The War Trail: The Hunt of the Wild Horse

And yet, with all their wanton love, they are true tyrants to the sex. Wife they have none – for it would be sheer sacrilege to apply this noble title to the “squaw” of a Comanche. Mistress is scarcely a fitter term – rather say slave. Hers is a hard lot indeed; hers it is to hew the wood and draw the water; to strike the tent and pitch it; to load the horse and pack the dog; to grain the skin and cure the meat; to plant the maize, the melon, squash; to hoe and reap them; to wait obsequious on her lounging lord, anticipate his whim or wish, be true to him, else lose her ears or nose– for such horrid forfeiture is, by Comanche custom, the punishment of conjugal infidelity!

But hard as is the lot of the native wife, harder still is that of the white captive. ’Tis hers to endure all the ills enumerated, with still another – the hostility of the squaw herself. The white captive is truly the slave of a slave, the victim of a treble antipathy – of race, of colour, of jealousy. Ofttimes is she beaten, abused, mutilated; and rarely does the apathetic lord interfere to protect her from this feminine but fiend-like persecution.

These were not imaginings; they were not fancies begot in my own brain. Would they had been so! Too well did I know they were facts – horrid realities.

Can you wonder that sleep was shaken from my eyelids? – that I could not think of rest or stay, till I had delivered my loved one – my betrothed – from the danger of such a destiny?

All thought of sleep was banished – even weariness forsook me. I felt fresh as if I had slept; my nerves were strung for emprise. It was but the excitement renewed by what I had read – the impatience of a new and keen apprehension.

I would have mounted and gone forward, spurning rest and sleep; regardless of danger, would I have followed; but what could I do alone?

Ay, and what with my few followers?

Ha! I had not thought of this; up to that moment, I had not put this important question, and I had need to reflect upon the answer. What if we should overtake this band of brigands? Booty-laden as they were, and cumbered with captives, surely we could come up with them, by night or by day; but what then? Ay, what then?

There were nine of us, and we were in pursuit of a war-party of at least one hundred in number! – one hundred braves armed and equipped for battle – the choice warriors of their tribe – flushed with late success, and vengeful against ourselves on account of former defeat. If conquered, we need look for no mercy at their hands; if conquered – how could it be otherwise? Nine against a hundred! How could we conquer?

Up to this moment, I say, I had not thought of the result I was borne along by only one impulse – the idea of overtaking the steed, and rescuing his rider from her perilous situation. It was only within the hour that her peril had assumed a new phase; only an hour since we had learned that she had escaped from one danger to be brought within the influence of another.

At first had I felt joy, but the feeling was of short existence, for I now recognised in the new situation a greater peril than that she had outlived. She had been rescued from death to become the victim of dishonour!

Chapter Seventy Nine.

A Subterranean Fire

In the midst of my meditations, night descended upon the earth. It promised to be a moonless night. A robe of sable clouds formed a sombre lining to the sky, and through this neither moon nor stars were visible.

It grew darker apace, until in the dim light I could scarcely distinguish the forms of my companions – neither men nor horses, though both were near me.

The men were still asleep, stretched along the grass in various attitudes, like so many bodies upon a battle-field. The horses were too hungry to sleep – the constant “crop-crop” told that they were greedily browsing upon the sward of gramma-grass that, by good fortune, grew luxuriantly around. This would be the best rest for them, and I was glad to think that this splendid provender would in a few hours recruit their strength. It was the chondrosium foeneum, the favourite food of horses and cattle, and in its effects upon their condition almost equal to the bean or the oat. I knew it would soon freshen the jaded animals, and make them ready for the road. At least in this there was some consolation.

Notwithstanding the pre-occupation of my thoughts, I began to be sensible of a physical discomfort, which, despite their low latitude, is often experienced upon the southern prairies – cold. A chill breeze had set in with the night, which in half-an-hour became a strong and violent wind, increasing in coldness as in strength.

In that half-hour the thermometer must have fallen at least fifty Fahrenheit degrees; and such a phenomenon is not rare upon the plains of Texas. The wind was the well-known “norther” which often kills both men and animals, that chance to be exposed to its icy breath.

I have endured the rigour of a Canadian winter – have crossed the frozen lakes – have slept upon a snow-wreath amidst the wild wastes of Rupert’s Land; but I cannot remember cold more intensely chilling than that I have suffered in a Texan norther.

