As soon as the Indian was sufficiently distant, the Mexican
vaulted upon the mare, and apostrophized the Indian:--
"You fool of a Red-skin, not cunning enough for a Mexican: you refused
my gold; now I have the mare for nothing, and I will make the trappers
laugh when I tell them how easily I have outwitted a Shoshone."
The Indian looked at the Mexican for a few moments in silence, for his
heart was big, and the shameful treachery wounded him to the very core.
At last, he spoke:--
"Pale-face," said he, "for the sake of others, I may not kill thee. Keep
the mare, since thou art dishonest enough to steal the only property of
a poor man; keep her, but never say a work how thou earnest by her, lest
hereafter a Shoshone, having learned distrust, should not hearken to the
voice of grief and woe. Away, away with her! let me never see her again,
or in an evil hour the desire of vengeance may make a bad man of me."
The Mexican was wild, inconsiderate, and not over-scrupulous, but not
without feeling: he dismounted from the horse, and putting the bridle in
the hand of the Shoshone, "Brother," said he, "I have done wrong, pardon
me! from an Indian I learn virtue, and for the future, when I would
commit any deed of injustice, I will think of thee."
Two Apaches loved the same girl; one was a great chief, the other a
young warrior, who had entered the war-path but a short time.
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