The Second William Penn | Page 3

foes, but for his cunning in devising
entertainment and hospitality for them. The menus of these luncheons
consisted chiefly of buffalo sausage, bacon, venison, coffee and canned
fruits. He carried the sausage in huge ten-gallon camp kettles.
The palace coaches that cross the old trail today pulled by the
smoke-choked engines of the A.T. & Santa Fe R.R. carry no provision
for yelling Comanches, Cheyennes, Arapahoes, etc. They lose no time
treating and trading with the Indians, and are never out of sight of the
miraculous changes exhibited by the advanced hand of civilization.

CHAPTER I.
In 1861 He Starts as Mail Driver.
In the spring of 1861 I went home to Burlingame, Kansas, and went to
work on the farm of O.J. Niles. I had just turned the corner of
twenty-one summers, and I felt that life should have a "turning point"
somewhere, so I took down with the ague. This very ague chanced to
be the "turning point" I was looking for and is herewith related.
Mr. Veil of the firm of Barnum, Veil & Vickeroy, who had the mail
contract from Kansas City, Missouri, to Santa Fe, New Mexico,
stopped over at Burlingame, Kansas, and there met Mr. Niles, the man
for whom I was working. Mr. Veil told Mr. Niles that he wanted a
farmer boy to drive on the Long Route because the stage drivers he had
were cowards and not satisfactory. Niles told him that he had a farm
hand, but, he added, "he won't go, because he has the ague." "Oh,
well," Mr. Veil replied, "that's no matter, I know how to cure him; I'll
tell him how to cure himself." So they sent for me, and Veil told me
how to get rid of the ague. He said, "you dig a ditch in the ground a
foot deep, and strip off your clothing and bury yourself, leaving only
your head uncovered, and sleep all night in the Mother Earth." I did it. I
found the earth perfectly dry and warm. I had not much more than
engulfed myself when the influences of the dry soil began to draw all
the poison out of my body, and I had, as I most firmly believe, the most
peaceful and delightful slumber I had ever experienced since infancy.
From that day until the present time I have never had another chill. I
gained 40 pounds of flesh in the next three months. I have known
consumption to be cured with the same "ague cure" on the plains.
The distance from Kansas City to Fort Larned, Kansas, is three hundred
miles. The distance from Fort Larned to Fort Lyon, New Mexico, is
two hundred and forty miles, and from Fort Lyon to Fort Union it is
one hundred and eighty miles, from Fort Union to Santa Fe it is one
hundred and eighty miles, making nine hundred miles for the entire
trip.

The drive from Fort Larned, Kansas, to Fort Lyon, Colorado, was
known as the Long Route, being 240 miles, with no stations between;
but across that treacherous plain of the Santa Fe Trail I made the trip
sixty-five times in four years, driving one set of mules the entire
distance, camping out and sleeping on the ground.
The trips were made with five mules to each coach, and we took two
mules with us to supply the place of any mule that happened to get sick.
Sometimes, strange to note, going on the down grade from Fort Lyon to
Fort Larned we would have a sick mule, but this never occurred on the
up-grade to Fort Lyon. When a mule was sick we left it at Little Coon
or Big Coon Creek. Little Coon Creek is forty miles from Fort Larned.
When Fort Larned was my headquarters I always went after my sick
mules, if I had any, the next day and brought them in. Fort Larned was
the regular built fort with a thousand soldiers, a settlers' store, and the
Stage Company's station with its large corral of mules and horses; it
was the headquarters of the Long Route to furnish the whole route to
Santa Fe. If the sick mules happened to be at Little Coon Creek, the
round trip would be eighty miles, and it would sometimes take me and
my little race pony several days to make the trip, owing of course to the
condition of the sick mule and its ability to travel. Camping out on
these trips, I used my saddle for a pillow while my spread upon the
ground served as my bed. I would tie the lariat to the saddle so the pony
would graze and not get too far away from our "stomping ground." If
the wolves came around, which they often did, the pony would come