"Some people criticized Colonel Chivington very bitterly, declaring that this warfare was brutal and uncivilized, but the people of Denver gave him a gold mounted rifle as a token of their good will. The Chief and three or four others escaped in the night with Mrs. Eubanks and they were caught later and strung up. The queerest thing about the hanging was that the Colonel of the troops who caught the Chiefs telegraphed to General Connor, in command of the department, that he had the devils in chains. General Connor replied, 'Then hang them in chains,' and it was done mighty quick. In a little time the Colonel received another message from General Connor, instructing him to bring the scoundrels to Julesburg, because he had decided to give them a trial. The Colonel telegraphed back to the effect that he 'obeyed his first message before he received the second.'" When Tom had finished this recital, the camp fires had nearly all gone out on the shore of the river, and the bright moon was lighting up the southern slopes of the Sweetwater Mountains. Through the stillness of the night was heard the occasional bark of a few coyotes and its echo reflected from the adjacent mountain-side. Our party separated and slowly wandered along the river to their respective camps. The manner in which Cody wrested from Comstock the sobriquet Buffalo Bill, has been explained in another chapter. CHAPTER XX A SPECTACULAR BUFFALO CHASE Except perhaps a sudden view of the blue waters of the broad ocean, few things in nature are more inspiring to the pilgrim who has plodded his way across our barren plains than is the first glimpse of some towering peaks of the Rocky Mountains. Riding my horse in advance of the train, which on an exceedingly hot July day was toiling up a long and difficult sandy grade, I reached a flat summit from which there suddenly and unexpectedly burst upon my view the entire panorama of the lofty peaks of the Wind River range, from Fremont Peak to South Pass. They were "crowned with a diadem of snow," but were not "in a robe of clouds," for not a speck of mist was visible in any direction. The mountains in all their detail stood out against the blue sky with wonderful clearness and it seemed as if they were not ten miles away. I may have been unduly excited, but in calling to those below me, who were next in advance, I shouted that the snow mountains were in sight. One after another of the party soon arrived at the summit, and being considerably heated after the climb they had made under the sharp rays of the sun, some of the men insisted that the brilliant white on the distant peaks was not snow. As one driver put it, "Do you think I'm a fool, to think that snow wouldn't melt in hot weather like this?" This man from the prairie did not appreciate the towering height of those far away peaks. On the following morning we were informed that they were still thirty miles away, and