Returning To The Fire, I Sat Down At
The Foot Of A Tree.
Wearily and anxiously hour after hour passed
away.
The old loose bark dangling from the trunk behind me flapped
to and fro in the wind, and the mosquitoes kept up their incessant
drowsy humming; but other than this, there was no sight nor sound of
life throughout the burning landscape. The sun rose higher and
higher, until the shadows fell almost perpendicularly, and I knew
that it must be noon. It seemed scarcely possible that the animals
could be recovered. If they were not, my situation was one of
serious difficulty. Shaw, when I left him had decided to move that
morning, but whither he had not determined. To look for him would be
a vain attempt. Fort Laramie was forty miles distant, and I could
not walk a mile without great effort. Not then having learned the
sound philosophy of yielding to disproportionate obstacles, I
resolved to continue in any event the pursuit of the Indians. Only
one plan occurred to me; this was to send Raymond to the fort with an
order for more horses, while I remained on the spot, awaiting his
return, which might take place within three days. But the adoption
of this resolution did not wholly allay my anxiety, for it involved
both uncertainty and danger. To remain stationary and alone for
three days, in a country full of dangerous Indians, was not the most
flattering of prospects; and protracted as my Indian hunt must be by
such delay, it was not easy to foretell its ultimate result.
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