This extreme does not arise from the absolute depression of the thermometer – which at least is but a poor indicator of either heat or cold – I mean the sensation of either. It is more probably the contrast springing from the sudden change – the exposure – the absence of proper clothing or shelter – the state of the blood – and other like circumstances, that cause both heat and cold to be more sensibly felt.

I had ofttimes experienced the chill blast of the norther, but never more acutely than upon that night. The day had been sweltering hot – the thermometer at noon ranging about the one-hundredth Fahrenheit degree, while in the first hour of darkness it could not have been far above the twentieth. Had I judged by my sensations, I should have put it even lower. Certainly it had passed the freezing-point, and sharp sleet and hail were borne upon the wings of the wind.

With nerves deranged from want of rest and sleep – after the hot day’s march – after the perspiration produced by long exposure upon the heated surface of the burnt prairie – I perhaps felt the cold more acutely than I should otherwise have done. My blood seemed to stagnate and freeze within my veins.

I was fain to wrap around my body a buffalo-robe, which some careless savage had dropped upon the trail. My followers were not so well furnished; starting as we had done, without any thought of being absent for the night, no preparation had been made for camping out. Only a portion of them chanced to have their blankets strapped upon the cantles of their saddles. These were now the fortunate ones.

The norther had roused all of them from their slumbers – had awaked them as suddenly as a douche of cold water would have done; and one and all were groping about in the darkness – some seeking for their blankets – others for such shelter as was afforded by the lee-side of the bushes.

Fortunately there were some saddle-blankets, and these were soon dragged from the backs of the horses. The poor brutes themselves suffered equally with their owners; they stood cowering under the cold, with their hips to the cutting blast, their limbs drawn close together, and their flanks shaggy and shivering. Some of them half sheltered themselves behind the bushes, scarce caring to touch the grass at their feet.

It would have been easy enough to make a fire; there was dry wood in plenty near the spot, and of the best kind for burning – the large species of mezquite. Some of the men were for kindling fires at once, regardless of consequences; but this design was overruled by the more prudent of the party. The trappers were strongly against it. Cold as was the night, and dark, they knew that neither the norther nor the darkness would deter Indians from being abroad. A party might be out upon the prowl; the very buffalo-skin we had picked up might bring a squad of them back; for it was the grand robe of some brave or chief, whose whole life-history was delineated in hieroglyphical painting upon its inner surface. To have made a fire, might have cost us our lives; so alleged the trappers, Rube and Garey. It would be better to endure the cold, than risk our scalps; so counselled they.

But for all that, Rube had no idea of being starved to death. He could kindle a fire, and burn it upon an open prairie, without the least fear of its being seen; and in a few minutes’ time he had succeeded in making one, that could not have been discovered by the most sharp-sighted Indian in creation. I had watched the operation with some interest.

He first collected a quantity of dead leaves, dry grass, and short sticks of the mezquite-tree – all of which he placed under his saddle-blanket, to prevent the rain and sleet from wetting them. This done, he drew out his bowie-knife, and with the blade “crowed” a hole into the turf, about a foot deep, and ten inches or a foot in diameter. In the bottom of this hole he placed the grass and leaves, having first ignited them by means of his flint, steel, and “punk” tinder – all of which implements formed part of the contents of Rube’s pouch and possible sack – ever present. On the top of the now blazing leaves and grass he placed the dry sticks – first the smaller ones, and then those of larger dimensions – until the hole was filled up to the brim – and over all he laid the piece of sod, originally cut from the surface, and which fitted as neatly as a lid.

His furnace being now finished and in full blast, the old trapper “hunkered” down close to its edge – in such a position as to embrace the fire between his thighs, and have it nearly under him. He then drew his old saddle-blanket over his shoulders, allowing it to droop behind until he had secured it under the salient points of his lank angular hips. In front he passed the blanket over his knees, until both ends, reaching the ground, were gripped tightly between his toes. The contrivance was complete; and there sat the earless trapper like a hand-glass over a plant of spring rhubarb – a slight smoke oozing through the apertures of the scant blanket, and curling up around his “ears” as though he was hatching upon a hotbed. But no fire could be seen, though Rube shivered no longer.

He soon found imitators. Garey had already constructed a similar furnace; and the others were soon warming themselves by this simple but ingenious device.

I did not disdain to avail myself of the extra “shaft” which the kind-hearted Garey had sunk for my accommodation; and having placed myself by its side, and drawn the ample robe over my shoulders, I felt as warm as if seated in front of a sea-coal fire!

