CHAPTER L

THE STAGE COACH

The stage coach is one among the most vivid memories of the boy of half a century ago. The very mention of it recalls the huge oval vehicle with its great boot behind, fronted by a lofty driver’s seat,—swaying, tossing, rocking, lumbering and creaking as it dashes along, impelled by four swift-footed horses, through mud and mire, over hill and dale, in the daily discharge of its appointed office. Anon the rapid toot of the horn, closing with a long refrain, which reverberates from every hillside, winding a different note to the varied motions of the coach, and a rattle of the wheels announces the arrival, and every urchin in the village is on the alert to see its passage to the hotel, and from the hotel to the post-office. It was the daily event in the memory of childhood, which no time can obliterate. As years wore on and improvements came, and one by one the old-time inventions gave place to others, the coach began gradually to disappear from the haunts of busy life, and the swift-winged rail-car to usurp its customary duties. Seemingly it shrunk away as if frightened at the improvements multiplying around it, and sought a freer life in the vast solitudes of the Great West. There it had full range without a rival for thousands of miles for a third of a century, and conveyed the van of that grand army of pioneers across the continent, who sought and found home and wealth and opened up a new and richer world than any ever before discovered on the golden shores of the great Pacific.

The system of overland travel, which afforded a comparatively rapid transit for passengers and mails between the oceans, made the stage coach an object of peculiar interest to the civilized communities of both continents. It was the bearer of the earliest news from the gold fields, the most assured means of communication between those families and friends whom the lust for fortune had separated, and the most available conveyance to the land of gold. The novelty of a trip across the plains, over the mountains, and through the cañons, its exposures to Indian attack and massacre, its thrilling escapades and adventures, can only be known to him who has accomplished it.

Before the construction of the Union Pacific Railway, mails and passengers were transported from the States to Montana by Holliday’s Overland Stage Line, running from Atchison, Kansas, by way of Denver and Salt Lake City, and connecting at the latter place with a stage line owned by other proprietors, running to Virginia City and Helena, a total distance of nineteen hundred miles. The route, for nearly its entire distance, lay through a country occupied by various Indian tribes, several of which were permanently hostile, and the others ready to become so as occasion offered, to satisfy their greed for plunder or robbery. The only habitations of whites, except at the places mentioned and two or three smaller settlements, were the log cabins of the stock-tenders. The regular time for a journey from Atchison to Helena was twenty-two days. Once started, the only stoppages were at the changing stations twelve to fifteen miles apart,—the eating stations being separated by a distance of forty or fifty miles.

In the Fall of 1864, I made this journey in company with Samuel T. Hauser,—the time occupied being thirty-one days and nights of continuous travel. Our journey was prolonged by delays occasioned by the incursions of the hostile Sioux, who had killed several stock-tenders at different stations, burned the buildings, and stolen the horses. From their frequent attacks upon the coaches from ambush, it was necessary for us to be on the constant lookout, with arms prepared to resist them at any moment. This cautiousness was intensified by the evidence of their murderous purpose we met with in our progress. On the second day after leaving Atchison, the eastern bound coach met us with one wounded passenger, the next day with one dead, and the next with another wounded. The reports of passengers eastward bound were also very discouraging. Yet this risk of life did not lessen travel. The coaches were generally full.

As a curious fact in stage-coach statistics, I may be pardoned for stating that in fourteen years, while National Bank Examiner for all the Territories and the Pacific States, and four years, while Collector of Internal Revenue, my staging to and fro over the continent exceeded seventy-four thousand miles. I learned in that experience that the most comfortable as well as most eligible place for travelling was the outside seat beside the driver; and as it was seldom in demand by others for travel by night, I usually had no difficulty in securing it. For one whose stage travel is pretty constant, no dress is more suitable than the one usually worn by express messengers, which consists of warm overalls and fur coat for ordinary winter weather, and a rubber suit for protection against storms. The only objection to them, and that sometimes and in some portions of the country a serious one, is the liability of the wearer to be mistaken for a guard. The road agent considers the guard with treasure in his keeping as legitimate prey, and shoots him without the least compunction if he evinces any determined resistance. It was my good fortune for several years to travel unmolested over routes which but the day before or after were the scenes of both murder and robbery.

