Sometimes coyotes and mountain wolves would molest us. The mountain wolf is about as large as a young calf, and at times they are very dangerous and blood-thirsty. At one time when my brother, C.W. Ryus, was with me and we were going into Fort Larned with a sick mule, five of those large and vicious mountain wolves suddenly appeared as we were driving along the road. They stood until we got within a hundred feet of them. I cracked my whip and we shot over their heads. They parted, three going on one side of the road and two on the other. They went a short distance and turned around and faced us. We thought we were in for a battle, and again we fired over their heads, and, greatly to our satisfaction and peace of mind, they fled. We were glad to be left alone and were willing to leave them unharmed. Had we used our guns to draw blood it is possible that they would have given chase and devoured us. We would not have been in the least alarmed had we advanced upon five Indians, for we would have invited them to join us and go to the station with us and get something to eat. Not so with the wolves, they might have exacted our bodies before they were satisfied with the repast. I was never afraid of Indians, so hardly ever took an escort. My greatest fear was that some white man would get frightened at the sight of the reds and kill one of their band, and I knew if that should happen we were in grave danger. I always tried to impress my passengers that to protect ourselves we must guard against the desire to shoot an Indian. Not knowing how to handle an Indian would work chaos among us. The Indians did not like the idea of the white race being afraid of them--the trains amassing themselves together seemed to mean to the Indian that they were preparing for battle against them, and that made them feel like "preparing for war in time of peace." At one time on my route I remember as we were passing Fort Dodge, Kansas, a fort on the Arkansas River, there was a caravan of wagons having trouble with the Indians. I had an escort of some ten or fifteen soldiers, but we passed through the fray with no trouble or hair-splitting excitement. CHAPTER II. The Nine Mile Ridge Massacre. During the coldest time in winter, in the month of January, 1863, nine freight wagons left Santa Fe, New Mexico, on their way East. A few miles before they reached the Nine Mile Ridge they encountered a band of almost famished Indians, who hailed with delight the freight wagons, thinking they could get some coffee and other provision. In this lonely part of the world, seventy-five miles from Fort Larned, Kansas, and a hundred and sixty-five miles from Fort Lyon, without even a settler between, it was uncomfortable to even an Indian to find himself without rations.