of grave concern were wired as soon as this station was reached.

[11] These were executive divisions and not to be confused with the
riders' divisions. The latter were merely the stations separating each
man's "run."

[12] Slade was afterward hanged by vigilantes in Virginia City, Montana.
The authentic story of his life surpasses in romance and tragedy most of
the pirate tales of fiction.

[13] The dispatch was taken from the main line to the Colorado capital
by special service. Denver, it will be remembered, was not on the
regular "Pony route," which ran north of that city. There was then no
telegraph in operation west of the Missouri River in Kansas or Nebraska.

[14] Roughing It.



Chapter V



California and the Secession Menace



When the Southern states withdrew, a conspiracy was on foot to force
California out of the Union, and organize a new Republic of the Pacific
with the Sierra Madre and the Rocky Mountains for its Eastern boundary.