The Dog Crusoe and his Master by R. M. Ballantyne (free ebook reader for pc .TXT) 📖

summits of the Rocky Mountains, causing the snowy peaks to glitter like flame, and the deep ravines and gorges to look sombre and mysterious by contrast, when Dick, and Joe, and Henri mounted their gallant steeds, and, with Crusoe gambolling before, and the two pack-horses trotting by their side, turned their faces eastward, and bade adieu to the Indian camp.

Crusoe was in great spirits. He was perfectly well aware that he and his companions were on their way home, and testified his satisfaction by bursts of scampering over the hills and valleys. Doubtless he thought of Dick Varley’s cottage, and of Dick’s mild, kind-hearted mother. Undoubtedly, too, he thought of his own mother, Fan, and felt a glow of filial affection as he did so. Of this we feel quite certain. He would have been unworthy the title of hero if he hadn’t. Perchance he thought of Grumps, but of this we are not quite so sure. We rather think, upon the whole, that he did.

Dick, too, let his thoughts run away in the direction of home. Sweet word! Those who have never left it cannot, by any effort of imagination, realise the full import of the word “home.” Dick was a bold hunter, but he was young, and this was his first long expedition. Oftentimes, when sleeping under the trees and gazing dreamily up through the branches at the stars, had he thought of home, until his longing heart began to yearn to return. He repelled such tender feelings, however, when they became too strong, deeming them unmanly, and sought to turn his mind to the excitements of the chase, but latterly his efforts were in vain. He became thoroughly home-sick, and, while admitting the fact to himself, he endeavoured to conceal it from his comrades. He thought that he was successful in this attempt. Poor Dick Varley! as yet he was sadly ignorant of human nature. Henri knew it, and Joe Blunt knew it. Even Crusoe knew that something was wrong with his master, although he could not exactly make out what it was. But Crusoe made memoranda in the note-book of his memory. He jotted down the peculiar phases of his master’s new disease with the care and minute exactness of a physician; and, we doubt not, ultimately added the knowledge of the symptoms of homesickness to his already well-filled stores of erudition.

It was not till they had set out on their homeward journey that Dick Varley’s spirits revived, and it was not till they reached the beautiful prairies on the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains, and galloped over the green sward towards the Mustang Valley, that Dick ventured to tell Joe Blunt what his feelings had been.

“D’ye know, Joe,” he said confidentially, reining up his gallant steed after a sharp gallop, “d’ye know I’ve bin feelin’ awful low for some time past.”

“I know it, lad,” answered Joe, with a quiet smile, in which there was a dash of something that implied he knew more than he chose to express.

Dick felt surprised, but he continued, “I wonder what it could have bin. I never felt so before.”

“’Twas homesickness, boy,” returned Joe.

“How d’ye know that?”

“The same way as how I know most things, by experience an’ obsarvation. I’ve bin home-sick myself once—but it was long, long agone.”

Dick felt much relieved at this candid confession by such a bronzed veteran, and, the chords of sympathy having been struck, he opened up his heart at once, to the evident delight of Henri, who, among other curious partialities, was extremely fond of listening to and taking part in conversations that bordered on the metaphysical, and were hard to be understood. Most conversations that were not connected with eating and hunting were of this nature to Henri.

“Hom’-sik,” he cried, “veech mean bein’ sik of hom’! hah! dat is fat I am always be, ven I goes hout on de expedition. Oui, vraiment.”

“I always packs up,” continued Joe, paying no attention to Henri’s remark,—“I always packs up an’ sots off for home when I gits home-sick; it’s the best cure, an’ when hunters are young like you, Dick, it’s the only cure. I’ve know’d fellers a’most die o’ homesickness, an’ I’m told they do go under altogether sometimes.”

“Go onder!” exclaimed Henri; “oui, I vas all but die myself ven I fust try to git away from hom’. If I have not git away, I not be here to-day.”

Henri’s idea of homesickness was so totally opposed to theirs, that his comrades only laughed, and refrained from attempting to set him right.

“The fust time I was took bad with it wos in a country somethin’ like that,” said Joe, pointing to the wide stretch of undulating prairie, dotted with clusters of trees and wandering streamlets, that lay before them; “I had bin out about two months, an wos makin’ a good thing of it, for game wos plenty, when I began to think somehow more than usual o’ home. My mother wos alive then.”

Joe’s voice sank to a deep, solemn tone as he said this, and for a few minutes he rode on in silence.

“Well, it grew worse and worse, I dreamed o’ home all night, an’ thought of it all day, till I began to shoot bad, an’ my comrades wos gittin’ tired o’ me; so says I to them one night, says I, ‘I give out, lads, I’ll make tracks for the settlement to-morrow.’ They tried to laugh me out of it at first, but it was no go, so I packed up, bid them good-day, an’ sot off alone on a trip o’ five hundred miles. The very first mile o’ the way back I began to mend, and before two days I wos all right again.”

