Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 63, No. 392, June, 1848

To Coleridge, indeed, whose snatches of literary criticism are admirable, (when he is not evidently led away by some capricious paradoxical spirit,) we have a debt to acknowledge on this subject. He first taught us, if we mistake not, to appreciate the structure of Shakspeare's plays, and vindicated them from that charge of rudeness and irregularity which had been so frequently made that it had passed for an admitted truth. He showed that there was a harmony in his intricate plots of a far higher order than the disciples of the unities had ever dreamed of.

Whatever may be their critical appreciation of the poetic language of others, these writers display very little taste themselves in the use of imagery, or illustration, or metaphor. What is intended for wit or pleasantry proves to be a cumbrous allegory or unwieldy simile; we feel that we are to smile, but we do not smile. Instances of this may be found at page 111, in a sort of fable about "leather" and "stockings;" and at page 133 about "four-sided and five-sided fields." The examples are too long to quote. At page 260, great men are compared to mountains. The simile is not new, but the manner of dealing with it has more of novelty than of grace. – "Mountains never shake hands," &c. – like great men, they stand alone. "But if mountains do not shake hands, neither do they kick each other." And here, at page 259, is an instance, not too long to quote entire, which shows how little tact and delicacy these writers have in dealing with metaphorical language.

"It is a mistake to suppose the poet does not know truth by sight quite as well as the philosopher. He must; for he is ever seeing her in the mirror of nature. The difference between them is, that the poet is satisfied with worshipping her reflected image, while the philosopher traces her out, and follows her to her remote abode between cause and consequence, and there impregnates her."

Frequently the illustration, standing alone, brief and obscure, becomes a mere riddle, a conundrum, to which you can either attach no meaning, or any meaning you please.

"Instead of watching the bird as it flies above our heads, we chase the shadow along the ground, and finding we cannot grasp it, we conclude it to be nothing.

"I hate to see trees pollarded – or nations.

"What way of circumventing a man can be so easy and suitable as a period? The name should be enough to put us on our guard; the experience of every age is not."

The oracular wisdom which these and the like sentences contain, we must confess ourselves unable to expound. We would not undertake to act as interpreter of such aphorisms; and we feel persuaded that if three of the most friendly commentators were to sit down before them, they would each give a different explanation.

In quitting our somewhat ungracious task, we would not leave the impression behind that there is absolutely nothing in this volume to reward perusal. There are some sparkling sayings, and some sound reflections, which, if the book had now appeared for the first time, we should think it our duty to hunt out and bring together. But the work has been long before the public, and our present object was merely to point out some of the weaknesses of a very dogmatical class of writers. The following guess, for instance, is very significant, and extremely apposite, moreover, to our own times. That we may leave our readers something to meditate upon, we will conclude by quoting it: —

"When the pit seats itself in the boxes, the gallery will soon drive out both, and occupy the whole of the house." – A.

LIFE IN THE "FAR WEST."

PART I. – CHAP. I

Away to the head waters of the Platte, where several small streams run into the south fork of that river, and head in the broken ridges of the "Divide" which separates the valleys of the Platte and Arkansa, were camped a band of trappers on a creek called Bijou. It was the month of October, when the early frosts of the coming winter had crisped and dyed with sober brown the leaves of the cherry and quaking asp, which belted the little brook; and the ridges and peaks of the Rocky Mountains were already covered with a glittering mantle of snow, which sparkled in the still powerful rays of the autumn sun.

The camp had all the appearance of being a permanent one; for not only did one or two unusually comfortable shanties form a very conspicuous object, but the numerous stages on which huge strips of buffalo meat were hanging in process of cure, showed that the party had settled themselves here in order to lay in a store of provisions, or, as it is termed in the language of the mountains, "make meat." Round the camp were feeding some twelve or fifteen mules and horses, having their fore-legs confined by hobbles of raw hide, and, guarding these animals, two men paced backwards and forwards, driving in the stragglers; and ever and anon ascending the bluffs which overhung the river, and, leaning on their long rifles, would sweep with their eyes the surrounding prairie. Three or four fires were burning in the encampment, on some of which Indian women were carefully tending sundry steaming pots; whilst round one, which was in the centre of it, four or five stalwart hunters, clad in buckskin, sat cross-legged, pipe in mouth.