The ill-starred cañon of the Port-Neuf River, memorable in all its early and recent history, for murder, robbery, and disaster, is about forty miles distant from Fort Hall, Idaho. It was named after an unfortunate Canadian trapper, murdered there by the Indians, and ever since that event a curse seems to have rested upon it. Captain Bonneville established his camp there for the Winter of 1833–34, and during his absence with a few men, those who remained, reduced by cold and hunger, were obliged to leave for a more promising location. He found them on his return in the Spring, encamped on the Blackfoot, a tributary of Snake River, not very far above Port-Neuf Cañon. Not only had they been pinched by famine, but they had fallen in with several Blackfoot bands, and considered themselves fortunate in being able to retreat from the dangerous neighborhood without sustaining any loss.

Ever since the stage road from Salt Lake City to Montana was laid out through this cañon, it has been the favorite haunt of stage robbers and highwaymen. Nature seems to have endowed it with extraordinary facilities for encouraging and protecting this dangerous class of the community. Both sides of the river wash the base of basaltic walls, which, by the combined action of fire, water, and wind, have been eroded into numerous columns, resembling in formation those of Staffa, and forming coverts and gateways alike favorable to the commission of robbery or murder, and the escape of the criminals. Indeed, it has been with many a commonly received opinion, that these gateways of rock gave the name to the cañon, the word Port-Neuf in compound form signifying “ninth gate.” Notwithstanding its terrible history, the drive through it upon a summer day is very delightful. In the most romantic portion of it, marked by an immense pile of crumbled basalt and favored by an almost impenetrable thicket of willows, is the scene of one of the most horrible tragedies that ever occurred in the murderous history of this robbers’ den.

Robbery and murder in the early history of the gold-seekers in Montana and Idaho were carried on upon strictly business principles. No attack upon a coach or a returning emigrant train was made without almost certain knowledge of the booty to be obtained. Some of the band of robbers were at the different mining localities, on the lookout for victims; and between them and the attacking party a system of telegraphy existed by which was communicated all possible information concerning every departure of the coach with a treasure-box, or passengers with gold dust.

In the Summer of 1865, Messrs. Parker and McCausland, who represented the interests of two successful merchants of Virginia City, and Messrs. Mers and Dinan, merchants of Nevada City, left Montana for St. Joseph, Missouri, with about sixty thousand dollars in gold dust in their possession. For a week or more before leaving, as was the custom in those days, they had sought by various devices to mislead any local operatives of the robber gang who might be watching them, as to the exact time of their departure, so that when they took leave of Virginia City they were very confident they had stolen a march upon them, and would pass the ordeal of a coach ride to Salt Lake City in safety. Port-Neuf Cañon was regarded as the dangerous spot. Once through that, they were comparatively safe. Their treasure, safely packed in buckskin bags, was in part concealed upon their persons, and the remainder locked up in a carpet-sack, carefully stowed away under the back seat which they occupied. Before their arrival at Snake River bridge, two more passengers, Brown and Carpenter, were added to the number. Leaving there in high spirits, they proceeded at a brisk pace down the road, entering the cañon at an early hour in the afternoon. It was a pleasant sunshiny day. Happy in the belief that before its close they would leave the dreaded place behind them, and that no attack would be made in daylight, the members of the company were engaged in one of those rambling discursive conversations which belong exclusively to this mode of travel. Each man, however, as if instigated by the evil spirit of the locality, had, before arriving at the cañon, examined his weapons of defence and placed them in a convenient position for use in case of necessity. Mile after mile was passed, and more than half the distance through the cañon had been travelled, when a voice issuing from a clump of bushes by the roadside sternly commanded the driver to halt, and at the same moment the muzzles of nine or ten guns were presented at the passengers, who were ordered to throw up their hands. “Robbers! Fire on them!” exclaimed Parker, who had taken a seat on the outside of the coach for the purpose of watching,—and suiting the action to the word, he cocked and raised his gun and attempted to fire, but fell forward riddled with buckshot. At the same time other shots killed McCausland, Mers, and Dinan, and seriously wounded Carpenter, who escaped by feigning death, as one of the robbers was about to shoot him again. Brown escaped by plunging into the surrounding thicket of bushes. Charley Parks, the express messenger, received a serious wound which necessitated the amputation of the leg at the thigh. The murderers then completed their work by rifling the bodies of their victims, and seizing whatever treasure they could find upon and within the coach, and then made their escape through the basaltic gateways to the fastnesses of the mountains. The driver, with his ghastly freight of dead and wounded, returned to the station. Large rewards were offered by the stage company for the arrest of the desperadoes who had committed this frightful butchery, and for the recovery of the stolen treasure. Many members of the Vigilante organization of Montana started in pursuit, but all attempts to trace the murderers were for some time abortive.

