Beadle's New York Dime Library No. 191

# Catalog Note

The Terrible Tonkaway: Old Rocky and His Pards is a frontier adventure by "Buckskin Sam" (Major Sam S. Hall), serialized in this 1882 issue. The narrative follows Shooting Star, a young Texas scout, who encounters Rattlesnake, a Native American tracker, near the Bandera Hills. Rattlesnake brings news of Apache war parties threatening settlers and delivers a lock of golden hair from a woman—Laura—whom Shooting Star believed lost. The discovery stirs profound emotion; Shooting Star reveals Laura was to be his wife before circumstances drove him to the frontier. Rattlesnake warns the Apache will soon cross the Medina River and expresses concern that Shooting Star will abandon frontier life for civilization. The chapter concludes with the arrival of "Old Rocky" (James Young), a celebrated regional scout whose interruption nearly provokes gunfire. The tale mixes romantic melodrama with frontier action and Native American characters rendered in period dialect.