The Indians around Maxwell's ranch were mostly a lazy crowd because they had nothing to do. Maxwell fed them, gave them some work, gave the squaws considerable work--they wove blankets with a skill that cannot be surpassed by artists of today. Not only were these Indian women fine weavers, but they worked unceasingly on fine buckskin (they tanned their own hides), garments, beading them, embroidering them, working all kinds of profiles such as the profile of an Indian chief or brave, animals of all kinds were beaded or embroidered into the clothes they made for the chiefs of their tribes. These suits were often sold to foreigners to take east as a souvenir and they would sell them for the small sum of $200 to $300. Those Indian women would braid fine bridle reins of white, black and sorrel horse hair for their chiefs and for sale to the white men. The Indian squaws were always busy but liked to see a horse race as well as their superior--their chief. A squaw is an excellent mother. While she cannot be classed as indulgent she certainly desires to train her child to endure hardships if they are called upon to endure them. She trains the little papoose to take to the cold water, not for the cleansing qualities, but for the "hardiness" she thinks it gives him. [Illustration] CHAPTER XX. General Carleton Received Orders from Mr. Moore to Send Soldiers' Pay Envelopes to Him. In March of 1865 I made my last trip across the renowned Santa Fe Trail from Kansas City, Missouri, to Santa Fe, New Mexico. Somewhere on the route between Las Vegas, New Mexico, and Fort Union I met a Mr. Moore of the firm of Moore, Mitchel & Co. This firm owned a "sutler's store" at Tecolote, Fort Bliss and Fort Union. The store at Fort Union was the general supply station for the other named stores. The stock carried at the supply store amounted to something like $350,000 to $500,000. This stock consisted of general merchandise. It was to this store one went to buy coffee, sugar, soda, tobacco and bacon, calico, domestic, linsey, jeans, leather and gingham, officers' clothing, tin buckets, wooden tubs, coffee pots, iron "skillets-and leds," iron ovens, crowbars, shovels, plows, and harness. To this store the settlers came to buy molasses, quinine, oil and turpentine, vermillion and indigo blue. Everything used was kept in this one store. During those times there were no drug stores, shoes stores, dry goods stores, etc., but everything was combined in one large store. Calico was sold for $1 per yard, common bleached muslin sold for $2 a yard, domestic was from $1 to $1.50 and $2 per yard. Sugar sold for 75 cents to $1 per pound. Coffee brought about the same. Tobacco and cheap pipes brought stunning prices.