Carson had a hundred just such knives as this one was in his pack, but
he could not take the time then to get one out. For my knife he traded a
yearling Buffalo, and there was meat enough to feed his whole crew three
or four days. That was the first Indian "Pow-wow" that I had ever seen
or heard of either.

The Indians ate supper with us, and after that they danced "the Peace
Dance" after smoking the Pipe of Peace with Uncle Kit. The smoking and
dancing lasted perhaps an hour, and then the Indians mounted their
horses and sped away to their own village.

I was with Carson off and on about twelve years, but I never saw him
appear to enjoy himself better than he did that night. After the Indians
had gone, Uncle Kit imitated each one of us as he said we looked when
the Indians first appeared in sight. He had some in the act of running
and others trying to hide behind the horse, and he said that if the
ground had been loose we would have tried to dig a hole to crawl into.
One of the party he described as sitting on his pack with his mouth wide
open, and he said he could not decide whether the man wanted to swallow
an Indian or a Buffalo.

The next morning we pulled out from there, crossing the divide between
this stream and the Arkansas. Just before we struck the Arkansas river,
we struck the Santa-Fe trail. This trail led from St-Joe on the Missouri
river to Santa-Fe, New Mexico, by the way of Bent's Fort, as it was
called then. Bent's Fort was only a Trading Station, owned by Bent and
Robedoux. These two men at that time handled all the furs that were
trapped from the head of the North Platte to the head of the Arkansas;
the Santa-Fe trail, as it was then called, was the only route leading to
that part of the country.