The Delahoydes : boy life on the Old Santa Fé trail

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ASTOP. LrrsOX AND TILO V r'- ^ :: :<:

THE

Chapter I

Ancestry of the Boys. — Their Home on the Arkansas River. — Animals and Birds of the Region. — Early Education of Carlos and Pierre. — Their Amusements. — Interior of their Dwelling, 9

Chapter II

The Boys' Duties on the Ranch. — Their Love for Animals.— Their Pets.— Failure to Tame the Lynx.— Their Dogs.— Rabbit and Hare Chasing.— Fighting Lynxes at Night.— Capture of a Young Elk.— Fate of '* Tom."— Catching Antelope Fawns. — An Intelligent Hound. — How the Boys Dressed, 16

Chapter III

Camping Out. — Their Equipage. — Their Campfire. — Shoot Blue-winged Teal. — Description of these Birds. — Catch a Jack-Rabbit for the Dogs.— Carlos Goes Fishing.— Adventure with a Bear.— Kill a Cub. — Pierre Rescues His Brother. — Sounds of the Night.— Shoot a AVild Turkey. — Manner of Cooking. — Arrival of their Father.— Return Home, .... SI

CHAPTER lY.

The Young Bostonians Meet Carlos and Pierre.— Dinner in the Indian Traders' Camp.— Talk about Wild Turkeys.— The Sandhill Cranes and their Antics.— In the Museum at the Dugout.— The Pet Bear, '' Ephraim."— Supper ai /re.sco. — The Big Spring.— Moles and their Habits, 56

Contents

CHAPTER Y.

Poisoning Wolves. — Bathing in the Big Spring. — Fishing with a Trot-line. — Burton's Curious Catch. — The Garpike.— Prairie Grouse. — Otter, and their Habits. — Hook a Soft-shell Turtle. — Talk about Animals around the Campfire.— Story of the Five Skunks, 77

CHAPTER VI.

Chapter I

ANCESTRY OF THE BOYS. THEIR HOME ON THE ARKAN- SAS RIVER. ANIMALS AND BIRDS OF THE REGION.

EARLY EDUCATION OF CARLOS AND PIERRE. THEIR

AMUSEMENTS. INTERIOR OF THEIR DWELLING.

PIERRE DELAHOYDE wri an old-time French- Canadian. U'ai?pejV' who haV} heAn an employe of the America)! Eur Company' as early as 1820. He died at the rij^e age of ninety-three, at his home on the North Platte, Wyoming, in 1B65. As was the custom of men , of his vocation, he mo.i'ried a squaw, a Cheyenne,^ and, had one son, also ,iia)jji'ed Pierre.

The younger.J^i^pi'e^ Delahoyde,\m'3bf'nt', when about fifteen years olcl, to schoof at l?lt>, .LVViiii^, as his father did not want to subject his only/bpy"to all the demoralizing influences incident to the life of a trapper, and he remained away from his home until he was twenty-three, after having been graduated with honors by the University of Missouri.

1 Trappers were men who in the days before the settlement of the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains were employed by the fur companies, to live out in those wild regions and catch the beaver, mink, and other animals valuable for their skins.

2 The Cheyenne tribe of Indians take their name from the French word chien, meaning dog.

3 Pierre, from petrus^ Latin, meaning a piece of stone ; and is French for Peter.

Pierre, however, having an instinctively unconquerable love for the wild life of the mountains and plains, inherited from his father, and the natural savage tastes of his Indian mother, chose to be a trapi)er, too, in which vocation he continued until 1866, when the advent of the railroads into the interior of the continent, and its incident rush of immigration, virtually ended the traffic forever.

In 1850 he squatted on a piece of land bordering the Arkansas river, near the mouth of the Walnut, a short distance from where the historip Santa Fe trail crossed that stream. -^ ' ,, % ; \ ,f , r;

He had married/ the. dau-ghtfef c,b|<'Q'arlo3 Beaubien, another old-tim'(?'<trapper and boon companion of his father, and, had two boys to whom were given the ancestral names gf their grandfathers.