They were a trapping party from the north fork of Platte, on their way to wintering-ground in the more southern valley of the Arkansa; some, indeed, meditating a more extended trip, even to the distant settlements of New Mexico, the paradise of mountaineers. The elder of the company was a tall gaunt man, with a face browned by a twenty years' exposure to the extreme climate of the mountains; his long black hair, as yet scarcely tinged with gray, hung almost to his shoulders, but his cheeks and chin were cleanly shaved, after the fashion of the mountain men. His dress was the usual hunting-frock of buckskin, with long fringes down the seams, with pantaloons similarly ornamented, and mocassins of Indian make. As his companions puffed their pipes in silence, he was narrating a few of his former experiences of western life; and whilst the buffalo "hump-ribs" and "tender loin" are singing away in the pot, preparing for the hunters' supper, we will note down the yarn as it spins from his lips, giving it in the language spoken in the "far west: " —

"'Twas about 'calf-time,' maybe a little later, and not a hunderd year ago, by a long chalk, that the biggest kind of rendezvous was held 'to' Independence, a mighty handsome little location away up on old Missoura. A pretty smart lot of boys was camp'd thar, about a quarter from the town, and the way the whisky flowed that time was 'some' now, I can tell you. Thar was old Sam Owins – him as got 'rubbed out'[14 - Killed, Died – both terms adapted from the Indian figurative language.] by the Spaniards at Sacramenty, or Chihuahuy, this hos doesn't know which, but he 'went under' any how. Well, Sam had his train along, ready to hitch up for the Mexican country – twenty thunderin big Pittsburg waggons; and the way his Santa Fé boys took in the liquor beat all – eh, Bill?"

"Well, it did."

"Bill Bent – his boys camped the other side the trail, and they was all mountain men, wagh! – and Bill Williams, and Bill Tharpe (the Pawnees took his hair on Pawnee Fork last spring:) three Bills, and them three's all 'gone under.' Surely Hatcher went out that time; and wasn't Bill Garey along, too? Didn't him and Chabonard sit in camp for twenty hours at a deck of Euker? Them was Bent's Indian traders up on Arkansa. Poor Bill Bent! them Spaniards made meat of him. He lost his topknot to Taos. A 'clever' man was Bill Bent as I ever know'd trade a robe or 'throw' a bufler in his tracks. Old St Vrain could knock the hind-sight off him though, when it come to shootin, and old silver heels spoke true, she did: 'plum-center' she was, eh?"

"Well, she was'nt nothin else.'"

"The Greasers[15 - The Mexicans are called "Spaniards" or "Greasers" (from their greasy appearance) by the Western people.] payed for Bent's scalp, they tell me. Old St Vrain went out of Santa Fé with a company of mountain men, and the way they made 'em sing out was 'slick as shootin'. He 'counted a coup' did St Vrain. He throwed a Pueblo as had on poor Bent's shirt. I guess he tickled that niggur's hump-ribs. Fort William[16 - Bent's Indian trading fort on the Arkansa.] aint the lodge it was, an' never will be agin, now he's gone under; but St Vrain's 'pretty much of a gentleman,' too; if he aint, I'll be dog-gone, eh, Bill?"

"He is so-o."

"Chavez had his waggons along. He was only a Spaniard any how, and some of his teamsters put a ball into him his next trip, and made a raise of his dollars, wagh! Uncle Sam hung 'em for it, I heard, but can't b'lieve it, no-how. If them Spaniards wasn't born for shootin', why was beaver made? You was with us that spree, Jemmy?"

"No sirre-e; I went out when Spiers lost his animals on Cimmaron: a hunderd and forty mules and oxen was froze that night, wagh!"

"Surely Black Harris was thar; and the darndest liar was Black Harris – for lies tumbled out of his mouth like boudins out of a bufler's stomach. He was the child as saw the putrefied forest in the Black Hills. Black Harris come in from Laramie; he'd been trapping three year an' more on Platte and the 'other side;' and, when he got into Liberty, he fixed himself right off like a Saint Louiy dandy. Well, he sat to dinner one day in the tavern, and a lady says to him: —

"'Well, Mister Harris, I hear you're a great travler.'

"'Travler, marm,' says Black Harris, 'this niggur's no travler; I ar' a trapper, marm, a mountain-man, wagh!"

