They Make No Hesitation, Therefore, To Murder The
Solitary Trapper, And Thus Destroy A Competitor, While They
Possess Themselves Of His Spoils.
It is with regret we add, too,
that this hostility has in many cases been instigated by traders,
desirous of injuring their rivals, but who have themselves often
reaped the fruits of the mischief they have sown.
When two trappers undertake any considerable stream, their mode
of proceeding is, to hide their horses in some lonely glen, where
they can graze unobserved. They then build a small hut, dig out
a canoe from a cotton-wood tree, and in this poke along shore
silently, in the evening, and set their traps. These they revisit
in the same silent way at daybreak. When they take any beaver
they bring it home, skin it, stretch the skins on sticks to dry,
and feast upon the flesh. The body, hung up before the fire,
turns by its own weight, and is roasted in a superior style; the
tail is the trapper s tidbit; it is cut off, put on the end of a
stick, and toasted, and is considered even a greater dainty than
the tongue or the marrow-bone of a buffalo.
With all their silence and caution, however, the poor trappers
cannot always escape their hawk-eyed enemies. Their trail has
been discovered, perhaps, and followed up for many a mile; or
their smoke has been seen curling up out of the secret glen, or
has been scented by the savages, whose sense of smell is almost
as acute as that of sight. Sometimes they are pounced upon when
in the act of setting their traps; at other times, they are
roused from their sleep by the horrid war-whoop; or, perhaps,
have a bullet or an arrow whistling about their ears, in the
midst of one of their beaver banquets. In this way they are
picked off, from time to time, and nothing is known of them,
until, perchance, their bones are found bleaching in some lonely
ravine, or on the banks of some nameless stream, which from that
time is called after them. Many of the small streams beyond the
mountains thus perpetuate the names of unfortunate trappers that
have been murdered on their banks.
A knowledge of these dangers deterred Captain Bonneville, in the
present instance, from detaching small parties of trappers as he
had intended; for his scouts brought him word that formidable
bands of the Banneck Indians were lying on the Boisee and Payette
Rivers, at no great distance, so that they would be apt to detect
and cut off any stragglers. It behooved him, also, to keep his
party together, to guard against any predatory attack upon the
main body; he continued on his way, therefore, without dividing
his forces. And fortunate it was that he did so; for in a little
while he encountered one of the phenomena of the western wilds
that would effectually have prevented his scattered people from
finding each other again.
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