THE PUEBLO AND BENT’S FORT
We approached the gate of the Pueblo. It was a wretched species of fort
of most primitive construction, being nothing more than a large
square inclosure, surrounded by a wall of mud, miserably cracked and
dilapidated. The slender pickets that surmounted it were half broken
down, and the gate dangled on its wooden hinges so loosely, that to
open or shut it seemed likely to fling it down altogether. Two or three
squalid Mexicans, with their broad hats, and their vile faces overgrown
with hair, were lounging about the bank of the river in front of it.
They disappeared as they saw us approach; and as we rode up to the gate
a light active little figure came out to meet us. It was our old friend
Richard. He had come from Fort Laramie on a trading expedition to Taos;
but finding, when he reached the Pueblo, that the war would prevent his
going farther, he was quietly waiting till the conquest of the country
should allow him to proceed. He seemed to consider himself bound to do
the honors of the place. Shaking us warmly by the hands, he led the way
into the area.
Here we saw his large Santa Fe wagons standing together. A few squaws
and Spanish women, and a few Mexicans, as mean and miserable as the
place itself, were lazily sauntering about. Richard conducted us to the
state apartment of the Pueblo, a small mud room, very neatly
finished, considering the material, and garnished with a crucifix, a
looking-glass, a picture of the Virgin, and a rusty horse pistol. There
were no chairs, but instead of them a number of chests and boxes
ranged about the room. There was another room beyond, less sumptuously
decorated, and here three or four Spanish girls, one of them very
pretty, were baking cakes at a mud fireplace in the corner. They brought
out a poncho, which they spread upon the floor by way of table-cloth.
A supper, which seemed to us luxurious, was soon laid out upon it, and
folded buffalo robes were placed around it to receive the guests. Two
or three Americans, besides ourselves, were present. We sat down Turkish
fashion, and began to inquire the news. Richard told us that, about
three weeks before, General Kearny’s army had left Bent’s Fort to march
against Santa Fe; that when last heard from they were approaching the
mountainous defiles that led to the city. One of the Americans produced
a dingy newspaper, containing an account of the battles of Palo Alto and
Resaca de la Palma. While we were discussing these matters, the doorway
was darkened by a tall, shambling fellow, who stood with his hands in
his pockets taking a leisurely survey of the premises before he entered.
He wore brown homespun pantaloons, much too short for his legs, and
a pistol and bowie knife stuck in his belt. His head and one eye
were enveloped in a huge bandage of white linen. Having completed his
observations, he came slouching in and sat down on a chest. Eight or ten
more of the same stamp followed, and very coolly arranging themselves
about the room, began to stare at the company. Shaw and I looked at each
other. We were forcibly reminded of the Oregon emigrants, though these
unwelcome visitors had a certain glitter of the eye, and a compression
of the lips, which distinguished them from our old acquaintances of the
prairie. They began to catechise us at once, inquiring whence we had
come, what we meant to do next, and what were our future prospects in
life.
The man with the bandaged head had met with an untoward accident a few
days before. He was going down to the river to bring water, and was
pushing through the young willows which covered the low ground, when he
came unawares upon a grizzly bear, which, having just eaten a buffalo
bull, had lain down to sleep off the meal. The bear rose on his hind
legs, and gave the intruder such a blow with his paw that he laid his
forehead entirely bare, clawed off the front of his scalp, and narrowly
missed one of his eyes. Fortunately he was not in a very pugnacious
mood, being surfeited with his late meal. The man’s companions, who were
close behind, raised a shout and the bear walked away, crushing down the
willows in his leisurely retreat.
These men belonged to a party of Mormons, who, out of a well-grounded
fear of the other emigrants, had postponed leaving the settlements until
all the rest were gone. On account of this delay they did not reach Fort
Laramie until it was too late to continue their journey to California.
Hearing that there was good land at the head of the Arkansas, they
crossed over under the guidance of Richard, and were now preparing to
spend the winter at a spot about half a mile from the Pueblo.