"'Well, Mister Harris, trappers are great travlers, and you goes over a sight of ground in your perishinations, I'll be bound to say.'

"'A sight, marm, this coon's gone over, if that's the way your 'stick floats.'[17 - Meaning, – if that's what you mean? The "stick" is tied to the beaver trap by a string; and, floating on the water, points out its position, should a beaver have carried it away.] I've trapped beaver on Platte and Arkansa, and away up on Missoura and Yaller Stone; I've trapped on Columbia, on Lewis Fork, and Green River; I've trapped, marm, on Grand River and the Heely (Gila.) I've fout the 'Blackfoot' (and d – d bad Injuns they ar;) I've 'raised the hair'[18 - Scalped.] of more than one Apach, and made a Rapaho 'come' afore now; I've trapped in heav'n, in airth, and h – , and scalp my old head, marm, but I've seen a putrefied forest.'

"'La, Mister Harris, a what?'

"'A putrefied forest, marm, as sure as my rifle's got hind-sights, and she shoots center. I was out on the Black Hills, Bill Sublette knows the time – the year it rained fire – and every body knows when that was. If thar wasn't cold doin's about that time, this child wouldn't say so. The snow was about fifty foot deep, and the bufler lay dead on the ground like bees after a beein'; not whar we was tho', for thar was no bufler, and no meat, and me and my band had been livin' on our mocassins, (leastwise the parflesh,[19 - Soles made of buffalo hide.]) for six weeks; and poor doin's that feedin' is, marm, as you'll never know. One day we crossed a 'cañon' and over a 'divide,' and got into a peraira, whar was green grass, and green trees, and green leaves on the trees, and birds singing in the green leaves, and this in Febrary, wagh! Our animals was like to die when they see the green grass, and we all sung out, 'hurraw for summer doin's.'

"'Hyar goes for meat,' says I, and I jest ups old Ginger at one of them singing birds, and down come the crittur elegant; its darned head spinning away from the body, but never stops singing, and when I takes up the meat, I finds it stone, wagh! 'Hyar's damp powder and no fire to dry it,' I says, quite skeared.'

"'Fire be dogged,' says old Rube. 'Hyar's a hos as'll make fire come;' and with that he takes his axe and lets drive at a cotton wood. Schr-u-k – goes the axe agin the tree, and out comes a bit of the blade as big as my hand. We looks at the animals, and thar they stood shaking over the grass, which I'm dog-gone if it wasn't stone, too. Young Sublette comes up, and he'd been clerking down to the fort on Platte, so he know'd something. He looks and looks, and scrapes the trees with his butcher knife, and snaps the grass like pipe stems, and breaks the leaves a-snappin' like Californy shells.'

"'What's all this, boy?' I asks.

"'Putrefactions,' says he, looking smart, 'putrefactions, or I'm a niggur.'

"'La, Mister Harris,' says the lady; 'putrefactions, why, did the leaves, and the trees, and the grass smell badly?'

"'Smell badly, marm,' says Black Harris, 'would a skunk stink if he was froze to stone? No, marm, this child didn't know what putrefactions was, and young Sublette's varsion wouldn't 'shine' nohow, so I chips a piece out of a tree and puts it in my trap-sack, and carries it in safe to Laramie. Well, old Captain Stewart, (a clever man was that, though he was an Englishman,) he comes along next spring, and a Dutch doctor chap was along too. I shows him the piece I chipped out of the tree, and he called it a putrefaction too; and so, marm, if that wasn't a putrefied peraira, what was it? For this hos doesn't know, and he knows 'fat cow' from 'poor bull,' anyhow.'

"Well, old Black Harris is gone under too, I believe. He went to the 'Parks' trapping with a Vide Pôche Frenchman, who shot him for his bacca and traps. Darn them Frenchmen, they're no account any way you lays your sight. (Any 'bacca in your bag, Bill?' this beaver feels like chawing.)