He lived jn a;^rimitive dugout near' the bank of the stream, and. ilip^rce' , his children w^re/born. It was merely an excaviit,i(>n/in the bluff ,, walled up on the inside with stone^ /t.5;i6*'i"O0f formed of saplings placed close together, over which about three feet of grass was lain, the whole covered with dirt, a layer of sod and rocks. It had three doors but no windows, the light from the entrances being deemed as sufficient; while the floor was the natural earth, pounded to a hardness as compact as that of the toughest wood.

No rain ever Altered through the thick roof, and it was as dry as the best of shingles could have made it.

There were five rooms in the dugout, one of which

THEIR HOME ON THE ARKANSAS RIVER 11

was called " the museum," and claimed solely by Pierre and Carlos, for their collection of objects in natural history, — of which farther on.

The furniture was of the rudest character. The beds were formed of the crotches of small saplings, driven in the ground, in which were placed short pieces the same width of the bed, over which poles were laid lengthways, and the mattresses composed of seven buffalo robes each, their coverings also buffalo robes, and the pillows flour-sacks stuffed with prairie-grass. There were three or four chairs, fashioned by the old traj^per of the natural wood, and which in an Eastern home would be considered rather artistic, rustic affairs, such as are often to be seen on the lawns of country gentlemen's homes. The only table was also a crude thing, made of slabs from the tree, smoothed with an axe.

The fireplace was a huge one, built of stone, the chimney above leading out of the roof, formed of sticks laid crosswise after the manner that children build their corncob houses in the country, and the interstices chinked with mud. There was an abundance of timber in the region at that early day on the Walnut, and it would have required much less labor to construct a cabin ; but a dugout is cooler in summer and warmer in winter, hence the character of their dwelling was purely a matter of choice.

So remote from the nearest settlements was this ranch on the Walnut, that it was impossible to procure any furniture less than hundreds of miles distant ; so

12 THE DELAHOYDE8

the primitiveness of the appointments of their home was not from lack of means on the part of the trapper, or indisposition to have it, but due to the difficulty in procuring it. Rude as everything was, their home was kept scrupulously clean, for Mrs. Delahoyde had been reared in a semi-cultured family in one of the large towns in New Mexico.

As the era of trapping had closed about sixteen years after Mr. Delahoyde took up his claim, he engaged in the stock business, which was just then developing all over the "Far West."

The site selected for his home was a perfect wilderness of beauty. The silent river which flowed rhythmically a few yards from the crudely picturesque home, and the gentle soughing of the breeze in the forest which surrounded and overshadowed it, were a soothing lullaby, which only those can appreciate who have tasted the solitude of Nature in all her charm of isolation from the conventionalities of a busy civilization, an absolute immunity from all the disturbing elements which characterize the features of a great city.

The whole region was a veritable hunter's paradise. The deep woods which fringed the river on both banks for many miles, was the home of the Lynx, or wildcat as it is commonly called, — though in fact there are no wildcats on the American continent ; all so-called wildcats are lynxes. The lynx has a short tail a little longer than its head, while the wildcat's tail is as long as his body. Another difference between the two ani-

ANIMALS AND BIEDS OF THE REGION 18

mals is that the ears of the lynx are tufted, while those of the wildcat are not ; and the lynx also lacks the precanine molar which is found in the teeth of the wildcat. On the open prairie beyond the timber, vast herds

of buffalo and antelope roamed, and the wolves were found in great numbers all along the stream for miles, where their dens were made in the rocky, precipitous bluffs bordering it.

The different varieties — the white, the gray, the brindle, and their despicable congener the coyote, the latter a thorough vagabond, outcast and Ishmaelite^ of the Plains — were almost as innumerable as the cottontails and the jack-rabbits.

It is not generally known, perhaps, that with the exception of an obliquity in the position of the eyes, and a variation in the matter of ears, there is little anatomical difference between the wolf family and the dog. The ears of the wild animal are always pricked, the lopped or drooping ear being essentially a mark of civilization.

In the era of which I write, through the geographical region described, where there were no restraining influences, the mountain wolves and the gray wolves of the prairie joined forces and hunted in packs, and were then seen at their greatest and bravest, fairly exceeding all other animals in shrewdness.