Frank Williams, the driver of the coach, soon after left the employ of the stage company, and was for some time a hanger-on of the saloons of Salt Lake City. The lavish use he made of money while there, excited the suspicion of those who were in pursuit of the robbers, and when he left the city, they followed him and watched him closely, until satisfied that he was using money in larger amounts than he could have obtained honestly. At Godfrey’s Station, between Denver and Julesburg, they arrested him. Conscience-smitten, he fell upon his knees at the feet of his accusers, and made a full confession, implicating eleven confederates, whose names and places of abode he revealed. He admitted that he had driven the coach into the ambush for the purpose of aiding the robbery, in the avails of which he was a participant. It probably never occurred to him that the murder of the passengers was possible; and from the moment of its occurrence he had not known a moment’s peace of mind or freedom from fear of arrest. He was hanged near Denver immediately after his arrest and confession. The information he gave enabled his captors to eventually secure the persons of several others engaged in the robbery, who were summarily executed,—but the larger portion of the robbers are still at large.

There have been several coach robberies in Port-Neuf Cañon and the vicinity since the one here recorded, but none in which life was taken. Indeed, attacks upon the downward bound coach became so frequent that for several years before the completion of the railroad the stage company provided for each treasure coach a guard, whose business it was to defend both treasure and passengers by all means in his power. Among the men selected for this duty they made choice of two who had figured conspicuously in the early Vigilante history of Montana, John X. Beidler and John Fetherstun.

The only stage station in this cañon was known by the very appropriate name of “Robbers’ Roost,” and I never passed the place without a feeling of mingled sadness and horror at the recollection of the tragedy which has given it such a bloody notoriety. Forty-six times have I passed through this cañon on trips from Montana to the States and returning. It has been with me a life-long custom to take my seat with the driver, and occasionally when riding through the cañon, clad in a buffalo overcoat, with headgear to correspond, I have experienced an instinctive feeling of discomfort at the thought that I might be mistaken for a guard, who is always deemed the legitimate prey of the road agent, and shot down by some avenging Nemesis of the band. The robbers, however, seldom demand the money or other personal effects of the driver or messenger, as these, being of small value, poorly compensate for the risk incurred in robbing the treasure-box and the passengers.

Among the various devices I had thought of adopting to escape robbery in case of attack, I finally concluded to act the part of a messenger, with whose methods long observation had made me familiar. The objection to this was that the robbers frequented _incog._ the stations on the route of their contemplated depredations, and knew the _personnel_ of all or nearly all the messengers. No mercy therefore would be shown to any one who was detected in the attempt to personate one of them. The risk was too great to be incurred except by one who courted adventure, or where the safety of a large amount was involved. An opportunity finally came.

My duties as bank examiner required a visit to Santa Fe, New Mexico, in the latter part of June, 1878. Having completed my examinations, the cashier of the Second National Bank requested me on my return to convey to Denver a considerable sum of gold and currency.

