| OCR Text |
Show 222 TALES OF THE COLORADO PIONEERS. wash the soiled linen and cook for the following week. Quite frequently the Indians gathered around my camp, so that I could do nothing all day. They wallowed in the water-sources from which our supplies were obtained, and were generally Very filthy. My babe was teething and suffering from fever and ague, so that he required constant attention day and night. I was weak and feeble, having suffered all the time that I lived in Kansas with ague. My weight was only ninety pounds. "We arrived in Denver about the middle of June, and as our cattle were footsore we were obliged to camp there until the first day of July. Then we went up Clear Creek where the town of Golden was being established. A miner came down from the mountains from whom we inquired the way to Gregory diggings. Leaving me and my sick child in the 7x9 tent, that my hands had made, the men took a supply of provisions on their backs, a few blankets, and bidding me be good to myself, left on the morning of the glorious Fourth. How sadly I felt, none but God, in whom I then firmly trusted, knew. Twelve miles from a human soul save my babe. The only sound I heard was the lowing of the cattle, and they, poor things, seemed to feel the loneliness of our situation, and kept unusually quiet. Every morning and evening I had a ' round up' all to myself. There were no cow-boys for me to cut, slash and shoot, no disputing of brands or mavericks. Three long weary weeks I held the fort. At the expiration of that time they returned. On the twenty-sixth of July we again loaded the wagon and started into the mountains. The road was a mere trail; every few rods we were obliged to stop and widen it. Many times we unloaded the wagon, and by pushing it helped the |
