"But yonder comes the powerful king of day
Rejoicing in the east. The lessening cloud,
The kindling azure, and the mountain's brow
Illumed with gold, his near approach
Betoken glad."
Thomson.
Scene: The fort in the Rocky Mountains. Morning breaking in the east.
Wind hushed. Captain Blunt and party making their way along the bottom
of the canon, which in many places is deep in drifted snow.
Who can paint in words the beauty, the glory of a sunrise among the
mountains? Why wish to be a poet--even a Longfellow?
Why wish to be even a Turner? for what artist that ever lived could
sketch in colour the deep blue of yonder sky, or the great grey clouds
that, even as we look change slowly to yellow and gold; or that strip of
crimson, or the darkness of those pine trees outshining from the blue
uncertain horizon's haze?
Some such thoughts as these rushed through Leonard's mind as he stood on
the ramparts of the little fort that had been to him and his friends a
quiet romantic home for so many months. For those friends, though still
absent, he somehow felt no anxiety. They were well armed, and if they
met the hostile Indians, they could no doubt give a good account of
them, if indeed the enemy should be brave enough to come to close
quarters. But despite the tales of Cooper--who has managed to encircle
the Red Man with a halo of romance--Leonard had been long enough in the
woods to find out that just as the American novelist depended upon
imagination for the facts embodied in his delightful stories, so the
American Indian depends upon numbers for his courage. He is bold and
daring enough when he is in strong force, and when sure of victory.
Then he will fight. I am not belying him.
When the party did arrive at the fort, they were much astonished at what
Leonard had to tell them.
"And the blizzard sent them adrift, eh?" said Captain Blunt. "Well,
it's an ill wind that blows nobody good."
"But they'll come back," said the trapper. "Gentlemen, they'll return,
that's as sartain as sunrise."
The Indian guides thought the same.
So the drawbridge was kept up all day.
But night after night passed by, and still there was no sign of the
Ojibbeways. Our party got bolder, and went hunting as usual.
But one day a scout found an unmistakable trail, and they followed it up
and up for many miles, till it led them to the top of a high hill. They
did not show themselves over this, for far away in a green valley
beneath they beheld an encampment; Indians on the warpath undoubtedly,
with fleet, wild-looking horses hobbled near them, and a cooking fire
smoking in their midst. There could not be less than fifty at the
least. Well, the fort was well stocked to stand a siege. But a siege
was _the_ one thing the party wanted to avoid. Pleasant as was this
land in summer and autumn, no one of them wished to winter here. It was
determined, therefore, to dispatch one of the Indian scouts for
assistance to his tribe. It would be a terrible adventure, to journey
all alone over hill and dale and prairie land in an enemy's country, but
the promise of a reward was sufficient to make several volunteer.
Another went out every night to watch the enemy. They had come nearer,
and were now only three miles from the fort.
Now, there is nothing that Britons will not dare; and when one evening
Leonard said,--
"I say, Douglas, some of those Indian horses would come in handy to
assist in our journey homeward."
"That they would," replied Douglas. "I was thinking the same."
"Hurrah!" then said Leonard; "let us have them."
So it was agreed to make the attempt.
And this is how it was accomplished. Four of the friendly Indians made
a _detour_, and attacked the camp of the foe in the rear. It was a
lovely moonlight night, and this ruse was completely successful. The
enemy sprang to their bows and arrows, and prepared to repel the attack.
A shot or two was fired, then the friendlies ran pursued by the foe.
The white men had it all their own way now; they speedily picked out
eight of the best horses, and were soon galloping off camp-wards as
quickly as the nature of the ground would permit.
In this case, at all events, fortune favoured the brave, and all got
safe inside the fort, only one Indian being wounded slightly.
But the Ojibbeways determined on revenge, and the very next night quite
a cloud of arrows was poured into the fort, and then an attempt made to
scale the rampart, the savages making night hideous with their howlings
and wild cries. They had to retire worsted, however, and it was nearly
a week before they again made an attack. But meanwhile they had been
greatly reinforced, and the fight was now a terrible one. It began
while it still was dark, but soon the moon rose, then the Indians
suffered severely for their rashness.
For many days, and night after night, these attacks were made. None of
the white men were wounded, but one friendly was killed, and another put
_hors de combat_. Things began to look very serious, and if assistance
came not soon Captain Blunt feared the very worst.
"Surely," thought Leonard and Douglas, "the worst has come," when one
night the poor trapper fell at their feet, pierced through the heart
with an arrow. This night's attack was a fearful one. The savages,
regardless of their lives, leapt on top of the rampart, though only to
fall dead within the enclosure.