When we took leave of Richard, it was near sunset. Passing out of the
gate, we could look down the little valley of the Arkansas; a beautiful
scene, and doubly so to our eyes, so long accustomed to deserts and
mountains. Tall woods lined the river, with green meadows on either
hand; and high bluffs, quietly basking in the sunlight, flanked the
narrow valley. A Mexican on horseback was driving a herd of cattle
toward the gate, and our little white tent, which the men had pitched
under a large tree in the meadow, made a very pleasing feature in the
scene. When we reached it, we found that Richard had sent a Mexican to
bring us an abundant supply of green corn and vegetables, and invite
us to help ourselves to whatever we wished from the fields around the
Pueblo.
The inhabitants were in daily apprehensions of an inroad from more
formidable consumers than ourselves. Every year at the time when the
corn begins to ripen, the Arapahoes, to the number of several thousands,
come and encamp around the Pueblo. The handful of white men, who are
entirely at the mercy of this swarm of barbarians, choose to make a
merit of necessity; they come forward very cordially, shake them by the
hand, and intimate that the harvest is entirely at their disposal. The
Arapahoes take them at their word, help themselves most liberally, and
usually turn their horses into the cornfields afterward. They have the
foresight, however, to leave enough of the crops untouched to serve as
an inducement for planting the fields again for their benefit in the
next spring.
The human race in this part of the world is separated into three
divisions, arranged in the order of their merits; white men, Indians,
and Mexicans; to the latter of whom the honorable title of “whites” is
by no means conceded.
In spite of the warm sunset of that evening the next morning was a
dreary and cheerless one. It rained steadily, clouds resting upon the
very treetops. We crossed the river to visit the Mormon settlement. As
we passed through the water, several trappers on horseback entered it
from the other side. Their buckskin frocks were soaked through by the
rain, and clung fast to their limbs with a most clammy and uncomfortable
look. The water was trickling down their faces, and dropping from the
ends of their rifles, and from the traps which each carried at the
pommel of his saddle. Horses and all, they had a most disconsolate and
woebegone appearance, which we could not help laughing at, forgetting
how often we ourselves had been in a similar plight.
After half an hour’s riding we saw the white wagons of the Mormons drawn
up among the trees. Axes were sounding, trees were falling, and log-huts
going up along the edge of the woods and upon the adjoining meadow.
As we came up the Mormons left their work and seated themselves on
the timber around us, when they began earnestly to discuss points
of theology, complain of the ill-usage they had received from the
“Gentiles,” and sound a lamentation over the loss of their great temple
at Nauvoo. After remaining with them an hour we rode back to our camp,
happy that the settlements had been delivered from the presence of such
blind and desperate fanatics.
On the morning after this we left the Pueblo for Bent’s Fort. The
conduct of Raymond had lately been less satisfactory than before, and
we had discharged him as soon as we arrived at the former place; so that
the party, ourselves included, was now reduced to four. There was some
uncertainty as to our future course. The trail between Bent’s Fort and
the settlements, a distance computed at six hundred miles, was at this
time in a dangerous state; for since the passage of General Kearny’s
army, great numbers of hostile Indians, chiefly Pawnees and Comanches,
had gathered about some parts of it. A little after this time they
became so numerous and audacious, that scarcely a single party, however
large, passed between the fort and the frontier without some token of
their hostility. The newspapers of the time sufficiently display this
state of things. Many men were killed, and great numbers of horses and
mules carried off. Not long since I met with the gentleman, who, during
the autumn, came from Santa Fe to Bent’s Fort, when he found a party
of seventy men, who thought themselves too weak to go down to the
settlements alone, and were waiting there for a re-enforcement. Though
this excessive timidity fully proves the ignorance and credulity of
the men, it may also evince the state of alarm which prevailed in the
country. When we were there in the month of August, the danger had not
become so great. There was nothing very attractive in the neighborhood.
