rst of their trials was now to come. Before they comprehended the
intention the Spanish official had seized their rifles and the men
were locked up with only the commonest fare to relieve their suffering.
Cruelty followed cruelty, but they believed it was the mistake of the
minor officers, and appealed to the general in charge at San Diego,
expecting an order from him for release. Instead of this they were
marched under guard to San Diego, where each was confined in a separate
room, frustrating their plan to recapture their arms and fight their way
out. Pattie's father presently became ill, and no amount of entreaty was
sufficient to gain permission for the son to see him even for a moment.
He died in his cell. After much argument and the intercession of some of
the minor officers, Pattie was permitted liberty long enough to attend
the funeral. At last the men were allowed to go back for the furs, which
no doubt the wily general intended to confiscate, Pattie himself being
retained as a hostage. But the furs had been ruined by a rise of the
river. Smallpox then began to rage on the coast, and through this fact
Pattie finally gained his freedom. Having with him a quantity of vaccine
virus, he was able to barter skill in vaccinating the populace for
liberty, though it was tardily and grudgingly granted. He was able, at
length, to get away from California, and returned, broken in health
and penniless, by way of the City of Mexico, to his old home near
Cincinnati, after six years of extraordinary travel through the wildest
portions of the Rocky Mountain region and the extreme Southwest.

In the year 1826, an afterwards famous personage appeared in the valley
of the Colorado, on the Gila branch, being no less than Kit Carson,*
one of the greatest scouts and trappers of all. At this time he was but
seventeen years old, though in sagacity, knowledge, and skill soon the
equal of any trapper in the field. In 1827, Ewing Young, another noted
trapper, having been driven away from the Gila by the natives, organised
a company of forty men to go back and punish them, which meant to kill
all they could see, innocent or guilty. Carson was one of this party.
They succeeded in killing fifteen of the offenders, after which slight
diversion they went on down the stream, trapping it as they went, but
finally, running short of provisions, they had to eat horses. Arriving
among the Mohaves, they obtained food from them, and proceeded across
to