But more took their place, and the fighting went on with redoubled fury.
"I fear all is up," said Captain Blunt in a moment's lull; "let us sell
our lives dearly."
But hark! what was that wild, unearthly yell in the rear of the foe?
All listened. The savages who had been coming on again towards the fort
fell back. The cries and yells were redoubled, and the din was
horrible, awful!
"Hurrah!" cried Blunt, "we are saved! The friendlies have come!"
And so it was. The battle in the bush raged for fully an hour, then up
rushed the scout who had so bravely done his duty. The drawbridge was
lowered, and in he dashed, and after him fully a hundred of his own
tribe, all in their war-paint, all fully armed, and, ghastly sight!
nearly all had scalps hanging to their girdles.
The very next day the fort was deserted, and the march eastward was
commenced. It was a very long and a very toilsome one. But they
reached civilisation safely at last. The friendly Indians thought
themselves well rewarded by being presented with the horses. And
considering that Captain Blunt and party had obtained the animals
cheaply enough, it was no wonder that satisfaction was expressed on both
sides.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
They found the _Gloaming Star_ ready for sea, and after selling their
skins and curios they embarked, and made all sail for the sunny south.
All the winter and spring was spent in cruising around the West Indian
Islands. They even stretched across to lonely Bermuda, encountering a
hurricane on the passage, which well-nigh dismantled the ship, and
necessitated a longer stay at the islands than they desired. Then
southwards and west, touching at Rio Janeiro, the most romantic and
lovely harbour in the world.
Monte Video, however, which they reached at last, did not afterwards
shine in their memories as Janeiro did. Its low flat lands, its shallow
seas and fogs, were not impressive in a pleasant way. But they found
the inhabitants--even then a strange mixture of nationalities--kind and
hospitable, and Leonard, Douglas, and Captain Blunt accepted an
invitation to go for sport into the interior.
The roads were terribly rough; there were no railways here in those
days. The roads were rough and the roads were long, but they found
themselves at last on the very confines of civilisation. And here they
spent some months, most pleasantly, too, though their adventures were
not without danger. They found the new settlers at war with the
Indians, the latter being a most treacherous race, possessing all the
cunning, though hardly so much of the extreme cruelty, which forms so
marked a characteristic of the Red men of the American wilderness.
Both Douglas and Leonard soon became adepts in riding the half-wild
horses over the plains, and in hunting the emu and llama, in throwing
the lasso and the bolas.
"It seems to me," said Douglas, one day, "that I would like to live in
this wild land for ever and a day."
"It seems to me," replied Leonard, "that I have been here all my life."
Everything was so new in this country, and as they happened to be
favoured with fine weather, some brief but terrible storms excepted,
everything was so lovely. They were the guests of a rich Spaniard,
whose house was a kind of shooting-box in the midst of most charming and
wild scenery. It was a house of logs, but most artistically designed
and built, with terraces around it, and porticoes and verandahs, over
which trailed flowers of most beautiful colour, shape, and perfume. It
was well surrounded--as indeed it needed to be--by a rampart and a
ditch, and more than once it had to stand a siege. Sometimes the
Indians made a raid down that way and drove away the horses. But Senor
Cabelas had many well-armed servants, and they took a delight in
following up and fighting Los Indianos, and returning triumphantly,
which they invariably did, with the re-captured animals, or most of
them.
Our heroes were always on the hunting path very early in the morning.
They went prepared to shoot or fight anything. Wolves there were in
plenty, but they gave the horsemen a wide berth, nor were they really
worth powder and shot. But far away among the wild hills, those
long-haired wolves are really a source of very great danger.
But there were panthers or pumas, and a few jaguars, and although none
of these attacked, still once or twice, when at bay, they made a
terrible resistance. In a case like this, if a man does not keep cool,
or if he allows any nervousness to interfere with his aim, it is ten to
one that the jaguar will have the best of the battle, and the huntsman
be left dead or terribly wounded.
When the day's sport or hunting in the pampas was over and done, when
the dinner in Senor Cabelas' tall-ceiled room had been discussed, how
pleasant it was to get out and sit under the verandah in the cool of a
summer's evening, and tell tales, and think and talk of home.
How pleasantly tired and drowsy Leonard and Douglas used to be by
bedtime, and how soon they were wrapped in dreamless slumber when their
limbs were stretched in bed, their heads upon the downy pillows!
How loud the great frogs croaked and snored around the lodge, ay, and
even in it; but their croaking and snoring never once wakened our pampas
sportsmen!
Book 3--CHAPTER THREE.