We supposed, moreover, that we might wait there half the winter without
finding any party to go down with us; for Mr. Sublette and the others
whom we had relied upon had, as Richard told us, already left Bent’s
Fort. Thus far on our journey Fortune had kindly befriended us. We
resolved therefore to take advantage of her gracious mood and trusting
for a continuance of her favors, to set out with Henry and Delorier, and
run the gauntlet of the Indians in the best way we could.
Bent’s Fort stands on the river, about seventy-five miles below the
Pueblo. At noon of the third day we arrived within three or four miles
of it, pitched our tent under a tree, hung our looking-glasses against
its trunk and having made our primitive toilet, rode toward the fort.
We soon came in sight of it, for it is visible from a considerable
distance, standing with its high clay walls in the midst of the
scorching plains. It seemed as if a swarm of locusts had invaded the
country. The grass for miles around was cropped close by the horses of
General Kearny’s soldiery. When we came to the fort, we found that not
only had the horses eaten up the grass, but their owners had made
away with the stores of the little trading post; so that we had great
difficulty in procuring the few articles which we required for our
homeward journey. The army was gone, the life and bustle passed away,
and the fort was a scene of dull and lazy tranquillity. A few invalid
officers and soldiers sauntered about the area, which was oppressively
hot; for the glaring sun was reflected down upon it from the high white
walls around. The proprietors were absent, and we were received by Mr.
Holt, who had been left in charge of the fort. He invited us to dinner,
where, to our admiration, we found a table laid with a white cloth, with
castors in the center and chairs placed around it. This unwonted repast
concluded, we rode back to our camp.
Here, as we lay smoking round the fire after supper, we saw through the
dusk three men approaching from the direction of the fort. They rode up
and seated themselves near us on the ground. The foremost was a tall,
well-formed man, with a face and manner such as inspire confidence at
once. He wore a broad hat of felt, slouching and tattered, and the rest
of his attire consisted of a frock and leggings of buckskin, rubbed with
the yellow clay found among the mountains. At the heel of one of his
moccasins was buckled a huge iron spur, with a rowel five or six inches
in diameter. His horse, who stood quietly looking over his head, had a
rude Mexican saddle, covered with a shaggy bearskin, and furnished with
a pair of wooden stirrups of most preposterous size. The next man was a
sprightly, active little fellow, about five feet and a quarter high, but
very strong and compact. His face was swarthy as a Mexican’s and covered
with a close, curly black beard. An old greasy calico handkerchief was
tied round his head, and his close buckskin dress was blackened and
polished by grease and hard service. The last who came up was a large
strong man, dressed in the coarse homespun of the frontiers, who dragged
his long limbs over the ground as if he were too lazy for the effort. He
had a sleepy gray eye, a retreating chin, an open mouth and a
protruding upper lip, which gave him an air of exquisite indolence
and helplessness. He was armed with an old United States yager, which
redoubtable weapon, though he could never hit his mark with it, he was
accustomed to cherish as the very sovereign of firearms.
The first two men belonged to a party who had just come from California
with a large band of horses, which they had disposed of at Bent’s
Fort. Munroe, the taller of the two, was from Iowa. He was an excellent
fellow, open, warm-hearted and intelligent. Jim Gurney, the short man,
was a Boston sailor, who had come in a trading vessel to California, and
taken the fancy to return across the continent. The journey had already
made him an expert “mountain man,” and he presented the extraordinary
phenomenon of a sailor who understood how to manage a horse. The third
of our visitors named Ellis, was a Missourian, who had come out with a
party of Oregon emigrants, but having got as far as Bridge’s Fort, he
had fallen home-sick, or as Jim averred, love-sick--and Ellis was just
the man to be balked in a love adventure. He thought proper to join the
California men and return homeward in their company.
They now requested that they might unite with our party, and make the
journey to the settlements in company with us. We readily assented, for
we liked the appearance of the first two men, and were very glad to
gain so efficient a re-enforcement. We told them to meet us on the next
evening at a spot on the river side, about six miles below the fort.
Having smoked a pipe together, our new allies left us, and we lay down
to sleep.