night the lofty peak, the scene of the action, blazed with fire from the burning _ranchería_. Rain-clouds gathered in the sky, and, after hours of threatening, broke into a severe but brief shower about sunrise next morning (May 15). [Illustration: APACHE GIRL WITH TYPICAL DRESS.] The young woman was given a little hard bread and meat, enough to last two days, and allowed to go off, taking with her the elder of the boy captives. The others stayed with us and were kindly treated. They were given all the baked mescal they could eat and a sufficiency of bread and meat. The eldest busied herself with basting a skirt, but, like another Penelope, as fast as her work was done she ripped it up and began anew--apparently afraid that idleness would entail punishment. The younger girl sobbed convulsively, but her little brother, a handsome brat, gazed stolidly at the world through eyes as big as oysters and as black as jet. Later in the morning, after the fitful showers had turned into a blinding, soaking rain, the Apache scouts made for these young captives a little shelter of branches and a bed of boughs and dry grass. Pickets were thrown out to watch the country on all sides and seize upon any stray Chiricahua coming unsuspectingly within their reach. The rain continued with exasperating persistency all day. The night cleared off bitter cold and water froze in pails and kettles. The command moved out from this place, going to another and better location a few miles south-east. The first lofty ridge had been scaled, when we descried on the summit of a prominent knoll directly in our front a thin curl of smoke wreathing upwards. This was immediately answered by the scouts, who heaped up pine-cones and cedar branches, which, in a second after ignition, shot a bold, black, resinous signal above the tops of the loftiest pines.