^ Ishmaelite, a term taken from the Bible: one resembling Ishmael, whose hand was against every man and every man's hand against him ; one at war against society. Hence the coyote is called the Ishmaelite of the Plains, because he is "against" every other animal, and they against him.

In the spriDgtime great squadrons of cranes sailed high in the air, and the eagle, our national bird, built his nest far up on the limbs of the dead cottonwood and elm trees. The river and its branches abounded in fish, principally cat and buffalo, together with little sun -perch, and that most ancient of all fish, whose ancestry dates back to the Devonian period,^ the garpike,^ a non-edible species. The catfish sometimes weighed sixty or seventy pounds, and when one of these great fellows was hooked, it required all the strength of the boys to land it.

Pierre and Carlos, as soon as they were old enough to handle a rifle, were carefully taught by their father how to use it, so that when ten years of age they became experts and could hit anything within range, though it were only a bird as small as a wren. Well educated himself, as has been stated, the devoted father became the tutor of his sons, setting apart a portion of the morning and evening of each day to their education. They could both read and write well, had a fair knowledge of the history and geography of their country, as well as that of foreign nations, and were prob-

1 The Devonian period is one of the great divisions, geologically speaking, of the earth's strata, next to the oldest of all. Rocks of the Devonian period occur "Widely in the United States, as well as in Europe. They abound in fossil plants and animals, including fishes of many varieties, one of the largest of which was probably fifteen feet long, and according to the opinion of geologists could have easily taken oflf a man's head at a bite. They were, in fact, armor-clad like the garpike, from which the latter common fish has descended. The latter has degenerated, being much smaller than its remote ancestor.

2 The garpike is a fish belonging to the genus of pikes, with a very long snout, the under jaw much shorter than the upper. Its scales are hard and knobby.

• THEIR AMUSEMENTS 15

ably better educated than the average American boy born and reared on the extreme Western frontier.

As is generally the case, boys reared remote from the confines of civilization necessarily hold closer communion with the visible forms of nature than do those of the great cities. To this rule Carlos and Pierre formed no exception ; or rather, in them it was developed beyond the ordinary. Baseball, billiards, marbles, kiteflying and other amusements incident to civilization were as unknown a quantity to the little trappers, as is the X in algebra. Having no neighbors nearer than a hundred miles, excepting the rough crowd at the staga stations, they were thrown upon their own resources for amusements, and their talents were directed to the study of the various animals and birds whose habitat was in the region where their home was located. They observed and studied all the animals, and not even the reptiles failed to escape their attention. In a few years they collected such a large number of pets that they alone would have constituted a small menagerie. Their father's knowledge of the fur-bearing animals was very extensive, because of his life-long vocation in that direction; and as he loved his boys, and was a most indulgent father, he took great pains to train their young minds to the study of animate nature, in which he himself was so well versed.

Chapter II

THE BOYS DUTIES ON THE RANCH. THEIR LOVE FOR ANI- MALS.— THEIR PETS. FAILURE TO TAME THE LYNX.

THEIR DOGS. — RABBIT AND HARE CHASING. FIGHTING

LYNXES AT NIGHT. CAPTURE OF A YOUNG ELK. FATE

OF " TOM. "—CATCHING ANTELOPE FAWNS. — AN INTEL- LIGENT HOUND. HOW THE BOYS DRESSED.

THE absolute work which Pierre and Carlos were required to perform on their remote ranch was very light; in fact, it was so little laborious that it seemed like mere play. It consisted solely of herding the relatively small number of cattle their father possessed, which duty was always performed on horseback, as each of the boys owned three of the hardy little Indian ponies. They met with many adventures while herding, and had such unusual opportunities for observing the habits of the many wild animals and great variety of birds with which they became acquainted during their life on the ranch, that nearly all their hours of sunshine were filled with amusement, rather than with what could strictly be called labor. The only thing that approached it was the cultivation of a small garden-strip along the margin of one of the creeks near home, where the soil was exceedingly rich,

THEIR LOVE FOR ANIMALS 17

and which was irrigated ^ by a spring flowing out of the wall of rock forming the canon through which the stream ran. There was no attempt made at farming on a large scale, as climatic conditions X3recluded its possibility, excepting under a complicated system of irrigation, which for that then remote region was something very far in the future.

