Oh, it is wonderful here, aunty dear, just paradise! Oh, if
you could only see it! everything so wild and lovely; such grand plains,
stretching such miles and miles and miles, all the most delicious velvety
sand and sage-brush, and rabbits as big as a dog, and such tall and
noble jackassful ears that that is what they name them by; and such
vast mountains, and so rugged and craggy and lofty, with cloud-shawls
wrapped around their shoulders, and looking so solemn and awful and
satisfied; and the charming Indians, oh, how you would dote on them,
aunty dear, and they would on you, too, and they would let you hold
their babies, the way they do me, and they are the fattest, and
brownest, and sweetest little things, and never cry, and wouldn’t
if they had pins sticking in them, which they haven’t, because
they are poor and can’t afford it; and the horses and mules and
cattle and dogs—hundreds and hundreds and hundreds, and not an
animal that you can’t do what you please with, except uncle Thomas,
but I don’t mind him, he’s lovely; and oh, if you
could hear the bugles: too—too—too-too—too—too,
and so on—perfectly beautiful! Do you recognize that one?
It’s the first toots of the reveille; it goes, dear me,
so early in the morning!—then I and every other soldier
on the whole place are up and out in a minute, except uncle Thomas,
who is most unaccountably lazy, I don’t know why, but I have talked
to him about it, and I reckon it will be better, now. He hasn’t
any faults much, and is charming and sweet, like Buffalo Bill, and Thunder-Bird,
and Mammy Dorcas, and Soldier Boy, and Shekels, and Potter, and Sour-Mash,
and—well, they’re all that, just angels, as you may
say.
The very first day I came, I don’t know how long ago it was,
Buffalo Bill took me on Soldier Boy to Thunder-Bird’s camp, not
the big one which is out on the plain, which is White Cloud’s,
he took me to that one next day, but this one is four or five
miles up in the hills and crags, where there is a great shut-in meadow,
full of Indian lodges and dogs and squaws and everything that is interesting,
and a brook of the clearest water running through it, with white pebbles
on the bottom and trees all along the banks cool and shady and good
to wade in, and as the sun goes down it is dimmish in there, but away
up against the sky you see the big peaks towering up and shining bright
and vivid in the sun, and sometimes an eagle sailing by them, not flapping
a wing, the same as if he was asleep; and young Indians and girls romping
and laughing and carrying on, around the spring and the pool, and not
much clothes on except the girls, and dogs fighting, and the squaws
busy at work, and the bucks busy resting, and the old men sitting in
a bunch smoking, and passing the pipe not to the left but to the right,
which means there’s been a row in the camp and they are settling
it if they can, and children playing just the same as any other
children, and little boys shooting at a mark with bows, and I cuffed
one of them because he hit a dog with a club that wasn’t doing
anything, and he resented it but before long he wished he hadn’t:
but this sentence is getting too long and I will start another.
Thunder-Bird put on his Sunday-best war outfit to let me see him, and
he was splendid to look at, with his face painted red and bright and
intense like a fire-coal and a valance of eagle feathers from the top
of his head all down his back, and he had his tomahawk, too, and his
pipe, which has a stem which is longer than my arm, and I never had
such a good time in an Indian camp in my life, and I learned a lot of
words of the language, and next day BB took me to the camp out on the
Plains, four miles, and I had another good time and got acquainted with
some more Indians and dogs; and the big chief, by the name of White
Cloud, gave me a pretty little bow and arrows and I gave him my red
sash-ribbon, and in four days I could shoot very well with it and beat
any white boy of my size at the post; and I have been to those camps
plenty of times since; and I have learned to ride, too, BB taught me,
and every day he practises me and praises me, and every time I do better
than ever he lets me have a scamper on Soldier Boy, and that’s
the last agony of pleasure! for he is the charmingest horse, and so
beautiful and shiny and black, and hasn’t another color on him
anywhere, except a white star in his forehead, not just an imitation
star, but a real one, with four points, shaped exactly like a star that’s
hand-made, and if you should cover him all up but his star you would
know him anywhere, even in Jerusalem or Australia, by that. And
I got acquainted with a good many of the Seventh Cavalry, and the dragoons,
and officers, and families, and horses, in the first few days, and some
more in the next few and the next few and the next few, and now I know
more soldiers and horses than you can think, no matter how hard you
try. I am keeping up my studies every now and then, but there
isn’t much time for it. I love you so! and I send you a
hug and a kiss.
CATHY.
P.S.—I belong to the Seventh Cavalry and Ninth Dragoons, I
am an officer, too, and do not have to work on account of not getting
any wages.
