beats any thing I ever saw or heard tell of; with this to guide us, we
could not get lost if we tried to."

We were now ready to start. Jonnie said to me, "Well, I feel we owe this
Indian something. How many butcher knives have you?"

I said, "I have two." "Alright, I will give him this finger ring and you
give him one of your knives."

We did so, and I think he was the proudest Indian I ever saw; he jumped
up and shouted, "Hy-you-scu-scum, white man," which meant "Good white
man."

The Indians all shook hands with us and then mounted their horses and
were gone. We now pulled out on our long and dangerous trip to Taos, New
Mexico, and strange to say, we never missed a camping ground that the
Indians had marked out for us, until we reached the head of the Arkansas
river, and the beauty of it was, we had good grass and good water at
every camping place, which was very essential for ourselves and our
horses.

When we struck the head of the Arkansas river we considered ourselves
out of danger of all hostile Indians. Besides, we knew every foot of the
ground we had to travel over from here to Taos, New Mexico. We camped
one night on the river, down below where Leadville stands now, and I
never saw so many huckleberries at one place as I saw there. After we
had our horses unpacked and staked out to grass, I said to the boys,
"Now you go and pick berries, and I will try and find some meat for
supper." I did not go far when looking up on a high bluff I saw a band
of mountain sheep. I noticed they had not seen me yet and were coming