spoke kindly as he left me, and bade me take care of
myself.
I put some bullets in my mouth, primed my pistols, and made all preparation to do my part. It seemed like an age before the fight began. I could hear my heart beat like a little drum.
The Indians certainly had not the least suspicion of danger. They were, it seemed, as much off their guard as possible. They evidently thought their camp, if not impregnable, beyond our reach and dis covery. They owed the latter to their own race.
At last we were discerned, as some of the most daring and experienced were stealing closer and closer to the camp, and they sprang to their arms with whoops and yells that lifted my hat almost from my head.
The yells were answered. Rifles cracked around the camp, and arrows came back in showers.
u Close up!" shouted Mountain Joe, and we left cover and advanced. I think I must have swallowed the bullets I put in my mouth, for I loaded from my pouch as usual, and thought of them no more as we moved down upon the yelling Indians.
A little group of us gathered behind some rocks. Then a man came creeping to us through the brush to say that the other side of our company was being pressed and that we must move on. Then another came to say that Mountain Joe had been struck across the face by an arrow, and his eyes were so injured that he could not direct the fight.