"Well, any how, thar was the camp, and they was goin to put out the next morning; and the last as come out of Independence was that ar Englishman. He'd a nor-west[20 - The Hudson Bay Company, having amalgamated with the American North West Company, is known by the name 'North West' to the southern trappers. Their employés usually wear Canadian capôtes.] capôte on, and a two-shoot gun rifled. Well, them English are darned fools; they can't fix a rifle any ways; but that one did shoot 'some;' leastwise he made it throw plum-center. He made the bufler 'come,' he did, and fout well at Pawnee Fork too. What was his name? All the boys called him Cap'en, and he got his fixings from old Choteau; but what he wanted out thar in the mountains, I never jest rightly know'd. He was no trader, nor a trapper, and flung about his dollars right smart. Thar was old grit in him, too, and a hair of the black b'ar at that.[21 - A spice of the devil.] They say he took the bark of the Shians when he cleared out of the village with old Beaver Tail's squaw. He'd been on Yaller Stone afore that: Leclerc know'd him in the Blackfoot, and up in the Chippeway country; and he had the best powder as ever I flashed through life, and his gun was handsome, that's a fact. Them thar locks was grand; and old Jake Hawken's nephey, (him as trapped on Heely that time,) told me, the other day, as he saw an English gun on Arkansa last winter as beat all off hand.

"Nigh upon two hundred dollars I had in my possibles, when I went to that camp to see the boys afore they put out; and you know, Bill, as I sat to 'Euker' and 'seven up'[22 - "Euker," "poker," and "seven-up," are the fashionable games of cards.] till every cent was gone.

"'Take back twenty, old coon,' says Big John.

"'H – 's full of such takes back,' says I; and I puts back to town and fetches the rifle and the old mule, puts my traps into the sack, gets credit for a couple of pounds of powder at Owin's store, and hyar I ar on Bijou, with half a pack of beaver, and running meat yet, old hos: so put a log on, and let's have a smoke.

"Hurraw, Jake, old coon, bear a hand, and let the squaw put them tails in the pot; for sun's down, and we'll have to put out pretty early to reach 'Black Tail' by this time to-morrow. Who's fust guard, boys: them cussed 'Rapahos' will be after the animals to-night, or I'm no judge of Injun sign. How many did you see, Maurice?"

"Enfant de Gârce, me see bout honderd, when I pass Squirrel Creek, one dam war-party, parce-que, they no hosses, and have de lariats for steal des animaux. May be de Yutes in Bayou Salade."

"We'll be having trouble to-night, I'm thinking, if the devils are about. Whose band was it, Maurice?"

"Slim-Face – I see him ver close – is out; mais I think it White Wolf's."

"White Wolf, maybe, will lose his hair if he and his band knock round here too often. That Injun put me afoot when we was out on 'Sandy' that fall. This niggur owes him one, any how."

"H – 's full of White Wolves: go ahead, and roll out some of your doins across the plains that time."

"You seed sights that spree, eh, boy?"

"Well, we did. Some of em got their flints fixed this side of Pawnee Fork, and a heap of mule-meat went wolfing. Just by Little Arkansa we saw the first Injun. Me and young Somes was ahead for meat, and I had hobbled the old mule and was 'approaching' some goats,[23 - Antelope are frequently called "goats" by the mountaineers.] when I see the critturs turn back their heads and jump right away for me. 'Hurraw, Dick!' I shouts, 'hyars brown-skin acomin,' and off I makes for the mule. The young greenhorn sees the goats runnin up to him, and not being up to Injun ways, blazes at the first and knocks him over. Jest then seven darned red heads top the bluff, and seven Pawnees come a-screechin upon us. I cuts the hobbles and jumps on the mule, and, when I looks back, there was Dick Somes ramming a ball down his gun like mad, and the Injuns flinging their arrows at him pretty smart, I tell you. 'Hurraw, Dick, mind your hair,' and I ups old Greaser and let one Injun 'have it,' as was going plum into the boy with his lance. He turned on his back handsome, and Dick gets the ball down at last, blazes away, and drops another. Then we charged on em, and they clears off like runnin cows; and I takes the hair off the heads of the two we made meat of; and I do b'lieve thar's some of them scalps on my old leggings yet.

"Well, Dick was as full of arrows as a porkypine: one was sticking right through his cheek, one in his meat-bag, and two more 'bout his hump ribs. I tuk 'em all out slick, and away we go to camp, (for they was jost a-campin' when we went ahead) and carryin' the goat too. Thar' was a hurroo when we rode in with the scalps at the end of our guns. 'Injuns! Injuns!' was the cry from the green-horns; 'we'll be 'tacked to-night, that's certain.'