Synopsis

CHASING A MAJOR-GENERAL The car had been side-tracked at Fort Keough, and on the following morning the porter shook me, and announced that it was five o‟clock. An hour later I stepped out on the rear platform, and observed that the sun would rise shortly, but that meanwhile the air was chill, and that the bald, square-topped hills of the “bad lands” cut rather hard against the gray of the morning. Presently a trooper galloped up with three led horses, which he tied to a stake. I inspected them, and saw that one had a “cow saddle,” which I recognized as an experiment suggested by the general. The animal bearing it had a threatening look, and I expected a repetition of a performance of a few days before, when I had chased the general for over three hours, making in all twenty-eight miles. Before accepting an invitation to accompany an Indian commission into the Northwest I had asked the general quietly if this was a “horseback” or a “wagon outfit.” He had assured me that he was not a “wagon man,” and I indeed had heard before that he was not. There is always a distinction in the army between wagon men and men who go without wagons by transporting their supplies on pack animals. ...