The Wagons
Of Vaskiss, An Old Trader, Were About To Set Out For A Remote Post In
The Mountains, And The Canadians Were Going Through Their
Preparations With All Possible Bustle, While Here And There An Indian
Stood Looking On With Imperturbable Gravity.
Fort Laramie is one of the posts established by the American Fur
Company, who well-nigh monopolize the Indian trade of this whole
region.
Here their officials rule with an absolute sway; the arm of
the United States has little force; for when we were there, the
extreme outposts of her troops were about seven hundred miles to the
eastward. The little fort is built of bricks dried in the sun, and
externally is of an oblong form, with bastions of clay, in the form
of ordinary blockhouses, at two of the corners. The walls are about
fifteen feet high, and surmounted by a slender palisade. The roofs
of the apartments within, which are built close against the walls,
serve the purpose of a banquette. Within, the fort is divided by a
partition; on one side is the square area surrounded by the
storerooms, offices, and apartments of the inmates; on the other is
the corral, a narrow place, encompassed by the high clay walls, where
at night, or in presence of dangerous Indians, the horses and mules
of the fort are crowded for safe-keeping. The main entrance has two
gates, with an arched passage intervening. A little square window,
quite high above the ground, opens laterally from an adjoining
chamber into this passage; so that when the inner gate is closed and
barred, a person without may still hold communication with those
within through this narrow aperture.
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