouring off for the open
country. Then there was a grunting of ponies as the spurs went in,
some hoarse oaths, and for a third time they tore away after the
“gentle work-oxen.” The steers had taken the bars in their stride.
Another hour’s chase, and this time the animals were thrown down,
trussed up like turkeys for the baking, and tied to posts, where they
lay to kick and bellow the night through in impotent rage. The
punchers coiled their ropes, lit their cigarettes, and rode off in the
gathering gloom. The morning following the steers were let up, and
though wet and chilled, they still roared defiance. For agricultural
purposes a Mexican “stag” would be as valuable as a rhinoceros or a
Bengal tiger, and I await with interest the report of the death-rate
at the Casa Camadra during spring ploughing.
In the handling of these savage animals the punchers are brave to
recklessness, but this is partly because it seems so. In reality they
have a thorough knowledge of bull nature, and can tell when and where
he is going to strike as quickly as a boxer who knows by the “skim on
the eye” of his opponent. But still they go boldly into the corral
with the maddened brutes, seeming to pay no heed to the imminent
possibilities of a trip to the moon. They toss their ropes and catch
the bull’s feet, they skilfully avoid his rush, and in a spirit of
bravado they touch the horns, pat him on the back, or twist his tail.
[Illustration: SHOOTING IN THE SIERRA MADRE]
After hunting for another day, with more success, we packed up and
“pulled out” up the Varras Creek towards the mountains, leaving the
last house behind us. Beyond was the unknown country. For many miles
it had been ridden by some of the punchers, but the country is large,
covered with vast mountain ranges, with wastes of stony foot-hills at
the bases, while _barrancas_ yawn at your feet, and for a great many
years the policy of the Apaches has been not to encourage immigration.
In 1860 a heavy band of Mexican prospectors undertook to penetrate
this part in the quest of Tiopa, but they were driven out. It is now
possible for strong outfits to travel its wilds with only a small
chance of encountering Apache renegades, but very few have attempted
it as yet. It is so remote that prospectors for silver or gold could
hardly work a mine if they found one, and for other purposes it has
little value. The most magnificent pine timber covers its slopes, but
it would take a syndicate to deliver one log at the railroad. As we
wound our way up the Varras Creek we passed beetling crags and huge
pillars of porphyry rock cut into fantastic shapes by water and frost,
resplendent in color, and admirably adapted for the pot-hunting of
humans as affected by gentry temporarily stopping at San Carlos.
In a dell in the forest we espied some “mavericks,” or unbranded
stock. The punchers are ever alert for a beef without half its ears
gone and a big HF burned in its flank, and immediately they perceive
one they tighten their _cincha_, slip the rope from the pommel, put
their hats on the back of their heads, and “light out.” A cow was
soon caught, after desperate riding over rocks and fallen timber,
thrown down, and “hog-tied,” which means all four feet together. A
little fire is built, and one side of a _cincha_ ring is heated
red-hot, with which a rawhide artist paints HF in the sizzling flesh,
while the cow kicks and bawls. She is then unbound, and when she gets
back on her feet the _vaqueros_ stand about, _serape_ in hand, after
the bull-fighter method, and provoke her to charge. She charges, while
they avoid her by agile springs and a flaunting of their rags. They
laugh, and cry “Bravo toro!” until she, having overcome her
indignation at their rudeness, sets off down the cañon with her tail
in the air.
Thus we journeyed day by day over the hills and up the cañons, camping
by night under the pines in mountain glades or deep ravines, where the
sun sets at four o’clock, while it is light above. The moon was in the
full and the nights were frosty, and many times we awoke to think it
morning when only our heads had become uncovered by the blankets and
the big white moon shone fair upon us. Getting up in the night to poke
the fire and thaw the stiffening out of one’s legs is called by the
boys “playing freeze-out,” and we all participate in the game. A
cigarette at two o’clock in the morning, with one’s back to the fire,
while the moon looks down on you, your comrades breathing about you, a
wolf howling mournfully from a neighboring hill, the mountains
towering on every side, and the tall pines painting inky shadows
across the ghostly grass, is a mild sensation and rather pleasant.
Some of the men are on foot, from soring their horses’ backs, and
their buckskin boots are wearing out, so they sit about the fire and
stitch. We are all very dirty, and I no longer take comfort in
watching the cook who makes the bread, for fear I may be tempted to
ask him if he will not wash his hands, whereat the boys may indicate
that I am a “dude,” and will look down on me. The flour is nearly
gone, and shortly it will not matter whether the cook’s hands are
rusty or not. The coffee and sugar promise to hold out. When William
can no longer serve “bull gravy” with his fried meat I shall have many
regrets, but they are swamped by the probabilities of a tobacco
famine, which is imminent. We get deer every day, but to one not used
to a strictly meat diet it begins to pall. The Indian hunter takes the
stomach of a deer, fills it with meat, and deposits it under the
coals. We roast it in slices and chunks, but I like it better when
“jerked” brown, as it then affords somewhat more mystery to a taste
already jaded with venison. In travelling with pack-animals it is the
custom to make a day’s march before halting, and a day’s march ends
about four o’clock, or when water is found. Ten hours’ march will
loosen one’s cartridge-belt five or six holes, for venison and coffee
is not a strong food. By 12 P.M. we acquire a wolfish yearning for the
“flesh-pots,” but that shortly is relieved by the contraction of the
stomach, or three or four quarts of mountain water will afford some
relief. By nightfall one can “fly into” a venison steak, while
cigarettes, coffee, and a desire to lie down restore one’s equanimity.