Under other circumstances, I might have joined in the merriment produced among my companions by the ludicrous spectacle which we presented. A comic spectacle indeed; nine of us squatted at intervals over the ground, the blue smoke escaping through the interstices of our robes and blankets, and rising around our heads, as though one and all of us were on fire!

Wind, sleet, and darkness, continued throughout the whole night – cold wind, sharp icy sleet, and black darkness, that seemed palpable to the touch. Ever so eager, ever so fresh, we could not have advanced along the trail. Grand war-trail as it was, it could not have been traced under that amorphous obscurity, and we had no means of carrying a light, even had it been safe to do so. We had no lantern, and the norther with one blast would have whisked out a torch of pitch-pine.

We thought no more of going forward, until either the day should break or the wind come to a lull.

At midnight we replenished our subterranean fires, and remained on the ground. Hail, rain, wind, and darkness.

My companions rested their heads upon their knees, or nodding slept. No sleep for me – not even the repose of thought. Like some fevered sufferer on his wakeful couch. I counted the hours – the minutes. The minutes seemed hours.

Rain, hail, sleet, and wind seemed, like darkness itself, to belong to the night. As long as night lasted, so long continued they. When it came to an end, all vanished together – the norther had exhausted its strength.

A wild turkey – killed before nightfall – with some steaks of the peccary-pork, furnished us with an ample breakfast.

It was hastily cooked, and hastily eaten; and as the first streak of dawn appeared along the horizon, we were in our saddles, and advancing upon the trail.

Chapter Eighty.

A Red Epistle

The trail led north-west, as written upon the maguey. No doubt Isolina had heard her captors forespeak their plans. I knew that she herself understood something of the Comanche language. The accomplishment may appear strange – and not strange either, when it is known that her mother could have spoken it well: with her it was a native tongue.

But even without this knowledge she might still have learned the designs of the savages – for these southern Comanches are accomplished linguists; many of them can speak the beautiful language of Andalusia! There was a time when a portion of the tribe submitted to the teaching of the mission padres; besides, a few among them might boast – which they do not – of Iberian blood!

No doubt, then, that the captive in their midst had overheard them discussing their projects.

We had ridden about two hours, when we came upon the ground where the Indians had made their night-camp. We approached it warily and with stealth, for we were now travelling with great caution. We had need. Should a single savage, straggling behind, set eyes upon us, we might as well be seen by the whole band. If discovered upon the war-trail, our lives would not be worth much. Some of us might escape; but even if all of us survived our plan would be completely frustrated.

I say plan, for I had formed one. During the long vigil of the night, my thoughts had not been idle, and a course of action I had traced out, though it was not yet fully developed in my mind. Circumstances might yet alter it, or aid me in its execution.

We approached their night-encampment, then, warily and with stealth. The smoke of its smouldering fires pointed out the place, and warned us from afar.

We found it quite deserted – the gaunt wolf and coyote alone occupying the ground, disputing with each other possession of the hide and bones of a horse – the débris of the Indian breakfast.

Had we not known already, the trappers could have told by the sign of the camp to what tribe the Indians belonged. There were still standing the poles of a tent – only one – doubtless the lodge of the head chief. The poles were temporary ones – saplings cut from the adjacent thicket. They were placed in a circle, and meeting at the top, were tied together with a piece of thong – so that, when covered, the lodge would have exhibited the form of a perfect cone. This we knew was the fashion of the Comanche tent.

“Ef ’t hed ’a been Kickapoo,” said Rube, who took the opportunity of displaying his knowledge, “th’ud ’a bent thur poles in’ard, so’s to make a sort o’ a roun top, d’ee see; an ef ’t hed ’a been Wacoes or Witcheetoes, thu’d ’a left a hole at the top, to let out thur smoke. Delawurs an Shawnee wud ’a hed tents, jest like whites; but thet ur ain’t thur way o’ makin a fire. In a Shawnee fire, the logs ’ud ’a been laid wi’ one eend turned in an the tother turned ut, jest like the star on a Texas flag, or the spokes o’ a wagon-wheel. Likeways Cherokee an Choctaw wud ’a hed reg’lar tents, but thur fire wud ’a been alser diff’rint. They’d ’a sot the logs puralell, side by side, an lit’ em only at one eend, an then pushed ’em up as fast as they burn’d. Thet’s thur way. ’Ee see these hyur logs is sot diff’rint – thur lit in the middle, an thet’s Kimanch for sartint – it ur.”