The night of Sept. 16th, before the attack next morning, Scout Culver, who was killed next day, pointed out to a few of us some torch-lights upon the hills that were being swung like signals. I knew that something “would be doing” soon, but, like a novice, I was as if on an anxious seat, under a strain of anticipation, expecting something strange and dangerous. The next thing that I now recall was that I was awakened just before daylight by a single cry, “Indians!” so loud and menacing that when I jumped up from the ground I was bewildered and felt as if I wanted to ward off a blow, coming from I knew not where, for it was still quite dark. That cry I will never forget. Soon I perceived a commotion among our horses and mules. The Indians, about a dozen, tried to stampede them. I could see in the dawning light the outlines of a white horse in the distance, and from the noise I realized that they were driving some of our stock before them. Later, in the daylight we could recognize some of our ponies on a neighboring hill in the possession of the Indians. As soon as we crossed from the north bank of the river to the island, just before the attack, we tied our horses and pack mules to shrubs as best we could. During the day a mule with a partial pack on his back got loose and wandered around the vicinity of my pit. He had several arrows sticking in his body and seemed wounded otherwise, which caused him to rear and pitch to such an extent that Jim Lane, my neighbor, and I, decided to kill him. After shooting him he fell and lay between us, and served us the double purpose of food and barricade. My horse was securely tethered to the underbrush on the island, and later that day I saw the poor beast rearing and plunging in a death struggle, having been shot and killed like the rest of our horses and mules. He also furnished me with several meals during the siege, even after he began to putrefy. There was little to choose between horse and mule meat under such circumstances—both were abominable. When day broke that Tuesday, the seventeenth of September, 1868, we saw our pickets riding toward camp as fast as their horses could carry them, excitedly yelling: “Indians! Indians!” As I looked up the valley toward the west I beheld the grandest, wildest sight—such as few mortals are permitted to see and live to tell about. Many hundreds of Indians in full war paraphernalia, riding their splendid war ponies, rushed toward us _en masse_. Some were galloping in one direction, others cantering in another, their lances topped with many-colored streamers, the fantastic Indian costumes lending an awful charm to the whole. About this time those among us who had any had boiled some coffee and were preparing to cross over to the island.