The coach robberies had been so numerous for nearly a year on this route, that Messrs. Barlow and Sanderson, the proprietors of the stage line and the express company, had refused to transport treasure over it, and all packages of merchandise were sent in charge of trusty messengers. I reluctantly assented, they taking the risk of the safe conduct of the money,—the other risk, to me at least the greater of the two, my own safety, I had to take myself. I was the only passenger. No one else coveted a ride over the dismal route. The money was securely locked in my valise which was packed among the mail-bags inside the coach. On arriving at Las Vegas a change of drivers took place. Charley Fernandez, a half-blood Mexican whose acquaintance I had made years before while on the same trip, took the reins, and we continued on our way in excellent spirits. He was known by the sobriquet “Mexican Charley.” He was an excellent whip, and noted for his coolness in danger, and kindness to his horses. At Eureka, Mr. Stewart, the stage company’s blacksmith, who had been shoeing the horses along the route, got into the coach. Fatigued with overwork, he rearranged the mail-bags and spread his blankets, and, without my knowledge, removed my valise containing the money to the front boot of the coach. The first half of the night had worn away. Charley had told me a great number of thrilling incidents about the stage travel, and the trouble with road agents along the road. The subject, though interesting, was not at the time and under the circumstances particularly inspiring, especially as we were now passing through the infested portion of the route. I had contrived to fall into a doze, and in that creepy mood so common to people whose condition is half-way between slumber and wakefulness, had so con-jumbled road agents and stage coaches, that but for a fortunate jolt now and then, I should probably have fallen into the unhappy consciousness that I was really a victim to robbery and disaster. We were passing at a moderate pace a cluster of isolated hills, known in that region as “Wagon Mound Buttes.” The horses had just begun with slackened gait to ascend a grade, when Charley roused me from my revery by a quick, short, half-breathless ejaculation, “What’s that in the road ahead of us?” Every sense I possessed was roused in an instant. The trust I had undertaken gave me infinite concern, and I confess to an alarm bordering upon fear. If I had left that money behind, I thought, I should have little trouble in taking care of myself. Peering into the darkness at that moment partially dispelled by the rising moon, I discovered, about fifty yards in front, two objects just disappearing among the bushes by the roadside.

“I guess,” said Charley, reassuringly, “it’s nothing but burros.”

“Quite likely, Charley,” I replied. “We have seen them at intervals all the way.”

“That’s what it is, you may depend,” rejoined Charley. “I’ve often mistook ’em before for the blasted road agents. But I was a leetle skeered at fust, warn’t you?”

“Considerably, Charley. I don’t want to meet them this time, at any rate.”

“No danger, I guess,” said Charley, as he touched his leaders with the whip to urge them up the grade.

The horses pulled along at a quicker gait, and I was settling back into a state of tranquil somnolence, happy in the thought that we were not probably the first men who had been frightened by a couple of jackasses, when suddenly, as if springing out of the solid earth, two men jumped from the bushes. They were about twenty feet apart. The one most distant, a short, rather slender person, seized the bits of the leaders with his left hand, holding in the right a cocked revolver. The other, a stalwart figure of six feet, with corresponding physical proportions, raised a double-barrelled shotgun, and aiming it directly at my head, shouted in a fierce, impetuous tone,

“Halt! Don’t either of you move a hand. I want that treasure-box.” This startling salutation, with its accompanying demonstration, for a moment filled me with apprehension, but the quick reply of Charley, “There’s no treasure-box aboard,” restored me to instant calmness. Now, thought I, is the time to put my chosen theory into practice, and pass myself as express messenger.

“Don’t say a word to them, Charley!” said I, in a suppressed tone. “Let me do the talking.”

The big robber, whose determination was more strongly whetted by Charley’s reply to his first demand, now spoke in an angry tone, and with his gun in closer proximity to my head, exclaimed,

“I tell you I want that treasure-box, and quick too. Throw it right down there,” pointing to the ground alongside the forward wheel of the coach.

My rapid breathing had now so far abated that I was able to say in a steady, natural tone,

“The driver has told you the truth. I have no treasure-box on this run. I don’t know what the other boys have had. You fellow’s have run the road to suit yourselves this summer. I haven’t had a treasure-box for more than two months.”