[Illustration: THE INDIAN’S STORY]
We have passed some small ranges and worm our way down bottomless
pits, but at last there rises ahead the main range of the Sierra
Madre. From the depths of a great _barranca_ we begin the climb. Never
have I seen hills as sideling as these. It is terrible work for one
not used to mountain-climbing and the short allowance of air one finds
to subsist on. The feeling of exhaustion is almost impossible to
overcome. The horses are thin, and Old Jim is developing more ribs
than good condition calls for, so I walk to ease the old fellow. There
are snow fields to cross, which intensifies the action. The journey is
enlivened at times by shots at deer, and the rifles echo around the
mountains, but being long shots they are misses. We passed the
_cordon_ of the mountains, and stopped on a knife-like ridge where the
melting snows under one’s foot ran east and west to the two great
oceans. The climb from here over the main range was a bellows-bursting
affair, but as we pulled on to the high _mesa_ our drooping nerves
were stiffened by shots, and presently deer came bounding down the
ravine to our left. Jack made a bully flying shot, and the stricken
deer rolled many yards, until caught by a fallen log. My companion,
who was in advance, had fired into some deer, and had shot a buck
which was lying down, and he was much puffed up with pride over this
achievement in still-hunting. From there on we passed through the most
wonderful natural deer park. The animals did not fear man, and stood
to be fired at, though the open timber and absence of underbrush made
the shots long-range ones. After killing all we could carry, we sat
down to wait for the _burro_ train.
That night we camped on a jutting crag, with the water running in the
_barranca_ two hundred feet below us. For a hundred miles the mountain
and plain lay at our feet--a place more for an eagle’s eyrie than a
camp for a caravan. The night set very cold, and from out in space the
moon threw its mellow light down upon us. Before the camp-fire our
Indian hunter told the story of the killing of Victoria’s band, where
he had been among the victors, and as he threw his _serape_ down, and
standing forth with the firelight playing on his harsh features, he
swayed his body and waved his hands, while with hoarse voice and in
a strange language he gave the movement of the fight. The legend of
the lost mine of Tiopa was narrated by a _vaquero_ in the quiet manner
of one whose memory goes far back, and to whom it is all real--about
the Jesuits, the iron door over the mouth of the mine, its richness,
the secrecy enjoined by the fathers on the people when they fled
before the Apache devils, and how there is always a light to be kept
burning at its entrance to guide them back. It was a grand theatre and
an eerie scene.
[Illustration: THE CLIFF-DWELLINGS]
On the other side of the mountain we found the trail most difficult. I
would never have believed that a horse could traverse it. To say that
it was steep is commonplace, and yet I cannot be believed if I say
that it was perpendicular; but a man could toss his hat a mile at any
moment if he pleased. Then, underfoot, it was all loose lava rock, and
the little ponies had to jump and dance over the bowlders. When we had
finally arrived on a grassy _mesa_ I concluded that if ever again I
did the like of that, it would most certainly be the result of a
tremendous error in my calculations. The pack-train was here detached
and sent to water, but we followed Jack to see his “discovery.” After
miles of travel through the dry, yellow grass we came out on a high
bluff with a _barranca_ at its foot, the bottom of which we could not
see. On the overhanging wall opposite were Jack’s cliff-dwellings,
perched like dove-cots against the precipice. It was only a quarter of
a mile to them, but it took two days to get there, so we did not go.
There are also holes in the cliffs, and underground passages. The
paths up to them are washed away, but Jack and some of his men have
invaded the silent village. They climbed up with lariats, and he was
let down over the cliff, but they found nothing left but dust and
cobwebs.
We could not get down to water, and as our horses were thirsty and
foot-sore, we “mogged along.” On our ride we “cut the trail” of a big
band of mustangs, or wild horses, but did not see them, and by late
afternoon we found the camp, and William busy above his fire. After
hunting down the valley for a few days for “burro deer” and wild
turkey, we found that the tobacco was promptly giving out, according
to calculations, and, being all inveterate smokers, we “made trail
fast” for the Neuearachie ranch. Our ponies were jaded and sore; but
having “roped” a stray pony two days before, which was now fresh, the
lightest _vaquero_ was put on his back, and sent hot-foot in the night
to the ranch for tobacco. He made the long ride and returned at noon
the next day on a fresh mount, having been thirty-six hours in the
saddle. This fellow was a rather remarkable man, as it was he who, on
the beginning of the trip, had brought some important mail to us one
hundred and seventy miles, and after riding down two ponies he
followed our trail on foot through the mountains, and overtook us as
we sat resting on a log in the woods.
How we at last pulled into the ranch at Neuearachie, with its log
buildings and irrigated fields, and how we “swooped down” on Mr. John
Bailey, and ate up all his eggs and bread and butter at the first
onset, I will not weary you with, but I believe that a man should for
one month of the year live on the roots of the grass, in order to
understand for the eleven following that so-called necessities are
luxuries in reality. Not that I would indiscriminately recommend such
a dietary abasement as ours, yet will I insist that it has killed less
men than gluttony, and should you ever make the Sierra trails with the
punchers, you will get rather less than more.