direction they had come. We found
twenty-seven dead Indians all laying close together, and it did not take
us long to take their scalps off. When we had finished this job, Jim
made the remark that he had scalps enough now to protect the train all
the way to California.

As it was yet about three miles to our camping ground, I told my scouts
what to do, and then I told Jim that I meant to follow the Indians alone
and see where they went to and not to expect me back until he saw me,
for I intended to see those Indians go into camp before I left them,
if it took me until midnight to do it, for if I did this I could tell
whether they meant to give us any more trouble or not.

Jim told me where to look for the camp when I wanted to find it, and I
left them, on a mission the danger of which I do not think one of my
readers can understand, but which at that time I thought very little
about.

I had followed the trail of the Indians but a short distance before I
was convinced that there were a great many wounded in the band, for
there was so much blood scattered all along the trail. I had followed
the trail about five miles when I came to a high ridge, and on looking
down on the other side I saw what looked to me like two or three hundred
camp fires, and from the noise I heard I thought that many that I had
thought to be wounded must be dead, for it was the same sound that I had
often heard the squaws make over their dead. I decided by the appearance
of the camp that I had discovered the main camping ground of the
Indians. On deciding this in my mind, I hurried back as quickly as I
could to tell Jim. When I reached camp, supper was just over. After I
had looked after my horse, I went into the camp, and a lady met me and
invited me to her tent, saying she had kept some supper warm for me and
had been on the lookout for me to come back, and the reader may rest
assured I was hungry enough to accept the invitation and to do ample
justice to the good things the kind lady had saved for me.

While I was eating, Jim came to me and asked what I had discovered. I
told him of the big Indian camp I had found at the foot of the ridge,
which was probably five or six miles from where we were then in camp,
and I told him of the noise the squaws had made too. He said, "Well, I
will bet my old hat that we won't have any more trouble with them, for
when they come back to get their dead warriors in the morning and find
them without their scalps