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Show FORTY YEARS AMONG THE INDIANS. 253 that they had lost that, and did not know anything about them. I showed him one of our books, and informed him that it told about their old fathers. At this he got up and called to a lot of other Indians that were loafing around. Some thirty or forty soon gathered around me. I commenced and explained considerable to them. They were growing quite interested when the agent was seen approaching. They seemed to understand that my words were not for the agent's ears, and manifested as much by their remarks, so I changed the subject and said that the Mor-mons had also sent us to look for country to settle, as we were growing and wished new country ; that we would perhaps settle near them ; that we were friends to the red man and hoped the Apaches would be friendly with us. The agent had approached near enough to hear this talk. He stayed around, giving me no further chance to explain the Book of Mormon to them. He made some remarks to call their attention away from me. I could see plainly that he wished me to stop talking, so I told the Indians we would meet again sometime. I felt that I had made a little impression for good upon them. Sometime after this I had a good long talk with the Apaches, which I will give an account of in the proper place. We had a vague idea of the western portion of Chihuahua, where the Mormons are now settling, but could get no definite directions, as we met no one who seemed to know much about the country. So we con-cluded to continue on the main road to El Paso. Nothing of interest occurred on the way. All went well with us. We drove into Franklin, a small town on the Amer-ican side of the line, opposite El Paso. The main ques- |
