rom Red Buttes to
Sweetwater, a distance of seventy-six miles. Road-agents and Indians
infested this country. I never was quite sure when I started out when I
should reach my destination, or whether I should never reach it at all.

One day I galloped into the station at Three Crossings to find that my
relief had been killed in a drunken row the night before. There was no
one to take his place. His route was eighty-five miles across country
to the west. I had no time to think it over. Selecting a good pony out
of the stables I was soon on my way.

I arrived at Rocky Ridge, the end of the new route, on schedule time,
and turning back came on to Red Buttes, my starting-place. The round
trip was 320 miles, and I made it in twenty-one hours and forty
minutes.

Excitement was plentiful during my two years' service as a Pony Express
rider. One day as I was leaving Horse Creek, a party of fifteen Indians
jammed me in a sand ravine eight miles west of the station. They fired
at me repeatedly, but my luck held, and I went unscathed. My mount was
a California roan pony, the fastest in the stables. I dug the spurs
into his sides, and, lying flat on his back, I kept straight on for
Sweetwater Bridge eleven miles distant. A turn back to Horse Creek
might have brought me more speedily to shelter, but I did not dare risk
it.

The Indians came on behind, riding with all the speed they could put
into their horses, but my pony drew rapidly ahead. I had a lead of two
miles when I reached the station. There I found I could get no new
pony. The stock-tender had been killed by the Indians during the night.
All his ponies had been stolen and driven off. I kept on, therefore, to
Plonts Station, twelve miles further along, riding the same pony--a
ride of twenty-four miles on one mount. At Plonts I told the people
what had happened at Sweetwater Bridge. Then, with a fresh horse, I
finished my route without further adventure.

[Illustration: PURSUED BY FIFTEEN BLOODTHIRSTY INDIANS, I HAD A RUNNING
FIGHT OF ELEVEN MILES]

CHAPTER II

About the middle of September the Indians became very troublesome on
the line of the stage along the Sweetwater, between Split Rock and
Three Crossings. A stage had been robbed and two passengers killed
outright. Lem Flowers, the driver, was badly wounded. The thievish
redskins also drove stock repeatedly from the stations. They were
continually lying in wait for passing stages and Pony Express riders.