Kit Carson became noted as a fearless hunter, trapper, miner, stockman, farmer, scout, guide, Indian fighter, Indian pacificator, treaty maker, Indian agent--all culminating in his Brigadier-generalship in the Civil War. In every capacity, he was faithful, persevering, energetic and capable. He learned the languages of the different tribes with painstaking study. He grew to understand the Indians as individuals, their ways, and their thoughts; he became their advisor and counselor, settled differences between tribes, and between the tribes and the Government; was the Government's advisor in treaty making, and was the first man to urge the attempt to domesticate the Indians. He knew the Spanish language as well as the Mexican and Indian patois; and he aided the Government in the solution of its troubles with the Indians as well as with the Mexicans and Spaniards. His influence for good stretched across a country, beginning with the Missouri River on the East and ending where the restless waves of civilization listened to the beating of the surges on the shores of the Pacific. He was a Lincoln sort of man with malice toward none. He had few enemies, and many friends. He was for peace, when peace was possible, but how he could fight when nothing else would do! Abbott, who does not realize that the towering peaks, the murmuring streams and the boundless plains, develop high ideals through the silent language that is all their own, says of Carson, "It is strange that the wilderness could have formed so estimable a character." In Christopher Carson I see a serious man, modest and retiring, soft spoken, with quiet manners, medium in height, blue eyes and broad shouldered. I see a priestly looking man, with thoughtful mien, with face clean shaven; high, broad forehead, with receding hair flowing toward his shoulders, long and wavy; thin, firmly compressed lips; in all, very like the strong, splendid face of the world-famed artist, Liszt. I see a domestic man, adoring his amiable Spanish wife. I see him lying on his buffalo robe, with his children playing over him, and hunting the sugar lumps out of pockets that were never empty. I see him standing, gazing into the eyes of the Indian whose hand he clasps, vieing with each other in erectness, while at their feet lie the idle guns and cartridges, the broken bows and arrows, and the pruning hooks into which their swords have been beaten. I see him dying, two score and three years ago, with his honest homely face illuminated, as he smiles his "adios" to all about him and sinks gently into his last, long, dreamless sleep. _Richens Wooten._ [Sidenote: 1838]