Joe was interrupted at this point by the sudden appearance of a solitary horseman on the brow of an eminence not half a mile distant. The three friends instantly drove their pack-horses behind a clump of trees, but not in time to escape the vigilant eye of the Red-man, who uttered a loud shout, which brought up a band of his comrades at full gallop.

“Remember, Henri,” cried Joe Blunt, “our errand is one of peace.”

The caution was needed, for in the confusion of the moment Henri was making preparation to sell his life as dearly as possible. Before another word could be uttered, they were surrounded by a troop of about twenty yelling Blackfeet Indians. They were, fortunately, not a war-party, and, still more fortunately, they were peaceably disposed, and listened to the preliminary address of Joe Blunt with exemplary patience; after which the two parties encamped on the spot, the council-fire was lighted, and every preparation made for a long palaver.

We will not trouble the reader with the details of what was said on this occasion. The party of Indians was a small one, and no chief of any importance was attached to it. Suffice it to say that the pacific overtures made by Joe were well received, the trifling gifts made thereafter were still better received, and they separated with mutual expressions of good will.

Several other bands which were afterwards met with were equally friendly, and only one war-party was seen. Joe’s quick eye observed it in time to enable them to retire unseen behind the shelter of some trees, where they remained until the Indian warriors were out of sight.

The next party they met with, however, were more difficult to manage, and, unfortunately, blood was shed on both sides before our travellers escaped.

It was at the close of a beautiful day that a war-party of Blackfeet were seen riding along a ridge on the horizon. It chanced that the prairie at this place was almost destitute of trees or shrubs large enough to conceal the horses. By dashing down the grassy wave into the hollow between the two undulations, and dismounting, Joe hoped to elude the savages, so he gave the word,—but at the same moment a shout from the Indians told that they were discovered.

“Look sharp, lads, throw down the packs on the highest point of the ridge,” cried Joe, undoing the lashings, seizing one of the bales of goods, and hurrying to the top of the undulation with it; “we must keep them at arm’s length, boys—be alive. War-parties are not to be trusted.”

Dick and Henri seconded Joe’s efforts so ably, that in the course of two minutes the horses were unloaded, the packs piled in the form of a wall in front of a broken piece of ground, the horses picketted close beside them, and our three travellers peeping over the edge, with their rifles cocked, while the savages—about thirty in number—came sweeping down towards them.

“I’ll try to git them to palaver,” said Joe Blunt, “but keep yer eye on ’em, Dick, an’ if they behave ill, shoot the horse o’ the leadin’ chief. I’ll throw up my left hand as a signal. Mind, lad, don’t hit human flesh till my second signal is given, and see that Henri don’t draw till I git back to ye.”

So saying, Joe sprang lightly over the slight parapet of their little fortress, and ran swiftly out, unarmed, towards the Indians. In a few seconds he was close up with them, and in another moment was surrounded. At first the savages brandished their spears and rode round the solitary man, yelling like fiends, as if they wished to intimidate him; but as Joe stood like a statue, with his arms crossed, and a grave expression of contempt on his countenance, they quickly desisted, and, drawing near, asked him where he came from, and what he was doing there.

Joe’s story was soon told; but instead of replying, they began to shout vociferously, and evidently meant mischief.

“If the Blackfeet are afraid to speak to the Pale-face, he will go back to his braves,” said Joe, passing suddenly between two of the warriors and taking a few steps towards the camp.

Instantly every bow was bent, and it seemed as if our bold hunter were about to be pierced by a hundred arrows, when he turned round and cried:—

“The Blackfeet must not advance a single step. The first that moves his horse shall die. The second that moves himself shall die.”

To this the Blackfoot chief replied scornfully, “The Pale-face talks with a big mouth. We do not believe his words. The Snakes are liars, we will make no peace with them.”

While he was yet speaking, Joe threw up his hand; there was a loud report, and the noble horse of the savage chief lay struggling in death agony on the ground.

The use of the rifle, as we have before hinted, was little known at this period among the Indians of the far west, and many had never heard the dreaded report before, although all were aware, from hearsay, of its fatal power. The fall of the chief’s horse, therefore, quite paralysed them for a few moments, and they had not recovered from their surprise when a second report was heard, a bullet whistled past, and a second horse fell. At the same moment there was a loud explosion in the camp of the Pale-faces, a white cloud enveloped it, and from the midst of this a loud shriek was heard, as Dick, Henri, and Crusoe bounded over the packs with frantic gestures.

At this the gaping savages wheeled their steeds round, the dismounted horsemen sprang on behind two of their comrades, and the whole band dashed away over the plains as if they were chased by evil spirits.

Meanwhile Joe hastened towards his comrades in a state of great anxiety, for he knew at once that one of the powder-horns must have been accidentally blown up.

“No damage done, boys, I hope?” he cried on coming up.

“Damage!” cried Henri, holding his hands tight over his face. “Oh! oui, great damage—moche damage, me two eyes be blowed out of dere holes.”

“Not quite so bad as that, I hope,” said Dick, who was very slightly singed, and forgot his own hurts in