hunter, who was an old soldier and a favourite. He was brought in with an arrow still transfixing his breast, but his scalp was gone. On the fourteenth of October, we again marched on our return. Soon after, we saw smokes arise over the distant hills; evidently signals, indicating to different parties of Indians our separation and march, but whether preparatory to an attack upon the Mexicans or ourselves, or rather our immense drove of animals, we could only guess. Our march was constantly attended by great collections of buffalo, which seemed to have a general muster, perhaps for migration. Sometimes a hundred or two--a fragment from the multitude--would approach within two or three hundred yards of the column, and threaten a charge which would have proved disastrous to the mules and their drivers. Under the friendly cover of the shades of evening, on the eighth of November, our tatterdemalion veterans marched into Fort Leavenworth, and took quiet possession of the miserable huts and sheds left by the Third Infantry in the preceding May. CHAPTER VI. A ROMANTIC TRAGEDY. As early as November, 1842, a rumour was current in Santa Fe, and along the line of the Trail, that parties of Texans had left the Republic for the purpose of attacking and robbing the caravans to the United States which were owned wholly by Mexicans. In consequence of this, several Americans were accused of being spies and acting in collusion with the Texans; many were arrested and carried to Santa Fe, but nothing could be proved against them, and the rumours of the intended purposes of the Texans died out. Very early in May, however, of the following year, 1843, a certain Colonel Snively did organize a small force, comprising about two hundred men, which he led from Northern Texas, his home, to the line of the Trail, with the intention of attacking and robbing the Mexican caravans which were expected to cross the plains that month and in June. When he arrived at the Arkansas River, he was there reinforced by another Texan colonel, named Warfield with another small command. Gregg says: This officer, with about twenty men, had some time previously attacked the village of Mora, on the Mexican frontier, killing five men, and driving off a number of horses. They were afterward followed by a party of Mexicans, however, who stampeded and carried away, not only their own horses, but those of the Texans. Being left afoot, the latter burned their saddles, and walked to Bent's Fort, where they were disbanded; whence Warfield passed to Snively's camp, as before mentioned.