Red Plume — page 32: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

82 RED PLUME. CHAPTER ao AN ORIGINAL CHARACTER, ; THERE was a gay and glorious time in the camp of Captain Steele, during the day on which his son, Frank, started on the scouting expedition which ultimately brought him within the Blackfeet village as a prisoner. A large band of. friendly Indians, of the Néz Percé, or Pierced Nose tribe, with their wives and children, had recently encamped in the neighbor- hood, and, as they still retained a quantity of their last sea- son’s peltries, and promised to be useful during the ensuing campaign, the captain hoped to drive a profitable trade with them. They were quiet, peaceable, well-meaning Indians, whose chief faults-were their great curiosity, and their pro- pensity to beg. Captain Bend ened Steele was a. Missourian, ‘about: fifty years of age, strong, healthy and good-natured. He had been in the fur-trading business for many years, and had accumulated quite a fortune, but he still cluag to it, from love of the excitement and adventure which it afforded. His most prominent trait was, an overpowering love for ‘his son, Frank, whom he had brought up to the same busirfess, and who took to it, the cap- tain said, as naturally as a Déavor takes to water. | ) Oagtain Steele had been still more overjoyed, that morning, by the arrival of a party of free trappers, who came to the camp riding at full speed, firing their guns, yelling and whoop- ing, and acting as much like wild Indians as it was possible for white men to act. They were a strange and motley crew, and made even Cap- tain Steele and his experienced hunters, half-breeds and Dela- wares, open their eyes to the widest extent. If he could se- cure the services of these roving blades during the ensuing season, the captain felt that he would have a great advantage over all other trading competitors ; therefore, he used his utmost endeavors to propitiate them and keep them at hiscamp. They were real gamecocks of the wilderness, who all thought comicbooks.conn