“I know better than that,” he replied, with the usual formula of oaths, “and if you don’t throw out that box, I’ll shoot the top of your head off,” at the same time advancing two or three steps, and aiming his gun with both barrels cocked, less than a yard’s distance from my head;—by reaching forward I could have touched it.

The man was very nervous. I knew that his object was robbery without murder, rather than murder and robbery afterwards. In his excitement, which had been rapidly increasing in intensity, I feared that he might unintentionally pull the triggers on which his fingers were resting. To possibly avoid a fatal result in such case, I moved my head backward and forward, to the right and left, and tried to keep as much out of range as possible. All to no purpose:—the gun kept motion with me, and held me constantly in range. I finally said to him,

“Oblige me by holding your gun a little out of range with my head. You’ve got the drop on me, but I can’t believe you wish to kill a man who is ready to give you all he has.”

“You just give me that treasure-box, and you won’t be hurt,” he replied, in an obstinate tone, with his gun still in position.

The other robber, seemingly much amused at the fear I manifested for my safety, in a jocular manner shouted to me, in a voice peculiarly feminine,

“Does them gun-barrels look pretty big?”

I replied that I could not readily recall a time in my life when gun-barrels looked quite as large as they did at that moment, and that although neither the moon nor stars were very bright, yet I was quite sure I could read the advertisements on a page of _The New York Herald_ which they had used for gun wadding.

This answer excited their mirth, and they laughed quite heartily, but it did not divert them from their purpose. After parleying with them a few minutes longer, I handed the big man the way-pocket containing the way-bill, and told him that the entire contents of the coach were entered on it, and he could satisfy himself that there was no treasure-box on board. They made the examination and were convinced.

During this research they watched our movements closely, lest Charley or I should draw a weapon. Neither of us was armed. Returning the way-bill to the leather pocket, the big man in a surly tone inquired,

“Got any passengers aboard?”

“There is a man inside, but he is not a passenger,” I replied.

“Who is he then, and what is he doing there, if he is not a passenger?”

“He is the company’s blacksmith.”

Frenzied with the disappointment of not finding a treasure-box, and thinking that I was screening a passenger by calling him an employee, the robber exclaimed.

“That’s played out. I want that man,” and, rattling the coach door, in language redundant with profane superlatives, he ordered him, if he wished to escape being shot, to come out and show himself.

Stewart, who had slept through all the previous part of the colloquy, on being thus summarily summoned, comprehended the situation of affairs, and slipping a small roll of greenbacks into his shoe, stepped out of the coach.

“Throw up your hands,” was the stern command addressed to him emphasized by the double muzzle of a loaded gun within a few feet of his head. He was not slow to comply, nor to submit with the best possible grace to the search which followed, yielding only a single Mexican dollar.

The fury of the robber as he held this meagre trophy of his enterprise up to the pale moonlight was dramatic in the highest possible degree, and yet so associated with his earlier disappointments, that one could hardly restrain oneself from bursting into a fit of laughter.

“What business have you,” he yelled, interlarding his speech with an unlimited use of profane and opprobrious epithets, “to be travelling through this country with no more money than that?”

Stewart answered that he was the horse-shoer of the company, which paid his bills while on the road, and he therefore had no need of money while thus employed.

After a careful examination of Stewart’s hands, which were found to be hard and callous, and the discovery of a box containing the tools used in horse-shoeing, the robber was satisfied that he had told the truth, and returned the Mexican dollar. Baffled at all points, he hurled the way-pocket into the sage brush, and in a tone of mingled anger and disgust, exclaimed,

“No passengers, no treasure-box, no _nothing_. This is a —— of an outfit.” With his gun still in point-blank range, he crept close beside the front wheel, and by the subdued light gazed scrutinizingly into my face for a brief space, as if to ascertain whether he had ever seen me before. He repeated this so often that I feared he would resolve the doubt he evidently entertained of my assured office against me, and shoot me for the imposition. This to me was the most terrible moment of the encounter. I returned his stare each time with an impassive countenance, resolved at all hazards to persist in my experiment. While thus occupied, he directed his companion to examine the contents of the rearward boot and overhaul the mail-bags within the coach. Ten minutes later, the search proving abortive, he said in slow, measured tones, dropping back a few paces, “Well, I guess you’d better drive on.”