With an abundance of leisure on their hands, and virtually having no neighbors, the boys were thrown upon their own resources for amusement, and their efforts in quest of it were directed to the study of natural history.

Pierre and Carlos had a variety of living pets, — as what boy on the frontier does not ? Among these were a coyote, an antelope, several prairie-dogs, a bear, an elk, some moles, and even a rattlesnake. They had made several attempts to tame young lynxes, but had to give it up as a failure ; so they were compelled to kill the quarrelsome brutes, as all the kindness bestowed upon them w^as fruitless of beneficial results, and they were mounted and placed in the museum, with other animals and birds the boys had captured for that purpose.

Of course both Pierre and Carlos owned dogs, several of them, — for what would a young boy's life

1 Irrigation. — In the early days of watering by artificial methods, simple little ditches were constructed, often with only a common hoe, through which the water flowed to the garden-patches. Irrigation on a large, complicated scale, requires the construction of expensive ditches, miles long, the water being directed into them from some river, like that of the Arkansas, in western Kansas, or the erection of pumping stations ; these enterprises sometimes costing a million dollars, and being controlled by a company.

be worth on a ranch without his most faithful friend and companion, even though the animal should be the meanest of mongrels ? Most of those belonging to them, however, were hounds, — some of rare, large breed, great shaggy-haired fellows that hunted by scent alone, and were a match, singly, for the biggest and most ferocious of wolves. Many times they had been engaged in hard-fought battles with them, and when not outnumbered, had invariably been Ihe victors. The boys also possessed four common greyhounds, noted for their swiftness, but which hunted by sight only.

The country was filled with hares, or jack-rabbits, as they are called, and the little cottontails, — the genuine rabbit. One of the distinguishing characteristics between the species is, that the hare makes his lair^ on top of the ground, generally in some thick mat of grass, while the rabbit-warrens are burrows underneath the surface, or in holes in the ledges of rock.

The boys had rare sport at all seasons, mounted on their ponies and following the greyhounds after the swift little animals, and the dogs were so perfectly trained that when the}- caught sight of one it rarely escaped : stewed or broiled rabbit was quite a prominent factor in the family larder.

The hounds were broken to chase the hare or cottontail in the following manner :

The dog which first sighted one went directly after him, the others keeping in the rear of the leader, but

^Liir, an Anglo-Saxon word meaning, literally, a couch; hence, the resting-place of any wild beast,

FIGHTING LYNXES AT NIGHT 19

si^read out at intervals of ten or twenty feet, keeping their eyes on their quarry, watching closely when he bolted sideways or suddenly doubled on his tracks, and then the nearest hound, having plenty of room to turn himself, would take up the chase. Then the first hound, whose impetus had sent him far ahead in a straight line the way he was going, would drop behind, and take his place in the rear, watching for his chance to run ahead when the rabbit turned again. Sometimes the little animal succeeded in getting no farther away from where he was flushed than twenty or thirty yards, when the hound that was directly after him would get close enough to shove his long nose under him, toss him in the air, catch him in his strong jaws as he came down, — and instantly that rabbit was dead I

Often at night — as the lynx is a nocturnal prowler — Pierre and Carlos would sally out from the dugout accompanied by their large hounds, and have many an hour's rare sport watching them tussle with the plucky beasts. The lynx was easily tracked to where he was prowling, for it has a cry strangely similar to that of a child, which betrays its whereabouts. The animal is no coward, and will fight to a finish, especially when cornered, and then lie makes the fur fly as he stands at bay, and the hoands " go f or " him. The dogs rarely came out of the battle unscathed, as many a long and deep scratch on their bodies, which they carried all their lives, indicated.

Although the boys possessed a great number of pets.

they had not been obtained without many a spirited adventure, attended sometimes with real danger.

