How the Old Man Subdued the Indians with an Electric Battery and
Phosphorus--He Tries His Hand at Roping a Steer--The Disastrous
Result.

Gee, but I thought Pa was all in when I closed by last letter,
when the Indians had him bound on a board, and had lighted a
fire, and were just going to broil him. Jealousy is bad enough in
a white man, but when an Indian gets jealous of his squaw there is
going to be something doing, and when a whole tribe gets jealous
of one old man, 'cause he has taught the squaws to be independent,
and rise up as one man against the tyranny of their husbands, that
white man is not safe, and as Pa lay there, waiting for the fire
to get hot enough for them to lay him on the coals, I felt almost
like crying, 'cause I didn't want to take pa's remains back home
so scorched that they wouldn't be an ornament to society, so I
went up to pa's couch to get his instructions as to our future
course, when he should be all in.

I said, "Pa, this is the most serious case you have yet mixed up
in. O, wimmen, how you do ruin men who put their trust in you."

Pa winked at me, and said:

"Never you mind me, Hennery. I will come out of this scrape and
have all the Indians on their kpeesan less than an hour, begging
my pardon," and then Pa whispered to me, and I went to pa's valise
and got an electric battery and put it in pa's pocket and
scattered copper wires all around pa's body, and fixed it so pa
could touch a button and turn on a charge of electricity that