Charley gathered up the reins, and was about giving the word to his horses, when it occurred to me that I might complete the deception I had all along practiced by a little _ruse_ which the occasion seemed to demand.

“Hold on, Charley,” and turning to the discomfited man I added,

“I want my way-pocket.”

“You can’t have it,” was the prompt reply.

“But I must have it,” I insisted. “I can’t go on without it. The company will discharge a messenger who loses his way-pocket.”

This reply seemed to allay his suspicions. He stepped into the sage brush and returned in a few minutes with the pocket, which he gave me, and ordered us quite peremptorily to drive on.

Charley needed no second invitation, but drove on quite briskly. After mutually congratulating each other on our escape, we naturally recounted the events of the evening, and among other things commented upon the feminine voice of the smaller of the robbers; but I soon dismissed the subject, feeling too well satisfied with the success of an artifice which had saved the bank a considerable sum of money, and possibly both of us from a fatal calamity.

Several months after this adventure, while returning by stage from Leadville to Pueblo, the driver directed my attention to a grave marked by a low wooden slab on the plateau overlooking the Arkansas River a short distance below Buena Vista. Just beyond it was an abrupt ravine.

“I never pass that grave,” said the driver, “without being reminded of the event connected with it. A few weeks ago a band of horses had been stolen from a ranche on the road between Trinidad and Wagon Mound Buttes, by two horse-thieves who were pursued by the owners over the range into the Arkansas Valley. They were overtaken with the stolen herd in that ravine. On attempting to enter it the smaller thief commanded the pursuing party to halt, disregarding which, he fired upon and wounded two of them. Roused by the firing, the other thief appeared, and a pitched battle ensued, in which he was slain outright, and the other fatally wounded. Surgical aid was obtained, and the surviving thief was found to be a woman. She died in a few days thereafter, refusing to the last to reveal her history, or furnish any clew by which it might be traced.” This event occurring so soon after the attempt to rob the coach, convinced the people thereabouts of the identity of the persons engaged in both outrages.

Many of the “home stations” on the stage lines, where meals were served, were favorite camping grounds for freighters engaged in the transportation of merchandise from the railroad to the interior towns. On the road between Kelton and Boise, the station at Rock Creek, one hundred miles distant from the railroad, was kept by Charles Trotter. It was one of the few stopping-places where palatable meals were served. Its reputation in this respect won for it a widespread popularity with the travelling public, and in process of time a small settlement sprung up around it. A store was opened, where emigrants and others could obtain provisions, clothing, and such other necessaries as they needed. Naturally enough, many of the newcomers were rough in their tastes, fond of gambling, drinking, and the athletic sports common in an unorganized community. The influence exercised by a few citizens of the better class was all that saved the little settlement from lapsing into lawlessness and crime.

My diary for 1877 shows that on September 17 I passed through Rock Creek by stage _en route_ for Boise. Our coach entered the place about the middle of the afternoon. An Englishman who had arrived in America a fortnight before, was the only passenger besides myself. It was his first journey in a stage coach, and the rough and desolate region through which it lay presented to his mind many features of novelty and interest, mingled with no little disquietude at the strange character of his surroundings. He was in a condition to be alarmed at anything.

As we alighted from the coach, our attention was directed by loud hilarious singing to a company of twenty or more men approaching the station, bearing in their midst a long pine box. I perceived at once that it was a funeral orgie over the burial of some wretch who had paid the penalty of a summary death for a life of crime. A person standing near me replied to my inquiry as to the cause. He said that about two years previous to this time, a stranger came one morning to the station and asked for breakfast. He was hungry and moneyless. Mr. Trotter gave him a breakfast and he left; but something about his actions and appearance aroused Trotter’s suspicions, and, concealed by the sage brush, he tracked him for some distance across the plain, and came up with him as he was in the act of mounting a horse which Trotter recognized as the property of a friend in Boise. Believing that the horse had been stolen, Trotter arrested the man, who gave his name as William Dowdle, sent him to Boise, where he was tried for the theft, convicted, and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment in the Idaho Penitentiary. Dowdle avowed that if he lived to be free, he would kill Trotter. At the close of his term he obtained employment as cook for a freighter named Johnson, and slowly wended his way to Rock Creek, where his employer and party camped for a day to replenish their stock of provisions.

