“Your modest men are always cowards. They don’t say anything, because they are afraid.” “It’s plain you don’t know Kit Carson. He told me that when he was fifteen years old his father ’prenticed him to a harness-maker. That was a good trade, but such a quick, nimble fellow as Kit couldn’t work at it very long. He did stay his full two years, though, and learned the trade, but when his time was out he decided that he would become a trapper. That was what he had always wanted to be. He told me that when he was a little fellow one of the trappers that had come in with his skins let him pull the trigger of his gun. That was the first time Kit had ever fired a rifle, but he wanted to keep at it, he liked it so well, and pretty soon he not only learned to shoot, but he became the best shot in the neighbourhood. The Indians all liked him and they told him a great many things about the woods and the animals that live there. You see, when his father first went into Howard County all the settlers had to live in a log fort for a while, that had guards on the lookout for the Indians day and night. That was a part of Kit’s work when he was a little chap. He got so that he knew the war-whoops of every tribe and almost every redskin. My father used to say that if Kit Carson did so well in his harness-making, which he didn’t like, he wondered what he would do when he found some work that he enjoyed.” “Did he go to trapping right away?” “He was on the lookout all the time, and pretty soon he went to the leader of a party that was going to start for Santa Fé. You see, then there were no trails marked out over the plains. That was a good while ago—in 1826.” “And I wish there wasn’t any now,” suggested Rat. “In those days they tried to hide the trails, and now they try to make ’em plain. The redskins know every time a party starts with their traps, and wherever you find game you find Indians there, too.” “Yes. Kit Carson told me some stories of how parties of Indians surrounded the trappers or traders and took their guns and horses away from them and either tomahawked the men or left them to starve. But every man in Kit Carson’s party was well armed, had a good horse, and was up to all the tricks of the Indians. I have seen them start out, every man wearing a deerskin suit, and some of the men all dressed up with bead embroidery, and the fringes of their shirts dyed half a dozen different colours. They had pack mules to carry the traps, and when they all started they marched in Indian fashion, single file. They took turns in going ahead, for the ones that went first had to break the way for the others. Then, there was a bugler at the head of the line. If any of the men strayed away while they were hunting, the bugle was to let them know where the main line was.” “That’s all very pretty,” said Rat. “I have heard a good many stories about Kit Carson, but I’m wonderin’ if he has any nerve.”