Early in the summer the grass is green, but later it is hay made naturally, root and branch dried on the ground--there is no sod--and this, though less agreeable, is more nutritious for the animals than fresh grass. A scattered growth of fine old trees furnishes shade at every camp, and immediately about the great tent they afford protection from the sun to parties of card players, or a "Grocery stand," at which the principal article of sale is "whiskey by the glass;" and perhaps, further on is a _monte_ table, parties from several Indian tribes, and the pioneer of semi-civilization--the back-woodsman--has come in "with his traps," a few bags of flour, and possibly some cheese and butter, and the never failing cask of whiskey. Perhaps his wagon is the grocery stand, to which we have just alluded. Without extenuation, these encampments were grand occasions of which a few descriptions may be found written at the time by men of science and intellectual culture, like Sir Wm. Stewart, who traveled upon these plains for pleasure, or the Rev. Samuel Parker, who happened at a Green River rendezvous, in 1835, while on his way to the Columbia River, under the auspices of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. This was long before Brigham Young came West--before his scheme of religious colonization had its birth. There is now--has been for years--a trading post where a Canadian Frenchman and an American partner, with Indian wives, have provided entertainment or furnished supplies to emigrants and Indians. It is near the Green River crossing, on the road from the South Pass to great Salt Lake City, via Fort Bridger. Amid the motley company it might be expected that quarrels would arise, and disorderly conduct, growing out of the feuds among the tribes of Indians. These were kept in abeyance as much as possible, and already Carson's popularity with them enabled him to act the part of peace-maker between them and the quarrelsome whites, as well as between each other, for many of them recognized him as the brave who had led excursions, whose success they had felt and suffered, and even though leader of victorious parties against themselves, they admired his prowess still; for the party of Blackfeet came to the rendezvous under the protection of the white flag, and for the time, no one more truly buried the hatchet than Carson, though just recovered from a wound given by a party of that tribe, which had nearly cost him his life, and of which we have written in a previous chapter. There was belonging to one of the trapping parties a Frenchman by the name of Shuman, known at the rendezvous as "the big bully of the mountains," exceedingly annoying on account of his boasts and taunts, a constant exciter of tumult and disorder, especially among the Indians. Bad enough at any time, with the means now for intoxication, he was even more dangerous.