One afternoon while Carlos was returning home with the herd of cattle he had been tending, as he reached the edge of the timber he saw a young elk had strayed from the side of its mother; so he determined to attempt its capture, failing in which, he intended to kill it for meat, as he always had his rifle with him. He was an adept at throwing the lasso, however, which was always attached to the horn of his saddle, ready for any emergency ; so, swinging his rope over his head as the fawn ran, he started for the beautiful little animal. Throwing it swiftly, it caught the creature around the neck and brought him to a sudden standstill. So abruptly was the frightened beast stopped, as Carlos 's pony braced his fore feet when he felt the lasso drawn tight, as he was trained to do, the elk was thrown sprawling on its side. The moment Carlos loosened the lasso so as not to strangle the animal, the latter sprang quickly to his feet, and, bristling with fight, made a rush for the pony. The hair on his neck was all turned the wrong way, just as the dog's is when he is going to have a tussle with another of his species, and it was with great diflficulty that Carlos could control the little fellow until he hobbled his fore feet and subdued his fiery nature.

Fortunately, the place where the new pet was captured happened to be but a quarter of a mile from the dugout; so, tying his prize to a tree, Carlos jumped on

CAPTUEE OF A YOUNG ELK 21

his pony again, and thumping its sides vigorously with both heels, he fairly flew down the trail toward home. Arriving there full of excitement, he told Pierre of his great fortune in lassoing an elk, upon which Pierre jumped on his pony, which was already saddled, and both boys hurried back to the spot where Carlos had left the animal. Reaching there in a few moments, they found the young elk safe and unhurt, although it was evident he had made desperate efforts to free himself, as the earth all around the tree to which he had been fastened was cut up by his sharp hoofs as if it had been dug with a spade.

Getting their valuable capture safely home, the boys were soon at work building a corral for the pet, from saplings, large enough for him to have sufficient exercise but high enough to prevent his jumping out, at which he made several abortive attempts, the moment he was placed in the inclosure. This was intended as a temporary structure only, as the boys, knowing well the nature of elk, were satisfied that as soon as he was tamed he would follow them around like a dog, and becoming accustomed to his surroundings would feel perfectly contented and not stray away.

Fortunately for the boys, the elk had been weaned, so all they had to do was to cut the tender grass and feed the little animal, which in less than ten days had become so attached to its young masters that, as they had predicted, it was apparently never perfectly contented when out of their sight.

The elk grew to be an immense fellow, and grazed around the dugout in company with the cows.

The boys named him "Tom," and his neck was fitted with a broad collar of red flannel, wrought with beads in the highest style of Indian art by their mother, and to the collar was attached a small bell.

The milk cows, numbering half a dozen, never roamed far from home ; they took a strange fancy to Tom, and would follow him everywhere. The tinkle of that bell seemed to infatuate them as does the bellmare of a train of pack-mules. Tom always led them to the best pasturage, or where the choicest browsing was to be found, as he instinctively seemed to know just at what time the different varieties of grasses on the prairie, and the shrubs in the great woods, were at their best. The boys were never at a loss to know where the cows were, or how far off, being ever guided by the "tintinnabulation" of that never-silent bell, as its sound was wafted through the pure atmosphere, — rarely any other noise disturbing it, excepting in the summer-time by the monotonous droning of innumerable insects, or in winter by the occasional howling of a wolf.

Tom's fate was a sad one. Going out together after the cows one evening about sundown, as was their custom, the boys noticed with surprise the absence of that familiar tinkle of the bell on the elk's neck, and soon coming up to the animals, which were in one of their favorite haunts at that time of year ( it was early in

FATE OF " TOM " 23

the spring), they saw at once that Tom was not with them. The cows appeared mieasy, and commenced to low the moment Pierre and Carlos came in sight, as if they wished to indicate to them that their companion was gone.

Both Carlos and Pierre were dumbfounded. At first they were at a loss what to do, or which way to turn. They knew that there were no wild beasts in the region excepting the wolves, large enough to kill their pet, and as these animals generally go on their predatory 3xcursions in the night, it was not at all probable that they had killed and devoured him; besides, some signs svould have been visible if such had been the case. The hide, or at least pieces of it, would have been left, and it would have been impossible for the wolves to devour Tom's antlers, which were now large, as he was fully two years old.

