356 JAMES O'MEARA
with the wilderness, in which they mainly pursued their excit- ing, hardy and oftentimes perilous vocation.
During the following October the Bonneville expedition reached the country of the warlike Blackfeet Indians, and from there Walker, with a band of twenty hunters, was dis- patched to range the region beyond the Horse Prairie.
At one of their camping places, while quietly enjoying their rest after a day of hard travel, and a hearty supper of the game they had killed, some sitting about the camp-fire, re- counting their adventures, others giving attention to their rifles and accoutrements, and Walker and a few more beguil- ing the hours at a game of "old sledge," they were suddenly surprised by the war whoop of a party of Indians, and had barely time to prepare for the instant onset of the savages, who shot into the camp a shower of arrows and had already seized upon the horses and pack mules to run them off.
Quick work with their handy rifles and the determined courage of the surprised band, in a little while turned the attack into a flight and the Indians were at last glad enough to make their escape from the deadly encounter without the animals they so much coveted.
Walker's coolness and intrepidity in the sudden hot dash, and his sagacity in directing the hurried plan of defense into mastery of the situation saved himself and his comrades from slaughter, and enabled them to get away from the scene in good condition, without serious wound or loss; but he was afterward more prone to adopt the very safest course from any repetition of the hazardous incident and he evermore hated "old sledge."
By his consummate skill in leadership and his equanimity and daring in moments of greatest difficulty and danger, as well as by his uncommon aptitude in mountain life and woodcraft, Walker became the most trusted and favorite among all in the expedition in the estimation of his chief; and hence, when the party reached the confines of what is now Utah Territory, to him Captain Bonneville committed the charge of the sub-