The next morning, armed with a revolver, Dowdle went to the station to execute his threat, and was greatly chagrined to learn that Trotter was confined to his bed with typhoid fever. He sought to alleviate his disappointment in liquor, which maddened him to that degree that he threatened the lives of several persons, and, seating himself beside the road, fired indiscriminately at all who passed him. One shot hit a Mr. Spencer, a blacksmith, who was passing quietly along, inflicting what was supposed to be a mortal wound. Attracted by the reports of the pistol, young Wohlgamuth, a relative of Trotter who had charge of the store, hurried to the doorway, when a bullet from Dowdle’s pistol penetrated the door-casing, just grazing his head. He immediately grasped his revolver from a shelf hard by, and shot Dowdle through the heart. The villain fell prostrate in the road, exclaiming, “Such is life, boys, in the days of forty-nine,” and died instantly. The entire settlement manifested their approval of Wohlgamuth’s timely shot by a season of general rejoicing, and a coroner’s jury exonerated him from all blame.

The funeral followed speedily. A rude coffin of pine, with four handles of cords knotted into the sides, was the single preparation. In this the body, incased in Johnson’s overcoat, was laid, fully exposed, the cover of the box being laid aside until the conclusion of the ceremonies. Four strong men grasped the handles, and lifting the coffin, the procession formed about equally in front and rear of them, and the march commenced. Frequent potations had exhilarated the entire company to such a degree that no attempt was made to preserve regularity of motion or direction. The line of march was between a ridge on the south and one on the north side of the station, about a mile apart. No clergyman was present to conduct the exercises, and no layman was in condition to offer a prayer or read the scriptures. The exigency could only be supplied by vocal music; and in the absence of hymn books it was thought to be exceedingly proper and befitting the occasion for all to join in an old California refrain entitled, “The Days of Forty-Nine.” Indeed, the last words of Dowdle seemed to convey a request for it. The song was a doggerel composed in the early Pacific mining days in commemoration of “Lame Jesse,” a kindred spirit to Dowdle. The mourners on this occasion substituted for the name of “Lame Jesse,” that of “Dowdle Bill.” This musical service was progressing as our coach drove up to the station. The song consisted of a score or more of verses of which I can recall the following only:

“Old Dowdle Bill was a hard old case; He never would repent. He never was known to miss a meal,— He never paid a cent.

“Old Dowdle Bill, like all the rest, He did to Death resign; And in his bloom went up the flume, In the days of Forty-Nine.”

Mrs. Trotter informed me that this procession of men bearing the coffin, had marched to and fro between the two ridges in a state of drunken revelry for a period of five hours; some singing one, some another verse, producing an utter confusion of sound, and so excited as to be utterly unable to preserve a straight line. At one of their halts near the coach, Johnson, who was at the moment one of the bearers, discovered that his own overcoat covered the body.

“—— if they haven’t laid him out in my blue overcoat!” he exclaimed, and loosening his hold of the handle, he raised the body, removed the coat, and put it on his own back. The march was then resumed, and amid singing, shouts, and laughter, the body was borne to a low ridge and buried.

Supper being soon announced, my English fellow-traveller did not appear at the table. He was perfectly appalled at the scene he had witnessed.

“Is this,” he inquired, with much earnestness, “the usual way funerals are conducted in this wild country? We never have such proceedings in England, you know. If the better class of people do such things, the country must be pretty rough. I didn’t know but they’d take me next, and I hadn’t any appetite.”

I assured him that our lives were perfectly safe; but it was not until we reached the next eating station, that hunger seemed to conquer his fears, and he was fully reassured.