The boys looked at each other in mute astonishment for a few moments, when Pierre suggested to Carlos that he drive the cows home, while he wandered around through the woods to find out what had become of Tom .

Pierre was a natural trailer, having studied the art so well that he could tell by the pressure upon a leaf or the grass what animal had trodden upon it, and in which direction it was going.

Pierre stood for a few minutes until Carlos with the cows was out of sight, then commenced to hunt around for tracks of the elk, as he wandered forward and backward over the ground where the animals had been feeding, and was rewarded at last by discovering the hoof -prints of his pet leading toward the river. He followed them very intently, now knowing well he could track the elk to where it was. After walking slowly for about a mile and a half, he saw ahead of him, partly hidden in a patch of timber, a steep precipice formed by the bluffs, at the foot of which the river flowed. He walked to its edge, looked over, and to his great grief and astonishment saw the body of poor Tom lying upon the cruel rocks below. It required only one look, as he recognized the red collar with its bell attached, to satisfy him that, alasl poor Tom was dead !

Almost overpowered by his feelings, Pierre scrambled down to the river bank ; and it must be confessed the boy shed a few tears, as he laid his hands upon the cold body of Tom. Then, philosopher as he really was, he began to theorize as to the cause of the animal's death. It required but very little observation tc determine the fact that the elk had incautiously aj)- proached too near the precipice, and probably in stepping upon the loose stones which were scattered around, had tumbled over, and the fall had broken his neck.

Pierre slowly retraced his steps to the cabin, and when he told the fate of poor Tom there was genuine grief in the little family, for the old folks as well as the boys were sincerely attached to the elk.

During the two years the boys had lived on the ranch they had made many attempts to catch a young ante-

CATCHING ANTELOPE FAWNS 25

lope, but had signally failed. One morning in May, while Pierre was out on the prairie about five miles from the dugout herding the cattle, he saw in the distance a herd of about a hundred, with lots of the coveted little animals among them. They were quietly feeding, and as the family had been out of fresh meat for three or four days, Pierre thought that here was an opportunity to replenish their larder and capture one or two fawns. He called Cyrus, one of the most intelligent hounds, a dog that he claimed for his very own, which always went hunting with him, and which he had taught a series of tricks. Taking a piece of paper out of his pocket, he wrote a few words upon it, and tying it to the dog's neck, he ordered him to take it home. The intelligent animal promptly obeyed, and started on the run for the dugout; arriving there in less than a quarter of an hour, he immediately hunted up Carlos, who was working in the little garden-patch. Noticing the note fastened to the dog, Carlos took it off and read it. It said :

"Carl, there 's a big herd of antelope about a half-mile from me, and lots of little ones with it. You better come out as quickly as possible with your rifle, and let 's try and get some. I cannot leave the cattle unless Cyrus is here; he '11 guide you to where I am. Come at once. Pierre."

Carlos, boy-like, dropped his hoe just where he was at work, hurriedly got his pony, which was picketed near the cabin, saddled him, and slipping the bridle-reins over the animal's head, led him up to the door, gave them to Cyrus to hold, while he went in for his rifle, buckled a belt of cartridges around his waist, came out in another' moment, mounted the pony, and started to where his brother was, following the hound, which led out on his own trail beautifully. He arrived where Pierre was waiting for him, in about twenty minutes,— for Cyrus was somewhat tired, and had occupied a little longer time than he had in going home. Carlos plainly saw the antelox:)e which his brother pointed out to him, still grazing peacefully, unconscious of danger; but they had gradually worked nearer to where the cattle were, than when Pierre first observed them.

Both of the boys knew very well how instinctively curious the antelope is, and feeling satisfied that the herd of cattle had attracted their attention, both got off their ponies, and putting the loops of their bridle-reins into the dog's mouth, ordered him to remain where he was and watch. They then took their rifles and crawled into a big patch of bunch-grass about three hundred yards away, which concealed them completely. They knew very well that if they patiently waited, the ordinarily timid animals, attracted by the strange appearance of the cattle, would aj^proach near enough for them to get a shot, and if they happened to kill a doe with a young one at her side, it would not leave its mother and they could easily capture it.