conspired to render their situation uncomfortable; stories of desperate
and bloody Indian fights were rife in the camp; our position was badly
chosen, surrounded on all sides by timbered hollows, and occupying an area
of several hundred feet, so that necessarily the guards were far apart;
and now and then I could hear Randolph, as if relieved by the sound of a
voice in the darkness, calling out to the sergeant of the guard, to direct
his attention to some imaginary alarm; but they stood it out, and took
their turn regularly afterwards.

The next morning we had a specimen of the false alarms to which all
parties in these wild regions are subject. Proceeding up the valley,
objects were seen on the opposite hills, which disappeared before a glass
could be brought to bear upon them. A man who was a short distance in the
rear, came springing up in great haste, shouting "Indians! Indians!" He
had been near enough to see and count them, according to his report, and
had made out twenty-seven. I immediately halted; arms were examined and
put in order; the usual preparations made; and Kit Carson, springing upon
one of the hunting horses, crossed the river, and galloped off into the
opposite prairies, to obtain some certain intelligence of their movements.

Mounted on a fine horse, without a saddle, and scouring bare-headed over
the prairies, Kit was one of the finest pictures of a horseman I have ever
seen. A short time enabled him to discover that the Indian war-party of
twenty-seven consisted of six elk, who had been gazing curiously at our
caravan as it passed by, and were now scampering off at full speed. This
was our first alarm, and its excitement broke agreeably on the monotony of
the day. At our noon halt, the men were exercised at a target; and in the
evening we pitched our tents at a Pawnee encampment of last July. They had
apparently killed buffalo here, as many bones were lying about, and the
frames where the hides had been stretched were yet standing. The road of